Dubai rocker Bojan Preradovic calls friends for solo album

EYE frontman Bojan Preradovic reveals plans for ambitious solo project Saytrip, a collection of collaborations with regional names including Pindoll's Miran Gurunian, Jay Wud, SimpleXity frontman Omar El Deeb and Gaya.

Bojan Preradovic of Empty Yard Experiment will perform at The Address hotel in Dubai Marina on Friday. Photo by Farhad Berahman

Bojan Preradovic is a busy man.

The musician is at the heart of two of the UAE’s biggest bands. He’s best known as the lead singer of leading metal experimentalists Empty Yard Experiment (EYE) and guitarist for rocker Jay Wud. The 33-year-old Serbian talent’s next musical foray is a solo album.

Entitled Saytrip, the record is conceived as a series of collaborations with musical mates from across the region. Tracks from the project will be previewed for the first time this weekend, at what's being billed as an EYE acoustic set (in reality it's just Preradovic and guitarist Mehdi Gorjestani) for The Other Side, hosted at Dubai's And Lounge on Friday, September 25.

Several of the record’s key collaborators are set to join the duo onstage: Dubai-based song­writers Gaya and Reiner Erlings, bandleader Wud, and Jordanian singer-songwriter and event headliner Hana ­Malhas.

“When you already have a meaningful relationship with another musician, the music that comes out is so much more striking,” says Preradovic.

“I want every song to have a different kind of character. I want people who like electronic music, rock music, singer- songwriters, the radio, whatever, to find something on it.”

Saytrip gathers material ­Preradovic has written over the past decade. He says it exhibits a distinct sound and more ­individual approach than his work with EYE.

“The songs are very ­personal. The concept, musically, is how this region, and the relationships I’ve made, have affected me,” he adds. “A tribute to the Middle East – what ­Beirut means to me, what Dubai means to me.”

While we can expect a first ­single before the year is out, with the full album to follow early next year, EYE fans needn't worry. The singer says that after a slow summer, the quintet are reconvening to work on a new album, to follow last year's ­excellently received Kallisti.

“EYE is totally different to this, but I can jump from one to ­another,” says Preradovic. “I just want to produce as much music as I can.”

• Preradovic will perform an acoustic set with EYE on Friday, September 25 from 9pm at And Lounge, The ­Address Marina Mall, Dubai. Also performing at The Other Side is Hana Malhas and the Overthinkers and Gaya. Tickets, Dh75, from www.platinumlist.ae