ARY Musik is a Pakistani TV channel under the ARY umbrella that runs youth-centric entertainment programming with a special focus on – as the name makes clear – music. Musik is part of the crowd of so-called ‘youth’ channels that sprang up to try and capture the attention and eyeballs of the ever so fickle youth audience. Ostensibly, Musik is also the ‘really’ surviving member of this crowd, what with the promising Aag spun into the soap-playing Geo Kahani, PlayTV dead in the water, and Indus Music back to being a dated Indus Music as its franchise agreement with MTV expired.

Recently, Musik launched a new on-air look and broadcast branding. This new, simple look replaces the whimsical idents that played on Musik from 2012. Let’s have a look at the older idents to get a sense of context.

With a very fun and whimsical feel that is brought to life with vibrant visuals and superb animation, the idents captured the raw fun vibe that the channel wanted to portray to the audience. This desi and genuine approach to on-air branding is what sets Musik apart from the otherwise unimaginative branding fare that Pakistani channels usually churn out.

With such a high bar set already, Musik had a real challenge in trying to match and top the quality of its previous branding. Arguably, the old idents could keep running looking fresh and fun for another season quite easily. But it’s great that Musik decided to put extra effort into its look and branding.

The new look is quite a departure from the old one as it completely eschews all but the essential. This approach is drastically simple which much in line with the general direction visual design has been taking lately. Ample use of clean typography and fresh, vibrant colors lend a very upbeat feel to the channel. The focus on simplicity is not just an aesthetic choice. It is also a very practical decision that highlights the content without calling too much attention to itself.

All in all, it is win and a inspiring example of how local creatives can produce international quality work.

Project Credits: Fayaz Gull Muhammad (Assistant VP, Creative) & ARY Musik Creative Team – with special thanks to Rauf Khalid & Danish Khawaja.