Urvah Khan is a Canadian-Pakistani rapper, rocker, curator, cultural provocateur and self-described professional shit disturber whose work exists at the intersection of music, migration, faith, identity and resistance.

Born in Karachi, raised in Abu Dhabi, and forged on the streets of Toronto’s Malvern neighbourhood, Khan has spent nearly two decades refusing to fit neatly into any one genre, culture, or community. From homelessness to international stages, from Islam to Christianity and the reclamation of the Azaan, her life has been a collision of worlds that were never supposed to coexist.

Rather than choosing between them, she built something of her own.

Khan created Scrap, a collision of rap, punk, rock, South Asian, and world sounds. More than a musical genre, Scrap became a philosophy: building something powerful from what the world discards.

With six musical releases, more than 30 independently produced music videos, and a career that includes opening for Canadian artists Bif Naked, Danny Fernandes, Saukrates, and Choclair, Khan has established a career spanning Canadian stages and Pakistan’s underground music scene. Her work has attracted recognition from BBC, CBC, VICE, SOCAN, and international media.

In 2016, she formed The Scrap Army in Pakistan, emerging as a pioneering female voice in the country’s rap and punk landscape.

But Khan’s ambitions were never limited to the microphone.

In 2019, she founded ScrapFest in Canada, bringing the festival to Pakistan in 2021 and creating a platform for underground, LGBTQI+, and marginalized performers.

In 2023, Pakistani authorities prevented two planned ScrapFest events from proceeding: one in a public setting in Karachi following proceedings in the Sindh High Court, and another at a private venue in Lahore through action by the Deputy Commissioner. Rather than abandon the artists, Khan organized alternative underground performances, compensated the performers, and documented their work.

First they took away the public stage. Then the private one. She kept building stages anyway.

In 2020, Khan founded Muslim Pride, a cultural and performance platform celebrating queer and trans Muslim artists. What began in Toronto expanded to New York City in 2025, with events at the historic Stonewall Inn and NYC LGBT Center. Having featured more than 100 artists, Muslim Pride continues to create opportunities for visibility, expression, and belonging, with plans to expand into Washington, D.C., in 2027.

What began as one woman’s search for somewhere to belong has become a career dedicated to creating spaces where others can belong, too.

Musician became bandleader. Bandleader became curator. Curator became community builder.

At the centre of it all is a word Khan created for her music:

It began as a sound. It became a philosophy. 

Taking what the world discards: people, voices, and ideas, and bringing them together to create something beautiful, powerful, and impossible to ignore.