Middle Eastern Fusions : Iraq

Vice Films/Filmfreak Distr. Eddy Moretti & Suroosh Alvi : Heavy Metal In Bagdad (IRQ,2008)****'

The makers followed for three years the only heavy metal band from Iraq that was able to get a real band status with at least some live gigs. Through the time we go deeper and deeper into their experiences in the post-war zone of Bagdad. All this is inflicted with communal and a personalised tragic reality with which we are faced much more directly and with a realistic context compared to almost any journalist view on how Iraq faces it’s present today. They seem to live in a sort of free zone that looks like a huge prison with no true rules and where paranoia and fear, gunshots and bombing are daily backgrounds, as if escaped from a playstation game that appears in the background. The story thoroughly gets sadder with each moment, even more so in the context where they had become refugees in Syria hoping to search for a better life and with music as their entity, while parts of their families stayed home in the hopeless zone full of rules, regulations and death. It is as if some reality never escapes their experiences. We are also faced that much with the reality of refugees and with how they feel that the makers succeed to make us feel part of all of it and understand how they feel.

In that way it is understandable how the documentary (on DVD with Dutch subtitles here) received enough attention so that the makers could raise enough money to get the band out of the country. This resulted in the making of a second documentary, “Heavy Metal In Istanbul”, as a second part, in a comparable style, and which starts much more hopeful, as a second chapter for a hopeful future. The band received press attention, but it was also because the idea looked attractive. In the end this didn’t bring them much further into any new place to start. We’re faced with the reality how Iraqi refugees are treated not for who they are but only through their origin and passports. Not in any of the Middle Eastern or not even Turkish countries they are allowed to stay long or take an official job, except that there exists at least some possibilities to survive for a short time. Everybody in the end is forced to go back and forced to face the hopelessness of the ruins of Bagdad.

In the first movie we experienced how heavy metal was the expression of frustration, anger but also with an image of what actually was their real reality world, while being expressed from a feeling and wish for freedom of expression, thoroughly it becomes all they have built up and can be taken with them everywhere, as their tool, while their true dream in the end remains their starting point of relatives and good times once experienced, and lost in Bagdad.

This is a moving documentary which is able to bring lots of consciousness around the matter. Music is just a part of it like being part of a quest for a creative salvation, and for a true and constructive identity in this world.

I have heard many of the Iran metal bands, from Iraqi’s neighbouring country. Also there, some religious and behaviour limitations and governmental rules of oppressions bring some frustrations because people want to be given the chance to channel all their energy, naturally, with full expression and power. In their heart all of these musicians remain really good people.

I was told the BBC resumed both documentaries and added a little bit more after story. One of the members seems to have received a visa to the US, but felt separate from the others. Most of them received refugee permission except one. They weren’t happy because in the end their friendship was all they had and the hope for change with each step still didn’t seem to bring them much further.

Homepage : http://www.heavymetalinbaghdad.com/

Trailer : http://www.youtube.com/...

& http://www.vbs.tv/vice-films/heavy-metal-in-baghdad/home.html

Distribution : http://www.filmfreaks.nl/ with movie : http://www.filmfreaks.nl/filmdetail.asp?id=786

Articles : http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2008/sep/11/heavymetal.inbagdad & http://www.nypost.com/seven/05232008/entertainment/movies/heavy_metal_in_baghdad_112098.htm

& http://movies.nytimes.com/2008/05/23/movies/23meta.html

& http://worldfilm.about.com/od/documentaryfilms/fr/heavymetal.htm

& http://www.roadrunnerrecords.com/blabbermouth.net/news.aspx?mode=Article&newsitemID=81723

German review : http://www.spiegel.de/kultur/kino/0,1518,534309,00.html

Sublime Frequencies V.A. : Choubi Choubi ! -folk and pop sounds from Iraq-(IRQ,'70's->2002)***°

Seeing and hearing this great compilation compiled by Mark Gergis, with the help of many people, I remember that I almost had purchased the 70’s socialist folkrock LP from Ja’afar Hassan on ebay once but only at the last hour someone else put in a higher bid which was unnoticed by me. Luckily there are three tracks from this album included. Most other tracks are from the Saddam Hussein regime period, a period which seemed to have encouraged the expression of music. Most of the recordings collected here come from LP’s and tapes found in Syria, Europe and Iraqi neighbourhoods in some parts of the US. ‘Choubi’ is a festive driving rhythmic style with hypnotic effect. Other Iraqi styles included are debka, another rhythmic dance style, basta, bezikh, hecha and mawal, which includes a vocal improvisation. Typical for Iraq are crispy rapid fire-machine-gun like rhythms produced by the ‘khishba’. Recordings in general were originally especially made to keep the artist’s name alive for obtaining new paid gigs (at night clubs, parties, in restaurants, ..), and were copied over all the area. All listed examples are from slightly to truly hypnotic (some more than others). I can imagine this is just a fragment of what musically is and was possible. I like especially the weird unknown hecha track (6), and of course the Ja’afar Hassan tracks, from the LP which became known amongst collectors for some reasons, but most tracks (for me especially the first 2/3rd of the compilation) are true winners to some degree within a certain tradition.

Audio : Ja'afar Hassan : "They Taught Me", Unknown : "Ahl Al Aqil", (or here), Bawin : "Ya Binaya Goumi", Unknown Artist : "Yumma, Al Hilou" (Mother, Here's My Beauty)

Sadun Jabir : "Ashhad Biannak Hilou", Unknown Aritst : "Yumma, Al Hilou"

Info : http://www.sublimefrequencies.com/item.asp?...

Other review : http://www.dustedmagazine.com/reviews/2465

& (with 3 more audio tracks) http://www.boomkat.com/item.cfm?id=19042

(-the "Thaught me" track is the Ja'Afar track-)

More info on Hassan : http://radiodiffusion.wordpress.com/category/iraq/

Private reissueRevival (IRQ/US, 1979)***°

Forced exposure : "Bootleg reissue of an unknown and theoretically privately released psych-prog album from 1979. Led by a Iranian guy on guitar & effects, this was recorded & released in the USA, but it says "Printed in Iran" for good measure. The line up is guitar, bass, drums & flute, and a number of styles are touched upon with drippingly tranced Middle Eastern instrumental atmospherics. At its peak this grazes upon Sun City Girls-like torches of improv ecstasy; other parts rely on a lot of flute, in almost Yatha Sidhra fashion."

Found somewhere else :

The story is that Al Basim was killed in Iran for working with Jewish musicans on this lp.*...

From http://www.progressive-newsletter.de/index.htm :

"Mit "La, la, la" beginnt dieses Epos, doch das war es dann schon an einfachem Liedgut. Revival, das war eine englische Prog Rock Formation (John Starrett - Bass, Phil Carter - Drums und David Reskin - Flöte) um den iranischen Gitarristen Al Basim. Bei der 1979 in einem amerikanischen Studio aufgenommenen und im Iran gepressten LIP soll es sich angeblich um eines der rarsten Teile aller Zeiten handeln. Das CD Reissue ist entweder (wieder in den U.S.A.) vom Master oder über ein digitales Equipment produziert. Nähere Angaben fehlen, wahrscheinlich um das Leben des heutigen Produzenten zu schützen, denn die Ayatollahs haben diese CD bestimmt schon auf der schwarzen Liste, da sie mit Sicherheit nicht in das heutige Weltbild des Iran passt. Übrigens auch nicht in das damalige, denn wie wir kurz vor Redaktionsschluss noch erfahren haben, waren die anderen Bandmitglieder Juden. Als Al 1979 in den Iran zurückkehrte, fanden die werten Ayatollahs heraus, dass er ein Rock Album mit Juden aufgenommen hatte. Er wurde als Verräter festgenommen und exekutiert! Doch nun zurück zur Musik. Geboten wird 70er Prog Rock mit viel Gitarre und Flöte, sowie leicht arabischen Folk-Einfluss. Hervorzuheben ist ein ruhiges Stück, auf dem sich die Gitarre und Flöte ein herrliches Soloduett geben. Der Schlusstrack bringt dann noch etwas Free Jazz mit Unterstützung eines Saxophons. Alles in allem ein Werk für alle Sammler aus den 70ern, jedoch überhaupt nichts für Neo Proggies." Thomas Jörger

Rough translation of this German text :

Revival, was an English Progrock formation (John Starrett -Bass, Phil Carter - Drums und David Reskin - flute) around the Persian guitarist Al Basim. As being recorded in an Amercan studio around 1979, and being pressed in Iran, it seems at first one of the strangest artifacts ever. The CD is reissued in US again, taken from master, and produced digitally. There are no details about the production lead from now, because the Ayatollas have this CD perhaps already on their blacklist because for sure it will not fit with the vision they want to present in Iran today. Besides it didn't fit at those days either. Because when Al returned in 1979 to Iran, the Ayatollas of those days found out he had recorded a rock album with Jews. He was sentenced as a traitor...

About the style it says .."it's 70's progrock with lots of guitars, flute with only slight Arabic folk influence. In general it's quiet music with wonderful flute/guitar communication. Closing track is more free jazz with additional sax. A work recommended to all collectors of 70's stuff, but not at all to neo-proggies."

Except for the last track the album is comparable in mediative mood / concept with the Yatha Siddra's Meditation Mass. The last track is more free jazz inspired, loosing it structure a bit at the end. Also two other tracks are more progressive with a free jazz fusion touch. Very good.

"A nice album with a sad story. Leader/guitarist Al Basim recorded this nice instrumental quartet album of flute-led progressive rock (also appearing are bass & drums) with unique middle-Eastern touches in the USA where it was pressed in an edition of 500. A few were sold here, but he returned home to his native Iran with the bulk of the copies.The fact that he had recorded his album in the US - the land of 'great Satan' - with a Jewish musican, led to his arrest & eventually his execution. This is absolutely a true story. In its original lp form, this is one of the rarest albums on the planet." Steve (Cuneiform Rec.)

* BUT !!! This whole story does not seem to be true at all ??? Al Bachim is live and well. And he's from Iraq, not from Iran. Was this story made up to sell better ? Really a terrible shame then !!! Why should people make up such a story which inflicts with politics as if it's anti-propaganda ? I prefer to see the truth like it is, whatever it is, with its advantages and disadvantages... Al Basim still has copies of his album and likes an official reissue of the album, with the inclusion of a part 2 which he developped during the years.

Homepage : http://www.basimmusic.com/

Audio : http://assocratere.free.fr/al_basim.htm