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| Syria-Lebanon-Iran |
| Lebanon rappers give Christian message a hip-hop twist |
| 2008-02-03 |
| With their baggy jeans, baseball caps and earrings, Lebanon's new rap music stars could almost be mistaken for their US urban ghetto counterparts, except that the lyrics tell a Christian story. In Lebanon -- a country which does not tolerate religious provocation -- the group "Militia", formed by two young Christians, treads a fine line by rapping and dancing about the glory of God. "From the bowels of hell, the Lord crossed the darkness," thunder the lyrics of the two-man band, which claims to be the first to spread the Christian message through the medium of Arabic hip-hop. Charles Makriss, 27, and Marun Adolph, 23, have released their first album after winning over a sceptical public. "We are the first to sing Christian hip-hop in Arabic. In the beginning when we started holding concerts with these types of songs, many people, particularly the older generation, were very hostile. It was a shock," writer and breakdance choreographer Makriss said. "Then one day, we were singing at a gig close to a church and I saw a priest clapping really enthusiastically," said the musician, who saw this as a sign the group's message was getting through. Hip-hop is not new to the Arab world. From Morocco to the Palestinian territories, dozens of Arabic rap groups have sprung up over the past few years. But religious hip-hop is less well known. "Here, in the Middle East, people frown on the idea of singing songs involving sacred texts," said Marun. |
| Posted by:ryuge |
| #4 Er... Nightwish is Finnish, not Canadian. :-) |
| Posted by: Jeff 2008-02-03 23:49 |
| #3 Frankly, no, Frank. |
| Posted by: twobyfour 2008-02-03 22:13 |
| #2 Passion Play? I have the Jethro Tull version. Not the same, I take it? |
| Posted by: Frank G 2008-02-03 20:57 |
| #1 Good for them! An interesting little story. I was introduced to a canadian band called Nightwish by an online forum friend. She had converted other forum members to the band, but felt especially proud of winning me over since I was seen as one of the few "cool and sane" members of the older generation. It was not a hard sell: they have a unique style they call operatic rock, and they do borrow heavily from classical operatic sources and motifs. Several years ago, she spoke of a new album from Nightwish, but was very uncooperative in telling me what the title was, and indicated that it would NOT be released abroad. Very strange for an evangelistic enthusiast of the band. Well, I was looking for new CDs for Christmas last year at amazon, and they helpfully pointed out that new CD: "Dark Passion Play". Took me aback a bit, and I was a bit hesitant, but went ahead and ordered it. Didn't listen to it for a while, kinda dreading what I would hear given the title. Foolish me: it was not about THE Passion of Christ, but the personal "passion" every new convert to Christianity has to go through when they are first converted. The CD does have some shovel-songs on it unrelated to the core theme, but the ones related to the theme of a "personal passion play" are very obvious, even though the doctrinal references are somewhat encoded. But they are definitely personal. The most personal piece is "Master Passion Greed", in which the devil urges the main character to give in to sexual temptation. The piece is pounding, insistent, repetetive, and quite vulgar in places. Extremely ugly and not pleasant listening to. However, if you've ever actually tried to fight sexual temptation, once you listened to the piece, you'd point to it, nod knowingly, and say, "YES! That is EXACTLY how bad it is when you're fighting it!" In short, it sounds as if some key members had actually come to Christ, dug into the Bible, and had translated their experience into their own music and style. I understood why my on-line friend was a bit hesitant talking about it, As far as I am concerned, there are five rules to witnessing: Know the Truth. Live the Truth, Tell the Truth (no kitman). Tell it with passion, and tell it in love. Everything else is mere tactics. |
| Posted by: Ptah 2008-02-03 20:30 |