May 8, 2008
Austinist Show Preview: 60 Years @ Scoot Inn
If Al-Farra’s story is any indication, his concert tonight with fellow Palestinian group DAM has the sort of context, history, and implications that you won’t see for quite some time, rap show or otherwise.
But you shouldn’t go to Scoot Inn tonight just because of the world these artists live in or Israel’s fast-approaching 60-year anniversary or Al-Farra’s forced status as an ex-pat. You should go because DAM and PR choose to respond to all of this through rap.
Hip-hop has always sought to serve and represent the communities in which it finds itself – one hears this in everything from Rick Ross to Public Enemy. As with the latter, this inevitable tie to community has at times required the music to rise to a different level, to be a pedestal or a banner or a thousand-person rally. Tonight, it could be all three for DAM and Mohammed Al-Farra. And like Public Enemy, both acts are agile and clever and talented enough that, once you hear them, the novelty fades and their music becomes, simply, rap.
[DAM's Myspace]
[PR's Myspace]
[Mohammed Al-Farra's Myspace]
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It's a shame that a conflict as deeply raging as the Israeli-Arab situation in the Middle East is relegated to be viewed under black-and-white measures. But, then again, I expect nothing better from a website like Austinist, where good music is considered what the editor likes, and where local politics is often treated like a WWF shouting match.
If anyone is really interested in studying the basic aspects of the Middle East situation, that person shouldn't be surprised to learn that what they've been told their whole lives, may not in fact be true; and that the real concessions towards peace are going to be determined by both sides in order to find a greater good for all.
Yes, I celebrate Israel's 60 years of existence, and I feel bad for those people who maintain "celebrating" the Nakba. But I also happen to know that the world is not necessarily the cleanest, sweetest place in the Universe. People do blow themselves up with rat poison tipped nails for political purposes, and that those situations end up being responded to in terms of security.