Rock On!

mochadad — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 13:30:28 -0600

Kudos to these ladies for stepping outside cutlrally acceptable boundaries and doing something they believe in.

Mocha Dad

www.mochadad.com

Saudi All-Female Rock Band a Hit on MySpace

lainad — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 06:14:28 -0600

The New York Times recently published a story of an all-female band from Saudi Arabia and people went nuts. (Well, bloggers showed plenty o' link-love to the NYT but many didn't provide any commentary about the news item.)

Some say that it is an indication that the times are changing in the Middle East - Saudi women are finally breaking the 'glass ceiling' that kept them from being regarded as equals to Saudi men. Some rejoice in the fact that the Accolade, the quartet of female university students, are a symbol that the new generation of Saudi women will fight for their right to be heard.

Honestly? It's too early to tell. Their first track, "Pinnocio" is a run-of-the-mill standard rock track that if put up to today's standards - well, okay, that's not a great analogy since most mainstream music is crap - the band would probably do alright. It's not the quality of the music that is really the object of obsession, it's the fact that stereotypically oppressed young women are finding out what millions of people have already discovered - rock 'n roll symbolizes freedom of expression.

But this country’s harsh code of public morals has slowly thawed, especially in Jidda, by far the kingdom’s most cosmopolitan city. A decade ago the cane-wielding religious police terrorized women who were not dressed according to their standards. Young men with long hair were sometimes bundled off to police stations to have their heads shaved, or worse.

Today, there is a growing rock scene with dozens of bands, some of them even selling tickets to their performances. Hip-hop is also popular. The religious police — strictly speaking, the Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice — have largely retreated from the streets of Jidda and are somewhat less aggressive even in the kingdom’s desert heartland.

Others (sorry, not going to provide links) have questioned the legitimacy and relevance of this band. The band's MySpace page has only one track yet has over 177,000 page views since its inception on November 11th, probably because of the NYT piece. People, like myself, are curious about who they are and what they plan to do next. But I can't help but be cynical. are they going to be lauded because of their symbolism, like Eminem, whom honestly, I couldn't figure out why he was popular because I thought his production (I.e. music) was terrible? Will their gender and their homeland being known as one where the women are oppressed be used as a marketing tool? From a commenter on Metafilter:

Sounds good. I hope they succeed in getting some paid concerts put on.
Was interested to learn that 60% of the country's population is under 25 years of age. As they age they'll move into positions of authority in the country and be able to make the changes they want. It'll be interesting to see how that works out. I hope they chart a new course from what they've grown up with, but I bet they won't just copy western-style politics and democracy either.

Are these young women purposely marketing themselves on that fact? And will listeners pay more attention to the novelty of it all and ignore the quality of the music? Does it matter that these women have had the opportunity to attend university and would we even be hearing about them is they were uneducated and poverty-stricken? It's all too soon to tell. The production of their one and only single is suspiciously very professional - too professional to have been recorded in someone's bedroom or garage. However, embracing Western - oriented genres of music is nothing new, and because of Saudi Arabia's growing population, is not necessarily a foreign concept.

I'm not trying to be trite about Saudi Arabia and the real oppression that women face there. My cousin lived there for over a decade, working in an American hospital. He told me absolute horror stories about how the women - not only Saudi women but Filipinas who had moved there to work in the hospitals or as domestic workers - were treated. Filipinas, he said, had it even worse than Saudi women, treated like they were servants, taking away jobs from other 'better suited' - whatever that means - people. American and Canadian women seemed to be exempt from scorn, as long as they kept their hair covered in public. He saw women being stoned, being beaten in the middle of the streets just for talking to a Saudi man that was not their husband or their employer. There were Canadians, Europeans and Americans there whom as far as I know, did nothing to help these women, even though realistically, I know that because of Saudi law it is not as easy as that. But isn't the Bush family palsy-walsy with the Saudi elite?

While it is certainly historic that these four young women decided not only to make music but to publicly broadcast it and despite their refusal for photographs and last names could be essentially be putting their lives on the line, lets celebrate that women are rocking, and not just oppressed Saudi women. I say that because it would seem as though we were a bunch of hypocrites if we did.

If you are interested in global rock culture, please check out (Canuck) Sam Dunn's awesome new documentary Global Metal (now available on DVD) where he looks at the metal scenes in Asia, South America,Indonesia and Iran. There is also Heavy Metal In Baghdad, another recent doc I have previously written about on Blogher.

Happy Thanksgiving to my American peeps!

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Rock On!

Saudi All-Female Rock Band a Hit on MySpace