People & Stories Worth Knowing
The K ·
Courtesy of the wonderful Beirut Jam Sessions
In one ultimate mash-up We Were Evergreen & Ramly were sitting by the sea at Lazy B when they decided to mash-up one of Ramly's songs 'The Cold' with We Were Evergreen's rendition of Jungle Book's most famous song 'Be Like You'.
More from We Were Evergreen: wewereevergreen.com
More from Elie Ramly: Soundcloud - YouTube - Facebook
The K ·
Follow Sultan Al Qassemi over on Soundcloud and Twitter
The K ·
This is a Samri song "Ya Hala Belli" sung at the Bin Hussein Diwaniya in Kuwait a well known and respected space for music. (song starts 42 seconds into the video)
Feel like singing along? Here are the lyrics in Arabic
What is Samri? A little bit about it in Performing the Past: Sea Music in the Arab Gulf States By Laith Ulaby
Here is the older version recorded by Aisha AlMarta
The K ·
@aljisrmusic hopes to be a 'bridge (Jisr) between music and comedy'. Their first music video uses humor to call attention to the overworked, underpaid and disrespected migrant worker who sings that he isn't afraid of his Kafil/sponsor.
“You think I’m scared?
I can see everything that you are up to”
The singers turn the usually insulting stereotypical portrayal of migrants on its head as they sing in the broken Arabic that is usually used to mock them on popular television. This time it is done as an act of defiance, as they hilariously blend the rap genre with local flair to lace the serious topic with enough tongue-in-cheek to get it passed around on everyone's social node.
Follow @aljisrmusic
Anti-sponsorship system video goes viral
Listen to them mentioned on BBC World Service: Outside Source (at 38.17 mins)