The Ghiwane aftermath haze

Quick notes from transient thoughts.
Such a great memorable evening! -sigh-, why the fun does not last till dawn.

Polarisation was my cue though, as I funnily experienced being the only young white person in the audience especially for this gig, with a few sparse middleaged Dutch folks loafing around amongst the huddled mass of Moroccans. I got puzzled looks from many, interested gazes from others. The 3 girls at the merchandise stand were genuinely sweet to me when I bought a few Nass albums (including their just-released-wet-from-press Ennehla Chama album and an older La Legende volume, yay!) They didn't know much about Nass other than *they're great, I guess* and were baffled with my explanation of my liking of the band into a mouthwatering rendition. Pfff, nerdism knows no break, sees wall nor obstacle.

Despite I expected a lot of middleaged fans of Nass el Ghiwane, it were nearly all youngsters of my age or even younger, 2nd & 3rd generation Dutch-Moroccans, who decided the audience demography. I asked my Moroccan colleague earlier today (You went to see Nass el Ghiwane?) why this was the case and basicly it came down to the fact that the middleaged Moroccans just do not run out for concerts, by old fashioned principle. Aside from that, Ismael explained that this target group is very unlikely to be reached through flyers or any other means of promotion, the community not endorsing a full view into cultural activities either. Sure their kids wouldn't tell mom and pops about the idols from their youth playing town, hell no, to be sure they have the space and freedom for themselves.

Thus so the dancefloor was controlled by the youths. To be an observing spectator was never easier whether I wanted it or not. There was a clear divide; groups of girls dancing in circles, seperated from the guys who danced in their own circles, all too shy to make direct contact except through peeks. Or even eyeing each other from a safe distance on the fringes of the pit. This charming and reserved ethic was interesting to witness, since on a normal dutch disco dancefloor both sexes mingle far more easily with each other or the Dutch.

Ok, enough of observant chitchat. What about the magic?

Support act Orchestra Al-Atlal gave a hipshakingly energetic performance, using double violins as the instigators while keyboards turned it into a Maghreb disco frenzy with people hustling for armlength spots. As a collective they sticked and were way better than the following famous acts of croonerstyled singers Abdelmoula and Jedwane. Sure, the slick suits and sugarsmoothed looks logically came with their on-stage appearance, but it was kinda bleak and sounded like any ordinary Chaabi to be heard blaring in your local Northern African music shop. I guess the recognition of quality famed disco folk is a missing link in my genes.
Finally Nass el Ghiwane came on and played their whole set acoustic. I especially got tight goosebumps on moments when Hamid Batma on sentir (a sort of lute) and Allal Yaala on snitra (a fretless banjo) did dual improvisations, where the heavy sound of the sentir pounced as a heartthrob while the snitra picked intricate melodies. I found myself swaying into a state of soft trance as the music got more grip on me, the longer a song lasted which could go on up to 15 minutes per composition. It's a comfort to know that earnest tribalism can still salvage the body and mind in a pure, sincere way, for it may not be taken out of context and repackaged as a rubbery bubblegum dream for the sake of product placement. Nope, it was savgely raw and real.

Oh yup, I promised some personal insight bits about Nass from Jace's unmissable Mudd Up! blog; see here, here, and here......

Mucho thanks to Joost for covering my opening shift at the cafe, so I could catch all of Nas el Ghiwane's magical set! :)

Spot the Ghiwane!

Today, in a few hours, the obscurely famed moroccan band Nass El Ghiwane plays Utrecht!....very much out of the blue.

Yesterday I visited the local indie shop after a spell of not setting foot in it at all...quickly browsed their long list of upcoming gigs and somehow my eye fell on the name Nass el Chiwane, misspelled by one letter, and indicating a next day live show. -Awe!- Could it be? I've to work my voluntary shift tonight at the cafe, so I was nearly cursing myself for missing them. But nope! Sweet luck has destined it to be an afternoon concert.

I reckon the afternoon was chosen to draw the older immigrant crowd to the gig at a reasonable hour. They're playing together with Jedwane, who is supposed to be the king of the Chaabi music, which is an Arabic & Berber style from Morocco linked to the Algerian Raï style. *Lila Maghrebia* is the name given to this varied Moroccan afternoon. I like it when such afternoons happen; good Moroccan cuisine, fresh mint tea, relaxed atmosphere and amazing music. Plus it is a nice change to the unjust Dutch racist view on Moroccan culture. Why not experience it in this earnest way instead of holding onto false presumptions?

So, "who is Nass el Ghiwane?" most of you will think with a plussed questionmark stretched across the face. Their fame is so hidden or that you either need to have Northern African roots or be turned onto them by someone else. Let's see if I can.
Nass el Ghiwane formed in Morocco in the late 60's and play Gnawa music along with many other styles (see comments below), thus creating a modernised folk style made up of intricate rhythms, taqsims ,deep trancedental flows and socially applied poetry. The effect to me, is near hypnotising with a build up to a louder climax. They are nationally seen as the Moroccan equivalent Rolling Stones, since they had a big impact on the new Moroccan music styles. I dare even say they might better musicians than the western Rollings Stones since they master their instruments in peculiar jawdropping ways, outside of the 4/4 mindset. They could easily play after western styles...but could western bands imitate their style? The odds are not even. Moroccan psychelic folk; this is the real thing, going on for over 30 years now.

I learnt about the band years ago through Jace aka DJ/ Rupture, eclectic as ever in his musical style and knowledge, who was always bigging them up for mighty good reasons stated above. Plus he has even toured with them! His outfit Nettle being the superb occasion for it. The multi-intrumentalist Abdel Hak and Jenny Jones are the other members of the Nettle project where northern african diasporic sounds get mashed up with western noise static. Nomadic roughness. I shall refer to some insight posts Jace made about Nass' at his excellent Mudd Up! blog, More on that later.

On an ending note, it should be real special to be among an immigrant crowd of middleaged to older people since this isn't a more stylish band that the younger immigrants and their dutch-borns would go to see....or would they? Tradition is the keyword and downright virtue is all it embodies. If I can make some bootleg recordings of the gig, I will put them on here at some point.

wowza, my first youtube embed..one's gotta learn. Nass el Ghiwane video clip, streetwise moroccanly! I wonder if this is a western travel viddy or genuinely local.


To continue, here a live registration from around the early 80's. It's hypnotising at its essence.


And some audio candy! >>>

This is a composition of their *safer* Musique Du Monde album of Moroccan Gnawa.
Nass el Ghiwane - Hamdouchia

This recording sounds way older, I guess it's 60's or 70's material sensing the hiss & crackle, as I got this album downloaded without any info. In 8 minutes it slowly builds up to a psychedelic wall. Awesome.
Nass el Ghiwane - Untitled track 1

Goeiemiddag livingroom concert!

yep, join us! if...you....want....to

see our fluffy blog, nicely created by Iris.



yippee ya yo ka yay, don't give it all away.

Aye, t'wis kinda dreich in Embra, cannae be better

('dreich' is scottish slang for grey and shitty wet weather, so ya know)

....but at least there was no snow as in Holland and Southern UK! Quite miraculous so as one must think, since Edinburgh is very much up north at nearly the same latitude as Scandinavia. Only the mountains had snow on it.

My previous blogpost hinted that guitarist Malcolm Middleton, who played Amsterdam the night before, was going to take the same flight as me and indeed he did as we met each other in the waiting lounge and it rejoiced us both by hoping the delayed plane would still come while the snow was pummeling down from the skies. It's a weird fate of coincidence to spend time travelling with a musician of one of your favorite bands -the recently disbanded group Arab Strap-. I put on the handcuffs, yes, guilty of craving Scottish melancholia blues since 2000. Malcolm, soft spoken and modest, had just done a 2 week solo tour in Germany and was now going home to Glasgow, though he first had to do a live sessionthere for the BBC One radio. Our plane did arrive and from the whitelands we flew into the wetlands. The end of his adventure, the beginning of mine and hasty goodbyes were said after he told me that he should be in Utrecht for a solo show in April.

So, Edinburgh busride into town. For some reason the whole ride really reminded me of the the Dublin route from the airport...I guess it's because the Scottish infrastructure is so much alike the Irish, such the architecture and general road atmosphere. Dejavuland was passing through the eyes, finding its way in quasi recognizable patterns from the brain and it all felt familiar, home style familiar!

Edinburgh centre is splittingly devided in 2 halves by a giant rock with a castle on top of it -Edinburgh castle, which still has an army up there funnily enough-, and the view is amazing. Not many cities can boast having such a landmark decorating the scenery and when you add the other 2 hills running from the centre, (one is a monumental green hill just past the castle rock and the other even a small nature mountain park right next to side of the centre), one feels that the city has achieved a perfect symbiose with a rougher side of nature.

Oops, back to thursday afternoon, Nessa picked me up and we did a small tour of the city for having a supernice veggie lunch at the Forest organic cafeteria, run by volunteers and which much reminded me of Utrecht's squatcafe ACU. Good to know that good places exist in any city that has a good cultural mindset to it. Soon afterwards, a pub was the next stop where I tasted the local blonde Innis & Gunn ale which had a slight whisky flavour to it, wow! This kinda marked the start of a weekend with many ales and whiskies; both alcopop liquids I normally don't drink. There always has to be a one time for everything. Back to Nessa's after a bout of pear cider and Swedish modernised bars. Cabbage and Ribs, the Hibs! Now there's some slang rhyming you'll have to crack to get the nut.

On Friday we took it kinda lazy, walked through the special Dean Village which contained streets and alleys of mews, which are old stables that are now used as pittoresque residences. After that we went to the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art where they had modernist paintings of Picasso, Miro, Ernst, Margritte and statues of Paolozzi. Eduardo Paolozzi was actually born in the Leith area where Nessa lives. Though his name comes from his Italian father, he was a born and bred Edinburgh resident and started the British pop art scene. These pics show some work, such as the huge and tall metal Vulcan statue that we saw! A pity we came kinda late into the gallery and were kicked out at closing time.

There were many Welsh up and about on the streets, as Scotland was playing Wales for the European 6 Nations Rugby Cup, The good thing about such rugby games is that it makes the atmosphere on the streets and in the pubs an amazing experience, where good behaviour is always the rule and not the exception....which can't be said about football fans very often. The Welsh were quite uppity in the days before the game and we either catched them in funny moods or singing deeply from their choir chests. Friday night Gavin -Nessa's boyfriend- joined us for a few good ones in a nice auld ale pub (20 taps on offer!), when some elderly Welsh gents started singing canon chants out of the blue, surely gave us goosebumps! I recorded a few of their songs and hope to put something up here later. Just after we left the pub, we saw an elderly Welsh man and his son staggering around drunk with pizza. The man suddenly fell flat on his face causing a huge cut of his eyebrow, blood pouring out, and we gave some support till the ambulance arrived (in less than 5mins, bravo). A few stitches should have sorted it, though I reckon waking up from his hangover the next morning wasn't too rosey, ouch.

Saturday we catched end of the organic farmers market and bought some fresh smoked kipper fish, gorgeous Scottish triple cream brie and even some lamb & mint sausages. It was a pity that Gavin had twitched his back earlier on and had to stay in all day, so me and Nessa wandered about, had some nice carrot-orange soup & goat cheesed panini's after a wet walking session in the creepy Greyfriars Kirkyard cemetary. The cemetary is supposedly haunted at night by the misty ghost of a woman and this is turned into a midnightly tourist attraction. Also there's the grave and momument of Greyfriars Bobby, a *westies dug* (ie Yorkshire dog) who for nearly 16 years stood and lived at his owner's grave and got fed by the locals. Loyalty is a bitter dreg, even for animals eh? We later strolled into the Natural Museum of Scotland. As we came a bit late again, we only saw bits of Scottish historical pieces, such as swords, celtic patterns on stones and some possessions of the royal Bonnie 'Prince' Charlie (hmmm confused with Bonnie 'Prince' Billy ;)), plus also seen some steam engines and other machinery of the industrial period. Oh what one can learn; golf, curling and bowling are all Scottish sports. Such usefull information indeed hah! The museum was really nice and we only saw 1 floor of it, guess I'll just have to go back once and see the other 4 floors.
Later at dinner I made the exception of tasting these nice minty things, yes meat I know, but it was worth it for one time..plus you can't get these over here, luckily ;) We went again to the Forest cafe as they had a Balkan music night on there (wow, that makes 2 weekends in row for me) with live bands. The last band was a young band with trumpets in the brass band style of things and altough they sounded messy, it was a good way of messiness which got people dancing and shouting. There was a song done by a Greek singer while she played the guitar in fingerpick style, which was breathtakingly amazing, but I'm just a sucker for this old Rebetika style from Greece, especially presented live. After that more of the brass' n 'booty sounds which kept us swaying. Just there was this one female singer who was pretty annoying as she was one of those self-absorbed attention seekers and many times she pushed Nessa aside when doing something. Really weird, and Nessa thus gifting her a personally twisted Larry David Curbed' momentum hah ;)

Oh yeah, earlier in the afternoon we also visited the special 2nd hand bookshop that has inspired the Irish-but-Edinburghbased actor Dylan Moran to create the excellent UK comedy show Black Books, as the owner of the real life bookshop seems to be just as strange as the one Moran plays in the show. We didn't get to see the owner, but saw many bizarre warning signs put up allover the shop, like *watch out for the floor*. Sense, no(n)sense, who decides? Paul, an fellow Irish friend of Nessa, works part-time in the shop by quirky coincidence and he invited us to his birthday party later that night, swell. So after the gypsy music we walked to the bday party while Nessa talked about slasher murders of young women that happen from time to time in Edinburgh parks and meadows, oy. Edinburgh has this Jekyll and Hyde feature looming over the city, safe and friendly by daytime, dark and twisted by night if you are at the wrong spot at the wrong time. No wonder author Robert Louis Stevenson is one of Embra's celebrated writers, portraying the dual sides of the city. Over to Paul's do, who is a funny character himself to boot as well where in one room bad trance and urban tunes were being played and in the other room some old style blues. One takes no hard thinking to know where we sat down. We were surrounded by film art students and their sport was to outwit each other with personal concepts. I was riling up London boy Gabriel for fun, fed him fuel for his words, since his manifesto was way too intricatie to be conceived by anyone. It can be fun talking about certain art concepts when in the right mood, but not when you're relaxing with some nice beer at 3am and just want to have fun. Someone put Gremlins on since a killer orca movie did not work, pity ah. Fine choice I must say, so that I could be dumbed down and untangled from the discussions while Paul was loading us up with chocolate cake and veggie pizza. Generously sound dude btw! Nessa actually works for the art section of Edinburgh university and she suddenly realised to her own shock that she knew most of the people at the party *by their student file*, haha....how about dragging your work into the weekend nights? Mad indeed. It kinda summed up the night.

Sunday was quite easygoing. We went up the 2 other mountains near the city centre of which the vaster and higher Salisbury Crags are really phenomenal for the view...in the Jojo phenomenological way, hah. As ye can see on the wikipedia link; just 5 minutes walking outside the eastern part of the centre you have this natural mountain park as if you are in the countryside.
Mad I tell ya! But it felt great as it was the first day it did not rain, no cold wind and even some sun, yay!

Below the ridged side that we walked on, such a grand view!


After that we had a long drinking session in the New Town area and discovered that the Dark Island black ale was most of my liking, coming from the Orkney islands. Also of all the whiskies I tried, the ones from the islands stood out the best. I must like those western islands for some reason. The night and my stay ended with watching a few episodes of Spaced by Simon Pegg (Shaun of the dead). British comedy shows always do things better it seems.

So it ended and had to get an early flight into Amsterdam, back to hell for having to work a horrible half day. Came home with a bag full of books of Tom Hodgkinson, Anthony Bourdain, Michael Palin and some classic Hunter S. Thompson's that were still missing in my collection, at last. I always enjoy shopping for books on the isles, as the choice and prices are excellent compared to books in English here, unless you want to get the same old overpriced bestseller's shite.

I'll defo enjoy the Tom Hodgkinson one of 'How To Be Free' which expands on his sincerely justified Idler philosophy. Let's see if life and use of time can be improved, it just has to give.

But yeah, having my eyes glimmering of the fact I'll be working 3 days a week for just slightly less money than my slave wage now, is almost reality! Just 3 weeks to go ho-ho! It adds up; a better yet more relaxed job, nicer colleagues, central location, good union and loads of holidays. There's no wrong, only right. I reckon the road to my own perdition will be without bumps, except goosebumps of excitement, Inshallah.

Thanks to Belgian friend (va)Ness I finally got my ears around the 'Gulag Orkestar' album by Beirut and it's steamy steady cut quality with freshly cooped trumpets and songwriter tricks. Gypsy meets indie halfway, bridging the gap between global trendy and western alternativism minus the unneccesary hype stance to it. It builds itself anyway. hur-rah. Share the joy and tears!

Beirut - Bratislava
Beirut - Mount Wroclai (Idle Days)
Beirut - Gulag Orkestar

The roundup spreads into Edimburgo

first, weekend roundup.

Friday, Jason Molina. You take one gubby dwarf playing singer-songwriting tunes, give him a capo so that he will play the same chords *a lot*. Despite this demeaning tone, his voice was crisp clear amazing to listen to. One of a kind sort of stuff. Pity about the fact that most songs sounded much alike and he didn't peek into his better stuff. No miss nor win. Just was.

Saturday, We vs. Death & Sennen, at the livingroom concert in the Ondiep artist breeding place. So there we go, postrock galore. blissful thinking and uncut nostalgiarama. The whole of arrangement of the livingroom was amazing, one white wall had old dia's projected from exotic holidays taken in the 70's whereas the other wall had movies projected onto them *The Birds*, *Coffee & Cigarettes* & *Dr. Strangelove*. You couldn't go wrong with that selection. Danielle Liebeskind did her non-amplified singing with the guitar aside, followed by the postrock blasts by We vs. Death. Sennen sealed it off perfectly, accompanied by Dr. Strangelove on screen, and it seemed as if every scene was made for the 40 minute sountrack of Sennen. The closing scene with all the a-bombs going off also created a climax in the form of exploding live sound. It was unplanned by the band, yet everything fell in the right place. Coincidence was not an oddity, rather the status quo.
After that me, Rory and Alison biked our way to the Rasa for some hustle n jumping Balkan music. Utrecht's gypsy punko DJ Tommi held up the night in a firm grip, entertaining us with classic and unheard gems. Sparkling bright, shiney of glitter..the sounds took many away....like that eastern european guy who kept on falling on the wet floor with every special move, time after time. Or that bunch of students that leapt on each other or were climbing the walls. Playtime mayhem, but it was all earnest and sincere spirited. Many smiles kept on going around and around and around.

Sunday, bar-work time. voluntary yup yup. After a night of not-so-good/much-sleep, the motivation sinks away, but it was defo nice to see loyal friends and family (Hi mom!) coming along as supporting clientele. Apple crumble, mmmmmmmmmmhhh I dream of cinnamon fairytales.

sooooooooooo secondly, what else?

Earlier today friend Peter asked me to come for a brainstorming session, mysteriously spoken. it was about a project he and Danielle (Liebeskind) are having for the *Club van 100*, which is a running tv show on the public broadcasting channel about how people can help other people, by using creative idea's with no personal/commercial gain. Right, the pinnacle idea of their project is how to get people to interact with special moments and share these with others, strangers or not, with the goal to create a common awareness that is not easy to be found nowadays. Tough cookie to bite, the raisins are dried out and the chocolate stale. So what can be done? Enter brainstorming session. I unsuspectedly sat at the table, ate some tofu curry, but when I had to speak my mind about what a *personal special moment*signifies and means to me, I had a camera glaring into my eyes. yikes. Apparently our talks will be used in the next episode coming Monday the 12th. Double the yikes. Haven't decided yet whether I will watch or not.
See more about it here

Just (read: 1 hour ago) came back from the Club 3voor12 session in Studio Desmet, A'dam
Me and Floor the only ones of our troop who wanted to catch the Scottish songwriter Malcolm Middleton (ex-Arab Strap guitarist) play tonight, so off we went! Malcolm did about 5 songs on his guitar, roughly voiced sung in a demeanor that was Arab Strap worthy. Scottish colleague Stevie D was abliss, so was I. It's a kinda funny start to my long weekend as in about 10 hours I will be off to Edinburgh (or locally known as Embra) for a few days. It will be nice to visit my friend Nessa there for the first time, taste some auld whiskey, do some hiking in nature and visit galleries. I'm sure more will come across our path.
So it's Scottish all the way these days. I talked a bit to Mr Middleton and he revealed that he might be on the 12.30 flight same as me, which adds even more coincidental batter to my short travel roll, ''Perhap' see ya lae'er den'', he outted. Let's see.

2:30am now, first thing in the morning before Schiphol airport looms, a short visit to the Utrecht university has to be made... future oh future of negotations, vague huh?

some Scottish pieces before I sign off....

Women waulking - Ho Na Filibig Chunnacas Bata
Arab Strap - Loch leven intro