[Bloquez l'empire!] EI: Interview / Music: The Arab Summit. Arab hip-hop forces unite for justice.

[Stefan Christoff]

Interview: Arab hip-hop forces unite for justice
Stefan Christoff, The Electronic Intifada, Oct 1, 2007

http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article9016.shtml

The Arab Summit is a musical project on the cultural front lines, uniting the 
most innovative hip-hop artists within the growing Arab rap movement of North 
America. The Arab Summit delivers inspirational beats that drive a musical 
project highlighting a progressive Arab voice in North America, advocating for 
the self-determination of people in the Middle East through hip-hop.

Comprised of artists with roots from throughout the Middle East -- from Syria 
to Palestine to Iraq -- the Arab Summit is a powerful cultural snap-shot of the 
Arab Diaspora in the West. Featuring the participation of the Narcicyst, a 
Montreal-based artist originally from Basra, Iraq; to Excentrik, a 
Palestinian-American producer/composer; to Omar Offendum of the Arab hip-hop 
crew the N.O.M.A.D.S.; to Ragtop of the Palestinian-Filipino-American crew the 
Philistines and executive producer of the underground hit, hip-hop Mixtape 
called Free the P. EI contributor Stefan Christoff recently interviewed the 
minds behind Arab Summit.


STEFAN CHRISTOFF: Multiple creative voices are represented within the Arab 
Summit project, representing musical projects on the cutting edge of the 
hip-hop scene and Middle Eastern arts in North America. What was the impetus 
for bringing together this culturally ground-breaking project?

THE NARCYCIST: This project aims to illustrate that hip-hop has become an 
important vehicle for the voice of reason in the context of global hate 
mongering and war. We didn't really have an agenda more than to speak on the 
issues that have touched us and affected our lives indirectly or directly. I 
wanted to further investigate the study of Arab identity in the West vis-a-vis 
hip-hop cultural belonging. So, really it was to finally put down the study in 
a concrete format for the people, especially our people, to see it as a real 
and progressive movement that is [about more than] music.

STEFAN CHRISTOFF: Through the experience of recording your first collaborative 
album project have you set artistic or political goals toward expressing the 
experience of Arab/Middle Eastern communities in North America?

RAGTOP: [Generally], I would say our music definitely expresses that 
experience, because we are the product of that experience and have that 
perspective, which is how we frame our music. It was also very much the purpose 
of the thesis, I think, to sort of encapsulate the Arab Diaspora youth 
experience, but on a song-by-song basis. I don't sit down and ask myself, "How 
am I going to represent all the Arabs in North America?" I just write what I 
feel and over time and a variety of beats, an overall picture, starts to 
emerge.

EXCENTRIK: Honestly, I agree with Ragtop -- It's an intrinsic value in the 
music we create because of our interesting identity -- Arab. ... The messages 
in the music are rarely deliberate, and that speaks volumes to the amount of 
thought these issues stimulate; they are perennial, unavoidable -- even in 
subjective mediums.

THE NARCICYST: Ditto. I would also like to add that it is our duty to use the 
many opportunities that we were lucky enough to access living in North America 
to use our voices ... the fact that our people are being oppressed and are 
subject to so many injustices ... our experience is inextricably a reflection 
of [that]. ... But as Ragtop said, there is no finite goal we are reaching 
[towards.] The reason we recorded this thesis in a two-week span was to make 
sure the pressure was on and we exerted that natural sense of communication and 
bond. That social mediation, the recording process itself, is the identity we 
were talking about -- the natural channel of internalization and further, 
re-appropriation.

STEFAN CHRISTOFF: Clearly the name "Arab Summit" could be interpreted in 
multiple ways, as summits have been a fixture of Middle East politics 
throughout the past century. Currently the US is pushing a "peace summit", 
which will host elite government representatives from Jordan, Israel, Egypt and 
the Palestinian Authority, excluding the major Palestinian resistance movement 
Hamas. Suppose the nature of your recent "summit" in California as Arab hip-hop 
artists working in North America was of a strikingly different nature, talk 
about your recent "summit" in the shadow of the continuous "peace" summits in 
the Middle East, generally viewed with cynicism on the Arab street? Will 
President Mubarak be appearing on your next album?

OMAR OFFENDUM: The metaphor for the Arab Summit project is two-fold. The first 
one pertains to our role as leaders of the Arab hip-hop movement, and how we 
strive to actually create a productive summit of our own from the ground up, 
where topics we wish could be addressed more sincerely [than] in the "summit 
industry" ... The second metaphor relates to the annual hip-hop summits that 
occur globally nowadays ... we strived to carry the ideals of such meetings to 
an even higher level, as hip-hop itself has been overrun by similar hacks.

THE NARCICYST: I feel the same way, honestly. But more importantly, we want to 
show that the next generation needs a new summit ... The "peace" summit that 
you speak of no longer holds the same value it did historically. So no Hosni, 
thank you very much; they can keep Mubarak ...

STEFAN CHRISTOFF: The Arab Summit song "Tomorrow's Justice" beings with a 
sample from the Lebanese singer Fairuz, from one of her most famous songs "La 
Fleur Des Cities," which meditates on the historical Arab city of Jerusalem, or 
al-Quds. At the time of Fairuz's recording (as it is today) the city remains 
under Israeli military occupation. Lebanon was engulfed in a civil war, the 
West Bank and Gaza Strip were under Israeli occupation and the Iran-Iraq war 
was just around the corner. Current and past generations in the Middle East 
indeed feel that little justice has been served. "Ain't no justice, so get up 
stand up," is a cut from one verse in your song, "Tomorrow's Justice." Do those 
involved in the Arab Summit project consider themselves as part of a movement, 
whether an artistic one or a political one?

RAGTOP: The inspiration to do what we do definitely came from a mixture of 
personal and political feelings -- for me it was the backlash following 9/11, 
both in the media and [against] our communities, that really drove me to try 
and make my voice heard ... "Get up stand up" is of course a reference to the 
classic Bob Marley line [that was] recorded before Fairuz and [which] 
reinforces the idea that little has changed ...

EXCENTRIK: Speaking for myself here, I don't see anything that isn't 
"political" in regards to being Palestinian and an artist. I think my way of 
standing up is as simple as being proud of my Palestinian identity and culture, 
in addition to the activism that all of us are involved with ... The message in 
that song is not a specific call to get up and do something; from my 
[perspective] I see it more as a somber tale of oppression and a yearning to 
educate people to what we feel on a daily basis.

STEFAN CHRISTOFF: Various members of the Arab Summit have been involved in 
ground-breaking hip-hop projects such as Euphrates in Montreal and the Free the 
P album/initiative. Can you speak about the role that Arab hip-hop plays within 
the larger global hip-hop movement, including that in the Middle East?

OMAR OFFENDUM: When set within the context of Middle Eastern hip-hop as a 
whole, it becomes obvious that we are all in this together. It is for this 
reason that I was able to link up with artists back home like DJ Lethal Skillz 
of Lebanon, and feel like we already had so much in common. That being said, 
the issues we address more specifically as part of the Arab-American experience 
are unique to us ...

THE NARCICYST: ... Arab hip-hop is on its way. Although we do lack a certain 
umbrella of representation in the industry, I also believe this is crucial for 
the movement to blossom into a full self-reliant machine. As an infant, it is 
still a bit naive, but we as the first generation of Western Arab enthusiasts, 
specifically MCs, have a role that is extremely potent and meaningful. It is 
the crossroads that we have built toward in our immigration, identity and 
social space. I think that these MCs, including us, when we first started, were 
not aware of the [impact of] our words. When certain things come from an Arab 
boy's mouth, it's not taken lightly. So as we are growing we are also learning 
how to present this without sacrificing our dignity and art form ...

STEFAN CHRISTOFF: Can you speak about your experiences as Arab youth and 
cultural performers in North America?

RAGTOP: I've been performing pretty regularly with Omar and my crew the 
Philistines in Los Angeles for a good three years now. We've traveled all over 
and performed in front of diverse crowds, and I have to say the response is 
overwhelmingly positive. Underground hip-hop heads show a lot of love when 
you're coming from an honest place and you got dope beats courtesy [of] cats 
like Excentrik, Offendum, and my co-Philistines Cookie Jar and DJ Cole Minor.

EXCENTRIK: Man! It's ups and downs for me. If I'm playing with my free jazz 
group then peeps are all, "What the hell is that?" If I'm playing my 'oud, some 
old Berkeley lady wants to take my picture, talking about my "exotic" culture 
... Performing with the Arab Summit is almost always pure love -- everyone 
seems to throw us some dope vibes. And that's a far cry from when I first 
started years ago -- I had a dude attack me with a crowbar after I spat a poem 
about racism towards Arabs in America! And that was way before 9/11 ...

THE NARCICYST: Don't expect everyone to love what we do, but the general 
consensus at shows is a positive vibe. Although I'm sure a lot of what we say 
flies over people's heads, some people do hijack our words and attempt to add 
their own perceptions to it ... [When] words like "Islam" or even "Pentagon" 
come out of an Arab man's mouth [it] can be taken the wrong way. It's relative, 
but the greatest thing that I believe is coming out of this music is dialogue. 
As long as we can talk and build, then it's a beautiful thing ...

STEFAN CHRISTOFF: Can you speak about your own personal experiences with the 
"home-front" of the War on Terror, certainly crossing back and forth between 
Canada and the US?

RAGTOP: Actually, Mr. Offendum and I have performed in Vancouver twice, and 
each time experienced harassment at the border. I have become very familiar 
with airport security procedures, especially the special side room where they 
give your bags that extra-special [search]. In Tel Aviv they assigned me my own 
special security agent to just follow me all around the airport and make sure I 
got on the plane. But I will say that things have gotten better in the last 
year or so, between me and airport security.

EXCENTRIK: I got stripped searched once ... I'm not kidding, just don't tell 
anyone.

THE NARCICYST: Let's just say, there are three copies of my fingerprints 
somewhere in the nether world of racial profiling and border searches. I have 
been questioned CSIS-style for several hours on end, while I have been denied 
entry into the US a couple of times. And somehow, I'm always the "random 
search" at airport, god dammit! In a government office near you, someone is 
listening to either me or my music. But so be it, there is nothing negative to 
our music; we do this for love and understanding in the long run ...

OMAR OFFENDUM: It's been hard ... but I won't turn this into one of those 
clichéd responses about how many times I have personally been detained at an 
airport; knowing that some innocent brothers and sisters still haven't been 
released is way more upsetting. So is the fact that most of my fellow US 
citizens can't really say they feel any safer six years later. The situations 
in Iraq, Palestine, and Lebanon continue to spiral out of control and there are 
no signs of a light at the end of the tunnel. Recognizing that we have certain 
opportunities (rights) our families back home don't have, we make it a point to 
address all these issues in our music with a sense of responsibility.

STEFAN CHRISTOFF: What's your take on hip-hop's origins and their relationship 
to the current role that hip-hop plays on a global level today, from the Middle 
East to Africa and Latin America?

RAGTOP: I think hip-hop is alive and thriving, globally speaking. It took a 
while for its popularity to spread enough to the point that ... people abroad 
grew up listening to hip-hop, and I think that's the main reason for the recent 
boom. ... Commercialization [is] rapidly making it the most popular music in 
the world, but at the expense of much knowledge, which is one of the original 
five pillars of the art form. What's interesting to see is how cats like our 
boys the [Palestinian MCs] DAM -- though initially influenced by more popular, 
less [socially-]conscious rappers -- when they began producing their music it 
emerged [as] an honest expression of their lives without any of the fake 
Hollywood posturing.

OMAR OFFENDUM: I see hip-hop as an extension of the same movements that brought 
about jazz, reggae, rock, and the blues. I also see it as an extension of the 
ancient aural traditions of Africa and the Middle East. It's no surprise that a 
soulful place like New York City could birth this most recent incarnation; nor 
is it surprising that similar urban experiences around the globe could latch on 
to it so rapidly. However, as is the case with all the aforementioned musical 
trends, there is a point [at which] something can get too big, too famous, and 
begin to lose its sense of origin. I believe this is what led to Nas to name 
his most recent release Hip-Hop is Dead. Yet the Internet has given our 
generation an opportunity to look past what is available commercially and plant 
new seeds. I am optimistic.

Stefan Christoff is an independent journalist based in Montreal and regular 
contributor to the Electronic Intifada and Electronic Lebanon.

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