Metal Jew

Eliyahu Dali's Metal Prayer

I'm impossible to please, really I am. I spent much of my life yearning for Jewish metal, but when it finally comes along I find I'm just as finicky, fussy and critical as I am about any other kind of music.

So Joel alerted me a couple of days ago to a piece in the Jerusalem Post about the Israeli musician Eliyahu Dali. Dali is making metal versions of 'classic' Jewish prayers and will at some point release an album called 'Metal Prayer'.

Listening to some of it online, it's clear that Dali is a decent musician in the prog/classic metal mode (not my favourite metal genre but not in and of itself to be deplored). I don't think though that the metal arrangements add anything to the liturgy - they just make them a little mushy.

I had this conversation at a conference in Finland last year when I metal a Lutheran pastor who runs a hugekly popular 'Metal mass'. I appreciate that some worshippers feel it adds a whole new spiritual dimension, but as I explained to the pastor, I like there to be a dividing line between synagogue music and everyday music. I love sections of the Jewish liturgy, but I'd never want to listen to it on my iPhone outside of synagogue. Conversely, I've no need for metal in services.

Still, I try and remain open minded to the possibility that sometime, someone will come up with a metal liturgy that I actually like. Till then, I'll stick with metal artists who have a looser connection to spirituality, such as Orphaned Land.

Here's Eliyahu Dali doing 'Mipi El'. I love the tune when it's sung in shul, but this version just doesn't work for me:

 

http://youtu.be/icOQq65QjfU

A few belated thoughts on the death of JDub

The announcement a few weeks ago that the prominent Jewish record label JDub was shutting down after 9 years, attracted a lot of commentary in the Jewish blogosphere. JDub was unable to sustain financial viability despite attracting a lot of communal philanthropic support and despite being at the cutting edge of hipster Judaism. This has raised the question of whether developing institutions to create a hip, cool Jewishness are a good use of communal resources.

I'll ignore those questions here, but I want to make a point from a metal perspective. It's striking that in the extreme metal underground, which is definitely a fringe taste and which has been just as effected as JDub by the revolution in the music industry, there are hundreds of labels that continue year after year. I'm struck by how many of the labels that existed when I was doing my PhD research on the metal underground in the 1990s are still around. Yet if anything, the financial viability of extreme underground metal is even weaker than a Jewish label supported by charitable foundation and critical acclaim.

One of the reasons why the metal underground survives is that it emerged organically, with no policy papers or strategic vision. Most people involved in it never expect to earn anything from it and they do what they do for love alone. Further, there is a robust scene that supports it, made up of committed scene members who live for the music and will spend vast amounts of money on it.

None of that is to say that JDub wasn't set up by people with the right motives or that it didn't attract support or that it didn't unearth and support some great music. The problem was that the Jewish music scene surrounding it was and is relatively weak. It lacked and lacks the autonomy that can sustain it. JDub was too removed from those Jewish music 'undergrounds' that do exist - klezmer, haredi music.

Ultimately, if there is to be a sustainable and vital alternative Jewish music scene, it will need to emerge slowly, through the devotion and commitment of members. JDub is a reminder that you can't create a scene from the top down.

 

Yeah yeah I know I'm not posting much at the moment

....in the meantime, here's some interesting titbits:

- I've recommended 'punkassjewjazz' act Pitom before . They have a new album out which looks interesting and there's a nice feature on them here.

- Here's a cool post on Jewish parody songs (and boy are there a lot of them).

- And I simply can't resist posting a track from the latest Anal Cunt release. A celebration of dumb redneckhood:

 

Jewish band name shtick

Teruah has put together some highlights from a Twitter meme called #jewishbandnames. It's fairly amusing stuff, many of them based on outrageous puns: Matzah The Hoople, They Might Be Golems, and a Jewish death metal band name Jewcifer (in fact there is already a Jucifer). This is all part of the trend, particularly in Klezmer for shticky, punning band names in Jewish music. There's nothing especially wrong with this, but as I've argued before on this blog (I'm too lazy to dig out the link) it does reveal a kind of anxiety about Jewish contributions to popular music, as though we don't quite fit in this world so we need to make everything archly self-aware. Again, I'm all for irony but it can be rather limiting and can hold people back from an uninhibited exploration of the possibilities of Jewish music. We don't need to shtickify to make Jewish music - we can do it without apologies.

Patrick Aleph Nails It

There's a nice little post on Jewcy from Patrick Aleph of Punk Torah (whose site appears to have been hijacked) and the Jew-Punk band Can!!Can
Aleph explains what makes his music Jewish and how he feels alienated from most conceptions of Jewish music:

They don't know what to say to me. Jewish music falls under four categories for them: Debbie Friedman, their parents Klezmer records, the Carlebach family, and the soundtracks to Yenta and Fiddler on the Roof. Maybe a fifth category too, the one that takes contemporary music, pours Mel Brooks love-shmaltz all over it, and becomes a Jewish self parody of the cool music.

The truth is, I've never liked that stuff. It's not authentic to me.

The things in the Jewish tradition that are dark and weird...that's my area. While everyone is celebrating the victory of Hanukah, I'm thinking about all the Hellenistic Jews that got murdered. My favorite midrashim (Jewish legends) are about Aaron's sons being burned to death and Abraham smashing his father's idols, then giving him a "fuck you" answer when asked about it.

Metal Hava Nagila

I was alerted last week to a cover of Hava Nagila by the Polish metal band Rootwater. I don't have much info about why they covered the song. It seems like they added to the lyrics in some way. Not sure whether I like it or not but it is at least interesting:

Article on Orphaned Land for The Forward

The new Orphaned Land album is now out. I have an article on the band, featuring an interview with singer Kobi Farhi at The Forward. As I say, the new album's progressive metal stylings are sometimes convoluted, but it's always an exhilirating and passionate journey - and the fusion of middle eastern music and metal is always complusively interesting. The promo photos are something else:

Jewish Chicks Rock - much too politely for my liking

I love the idea of Jewish Chicks Rock, an initiative by the US singer-songwriter Naomi Less. It's only just up and running but it appears to be an initiative to encourage Jewish women's empowerment. A good cause, but musically Naomi appears to have more than a touch of Lilith Fair syndrome - ie it's very earnest, acoustic guitar-driven and terribly polite. I know this works for some women and good luck to them, but let's not forget that some Jewish chicks like rock hard...

Haredi concert banned

There's a fascinating debate going on in the Haredi world at the moment about the acceptability of Haredi pop concerts, following the 'banning' of a concert by several Haredi stars such as Lupa at Madison Square Gardens. Y-Love - an Orthodox rapper who I greatly respect - has an excellent post on the subject.

Jewish Alternative Music

There's a new Facebook group called 'Jewish Alternative Music' [couldn't work out how to link to it]. There's a few bands listed on the page, none of whom are greatly to my taste and whom prove the misuse of the term 'alternative music' since the early 90s.  Best of the bunch are The Return and Levetikus.

Still, it is exciting that a more interesting Jewish music scene is starting to develop.