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Shaaban conducts traffic
(June 26, 2001, cairolive.com) Shaabi singer Shaaban Abdel-Rehim has made it to the big time. After spending nearly two decades touring on the shaabi circuit, putting out low budget tapes that sell for three and four pounds with no marketing, now he's way up over 6 October Bridge, with a billboard as big as the best of them.
Shaaban has signed on with a high-class record label and his new tape Amrika ya Amrika, sells for LE8. He even looks slicker on the cover, as if he's been airbrushed into slightly more respectibility.
A tape seller at Nasr City's Geneina mall indicated that the tape is selling "like hot cakes. Shaaban always does us well."
The tape's lead song -- called "Amreeka ya Amreeka" -- is a baladi chant urging the US to re-think its foreign policy, and convince its bosom buddy Israel to make peace with the region. (see lyrics below)
Shaaban raised eyebrows recently when he did an ad for McDonald's new sandwich McFelafel. What was Shaaban -- who sings, "I'd refuse foreign wool but wear my country's burlap," on one of his tapes -- doing signing for McDonald's? Was he now plugging his country's burlap, packaged in foreign wool? Anything for money, you might say, but he claims he was just told he'd be singing for taamiya (felafel), but not for an American company.
"I Hate Israel," the Shaaban hit heard round the world, has been credited with much more than just fanning the flames of Arab public opinion. Last week the American Jewish Congress complained to Mama McDonald in the States that an Israel-hater shouldn't be employed by an American company.
Perhaps by coincidence, the ads are no longer showing.
Ever the model citizen, Shaaban's new tape also features tomes on the importance of wearing seatbelts... "Don't get a belt from a suit case, and call it a seat belt... and don't just place it over your shoulder", he sings, making fun of people who wear any sort of makeshift seat belt lookalike to avoid getting a fine.
There's also a song about mad cow disease that starts with the line "Even the cows have gone mad..." and ends with "now the duck wags his tail, and thinks he's Hercules..."
From the archives:
•Find out what Dardasha has to say on the shaabi singer's sudden popularity
•Read excerpts from an interview with Shaaban Abdel-Rehim
•Order a new book about the shaabi singer
LYRICS TO AMRIKA YA AMRIKA
(Amrika ya Amrikia, al nass aysha fi alam
wal alam kulla awaiz hobb wa salam)
Oh America, people are living in pain
And the whole world wants love and peace
M...M...M... Amrika
President Hosni Mubarak no longer sleeps
He's always busy with the peace issue
M...M...M... Amrika
Oh America, we've been sick of this for a long time
We were upset about Iraq, Bosnia, and Chechnya
M...M...M... Amrika
Famine in the south, in the Congo and Somalia
Children can't find food to eat, and are crying
M...M...M... Amrika
Please uncle Kofi, please oh secretary general
Explain to Israel how to move towards peace
M...M...M... Amrika
Please uncle Kofi
Please uncle Kofi
Please uncle Kofi
Please uncle Kofi
Amrika
Amrika ya Amrika
Amrika ya Amrika
Oh America, people want peace
No matter what country -- and Israel as well.
Amrika
Amrika
Amrika
How many thousands of children
did they kill without thinking
They didn't feel bad
and didn't say stop.
Amrika
Amrika
Amrika
Don't say war,
and enough threats
we like peace
but our will is steel
M...M...M... Amrika
The High Dam is protected,
who can ruin it?
If anyone comes close to it,
I swear we'll electrify him
M...M...M... Amrika
Our president has a kind heart
but when he's serious he's serious
he doesn't let his country's rights go,
and he doesn't hate anyone
Amrika
Amrika
M...M...M... Amrika
In the interview
the President's words were clear
he said to Israel
the solution is peace
Amrika
Amrika
M...M...M... Amrika
People want to live
and feel secure
The beating of the past
is enough for Israel
People want peace
Don't say war again
Those long years were enough
....
Amrika
People want peace
People want peace
People want peace
From the archives:
•Find out what Dardasha has to say on the shaabi singer's sudden popularity
•Read excerpts from an interview with Shaaban Abdel-Rehim
•Order a new book about the shaabi singer
Did you like this article? Send your comments to comments@cairolive.com
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