Will freedom to express through music ever be embraced in Kuwait?
2012 has started off with some promising developments in Kuwait’s music industry. With the BBC having come to Kuwait to do a feature on the music industry, initiatives such as BLEND and Acoustica having birthed, a plethora of music events popping up around the country, and Kuwait Music being at the core of all of this, many see this year as one of hope for the music industry in Kuwait. But with the new leadership of the country making moves that don’t exactly support a thriving music ecosystem, are we really headed toward a lively music scene for the country….? Or are we just living in delusion?
Living in a state of contradictory opposition
Since December 2010 when Kuwait Music went online, more people in Kuwait are aware, knowledgeable and picky about Bands, DJ’s and artists that they have at their disposal. This is a good thing because it creates connections and collaborations between regular people and musicians. Recently, Ali Sleeq founded a new project “Avant-Garde” which has grown in popularity due to its ‘forum’ style band and musician setup.
On the other side of the coin however, another music project initiative has yet to come off the ground due to outlandish reasoning from management over a music event. See details here >>
Censorship and the swirl of the pen
Music Master, a leading distributor for record labels pulled out of Kuwait due to censorship woes recently, and this has dealt a big dent in the music industry here. The company sells into some 50 stores across Kuwait, but said it had struggled to maintain sales in the face of strict rules on album artwork and lyrics that shut some artists out of the market. Even the freedom of the press ranking for Kuwait has dropped from 115th in 2010 to 124th place in 2011. Things aren’t getting better.
Watch the BBC feature done on Kuwait Music, Avant – Garde and censorship
What the internet community thinks
Even Mark at 248am.com posted about the video above and it sparked a heated debate on Islamist mentality vs liberal thinking. The thread includes everything from discussions on alcohol, to freedom of speech, to why music should not be allowed in Kuwait at public events. A wry testament of the state of contradictory mentality in Kuwait. See the post here >>
So what does this mean for musicians?
The cancellation of events, banning of CD’s, stricter censorship laws and a leadership that is not exactly trying to make Kuwait more forthcoming to the world’s developments, means that musicians can only hope. Hope for divine intervention, or maybe just intervention of any kind. Only time will tell.
About the Author
Caesar (Kuwait Music) Caesar is the Founder and CEO of Kuwait Music. A passionate musician and web nerd, Caesar spends most of his time thinking about how to build a healthy music business in the region Follow Caesar at the below links: Google+
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okay again, censorship is really overrated music wise. If government folks ban CDs. There is always the internet. You can get whatever you want and if censored, There is always away around it.
As for events, The blend festival is a good experience mainly because, in my opinion, it was held in a closed place. Not much of bragging from the organizer how biiiig the event will be and how it would bring millions of people in one place.
Plus, people behaved at the venue that’s a plus.
As for the Acoustica incident, its really confusing and I agree with Dejan about it. Doing all the things according to the rules IS a way to go but sometimes you got people who just are stubborn and make the decision not to allow people to play. And this is not Death/Punk/DOOOOM Metal, its an acoustic band. Confusing much?
The whole argument of Islamicists VS Liberal, I consider it utterly a clash of two opposing camps, Its like if you don’t belong they’ll surely gonna go after you for not choosing sides.
Freedom, well to me. Its in your mind and body, you don’t have to go Punk Rock on Islamists and deem them ALLLL evil and you don’t have to condemn a metal kid for occuyping their time with someithing called music.
I say, people believe what they want to believe. Us coming and trying to kill each other is just another day in human history and thing is. We always hate each other. Let’s try to get along and maybe …. Maybe freedom could be happening.
Pingback: Acoustica : Collaboration of musicianship and involvement - focused music | Kuwait-Music.com | April 2, 2012
Dear Mr. Ceasar,
Can you send me your email ID
Regards
Antic Emmanuel
I agree with you on this, @Ahmed; no-one could have said it better!
I agree about the effect of censorship in Kuwait being totally overrated. This isn’t Azerbaijan, or even Syria, and if the authorities are a little too narrow-minded or near-sighted and don’t let certain things through, that’s why we thank our lucky stars for the Internet! If you are intelligent and resilient, you quietly make your way around things. It’s frustrating but think of how successful the Blend Festival was, as Ahmad mentioned, versus Shurooq Amin’s ‘censorship’ fiasco at Dar Mashreq Gallery – a little thoughtfulness about the space, the people, the marketing, you get a good, serious intelligent crowd listening to good music or looking at good art. Sometimes the disrepancies are annoying – certain movies are banned from the cinema, but others with tons of blood and violence aren’t – certain artists are considered ‘avant-garde’ and fetch a pretty penny, others like Acoustica are unfairly cancelled. It’s hard to get a license to play music in public *but* the NCCAL spends so much of their budget on organizing several major musical festivals annually. These things happen! How else can creativity thrive and struggle and resist and try intelligent ways to make things beautiful and make things work instead of stamp their feet to have it their way.
It *is a clash of opposing camps, but doesn’t it feel sometimes that some people are so far left they meet the far right at the other end? Let’s just stick to a place somewhere that gives us the elbow room to play our instruments (and not play), to write (and not write), to paint (and not paint), and all of these things are okay. I get frustrated that I can’t find my favourite music anywhere, that there are only two English-langauge bookstores left and that to buy anything there would break my wallet, but guess what? It’s a complicated story, but people do not read, the things worth reading are not read, other people travel to read, and therefore we are left with the dusty leftovers of what people here want or what the big corporations and boards think they want. But we work around it. If you really want it and believe in it not for the resistance, not for the battle, but because it matters, we’ll find it somehow. How else do some of us still get good jazz records or our favourite books?
Love these discussions as always.
Very true nur,, completely agree .