The Malaysian Insider :: Showbiz
The Malaysian Insider :: Showbiz |
| Stealth festival to rock Kabul with musical explosion Posted: 01 Oct 2011 08:56 AM PDT KABUL, Oct 1 — Afghans are used to having their days broken by a burst of gunfire or the boom of an explosion. But the barrage of drumming, bass beats and amped-up guitar solos that will hit the city next week may stop many in their tracks.  From left, Hojat Hamid, Sulyman Qardosh and Qasen Foushanji practise during a workshop as part of preparations for Sound Central. — Reuters pic Afghan bands playing music from doom death metal to blues rock will be joined by musicians who have flown in from across Central Asia — Iran to Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. The music will almost certainly be a new experience for most of the audience in a country where people seeking a change from traditional Afghan music tend to listen to Western pop or sound-tracks from India's big-hit Bollywood films. "The real bottom-line aim of this festival is to ignite youth to be interested in modern music," said organiser Travis Beard, who dreamt up the festival four years ago, and has been working on it in earnest for the past two years. "What we are trying to do is to expose them to new kinds of music so they can get into those styles of music, and also just start playing music. Hopefully we'll get some kids saying 'Hey this is really cool! Dad can I get a drum set?' or 'Mum can I get a guitar'," Beard said. Beard is an Australian who first came to Afghanistan as a news photographer five years ago, joined a band in Kabul and rediscovered his love of music "after many years away". As he started to meet Afghan musicians, he got involved in supporting them — with instruments or a place to practise — and the festival was inspired by the community they formed. With that in mind, he organised not only the day-long festival, but a week of workshops for Afghan musicians, and underground pre-festival concerts for all the bands at the festival to play more experimental music to a committed crowd. They are also holding on to the amplifiers, graphic equalisers, drum kits and guitars that have been flown into Afghanistan for Sound Central, aiming to turn the festival into a yearly event and make it easier for kids who are interested in rock to start playing the rest of the year. "I live in Herat, which is an old city and the people are too traditional," said Masoud Hasan Zada, a full-time journalist and part-time lead singer of blues-rock band Morcha, or "The Ants". "There is too much tradition, including traditional music," he told Reuters. "It's too hard to talk about modern music, especially blues . . . it's horrible sometimes." He spent a week in Kabul at the workshops, learning everything from online marketing to stage presence — something Beard says is particularly hard for musicians who are talented but grew up in a culture that frowns on exhibitionism. "We are going to teach them how to actually rock out!" Beard said with a grin at the start of the workshop, where more experienced performers thrashed on air guitars and jumped around a tiny stage, under the quizzical gaze of the students. Security concerns  Osama bin Laden parodied on the guitar of one of the Afghan rock musicians. — Reuters pic Publicity has been mostly word of mouth because of security concerns, and the date has been kept deliberately vague. Messages revealing the time and venue will go out to music fans only on the morning of the event. "It's been termed the first ever stealth festival in the world," Beard said. "So like a stealth bomber . . . we are coming in under the radar, dropping a lot of music on the kids, and then flying out. The promotional side of it is very very small." He has also recruited international support for the festival, hoping to show the world a different side of the country he has made his home. "Much as they see in the news that there is a lot of troubles here, a lot of the youth here just want to have some fun, just want to express themselves through the arts, whether it be music or any other type of arts," he said. The crowds may still be relatively small, but at the underground concerts leading up to the festival, there were already a few die-hard fans. "I really want to hear you scream," shouted Sabina Ablyaskina, lead singer of Uzbek funk band Tears of the Sun, in the tiny concrete bunker where the bands are warming up in front of a core of devoted fans for the main festival. The crowd was a mix of hip young Afghans, one in a pair of Kanye West glasses, and a few expats. They roared back at her, and then started dancing, hard, to the music. "This is the first time I'm watching music live, the first time in Kabul we've had something like this," says breathless 22-year-old Asil Ahmad. "It's one of the most unforgettable nights." At 11.15pm, the next band was just starting to get into its stride when the power cut off. At first organisers thought it was one of Kabul's regular electricity shortages, but then discovered that the landlord and his family — trying to sleep upstairs — weren't quite as taken by rock and roll. But Afghanistan is muddling along towards a new music future. That night, an impromptu acoustic concert by torchlight kept the crowd dancing for half an hour. And the landlord eventually agreed to leave the power on for the rest of the week — if the concerts ended early. So Afghanistan's first underground concerts now start at 8pm, and are over by 10.30, and there's no bar or alcohol allowed, in deference to the laws of the Islamic republic. But the crowd doesn't seem to need anything more than the music. — Reuters |
| Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore try to tweet sway split rumours Posted: 01 Oct 2011 06:49 AM PDT LOS ANGELES, Oct 1 — Can Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore save their marriage — or at least stave off divorce rumours — through the power of Twitter?  Kutcher and Moore on firmer ground wave to fans as they arrive for Colcci's Winter 2011 collection during Sao Paulo Fashion Week, January 30, 2011. — Reuters pic The most recent buzzing about discord in the couple's marriage began last Friday, on the eve of the couple's sixth wedding anniversary, when the pair were spotted on separate coasts. Moore was in New York promoting her Lifetime movie "Five". Kutcher, meanwhile, was seen partying with his former "That '70s Show" co-star Danny Masterson at San Diego, California, nightclub The Fluxx — after which, according to the current buzz, he spent the night with hitherto-anonymous San Diego blonde Sara Leal. From there, the rumours — as they tend to do — blossomed. As yesterday, according to esteemed celebrity journalist Perez Hilton, there might have been multiple women holed up in Kutcher's hotel room — though, apparently, the other women waited in a separate area while he and Leal commingled. (Memo to Ashton: If that is, indeed, the way it went down, you're doing it wrong.) While neither Kutcher nor Moore have dignified the affair rumours with a direct response, they do appear to have obliquely addressed the issue via Twitter, which appears to be their favoured method of communicating with their fans. On Thursday, Kutcher made sly reference to the brouhaha, tweeting a link to Spotify to indicate that he was currently listening to the Public Enemy chestnut "Don't Believe the Hype". He followed up with a variation on another chestnut, writing "When you ASSUMME to know that which you know nothing of you make an ASS out of U and ME". Meanwhile, Moore offered her own puzzler Monday, posting a photo of herself with her eyes closed with the caption, "I see through you . . ." Though some reports have interpreted Moore's Twit-pic as a message to her 33-year-old husband, it's equally likely that she's broadcasting to the tabloid media that their methods and tactics are transparent, even with her eyes closed. Or she could just be making a goofy joke unrelated to the affair rumours at all. Leal's intentions seem to be a little more clear, at least if the New York Post is to be believed. According to the Post, Leal has met with Beverly Hills attorney Keith Davidson — who brokered a settlement between Lindsay Lohan and former Betty Ford worker Dawn Holland — and is shopping the story of her alleged fling with Kutcher. The Post's source tells the paper, "Sara is talking to multiple media outlets for a deal. She wants $250,000 (US, or RM797,700), but the offers haven't been as high. What she really wants is to get a payoff from Ashton. She has reached out to Ashton's team." We can only hope that Kutcher renders his response via Twitter. — Reuters |
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