I’m still putting together my blog entry on the taqwacore punk bands Al Thawra and The Kominas and hope to publish it shortly. Until then, following on from last week’s taster “Sharia Law In The USA” by The Kominas, here is a crisp biscuit from Chicago punks Al Thawra. “Miskeen” which is arabic for a poor or unlucky person is taken from their 2008 CD “Who Benefits From War”. This is about as abrasive arab music ever gets and is not for the faint-hearted.
Thanks to Abdelhalim El Hachimi (of Tales from Bradistan) for turning me on to Skindred, a British band that brings together metal, punk and reggae to create damn good pop music. Below is the first part of his excellent post on Skindred — a lot of info on the band, scads of links, nice photos, and insightful reflections on punk history.
Skindred
Kerrang magazine consistently labels Skindred as the best live band in Britain. I would go further than that and say that they are the best band in Britain full stop. There isn’t much originality or creativity left these days amongst home-grown groups and Skindred stand well apart from the rest of the pack. Their effective fusion of metal, punk and reggae, infused with a pop sensibility, works consistently well and there is literally none like them.
Skindred were formed in 1998 from the ashes of Dub War, the former band of Skindred frontman Benji Webbe. Dub War had a reasonable amount of success but for me the different elements of their sound never came together in the way that Skindred have successfully managed to achieve.
