It's been a while since my last post but then, there really has nothing been nothing new to write about. Lebanon still gets bombed and Israel rocketed, Iraq slides ever further towards civil war, Tony Blair continues to be The Manichaean Candidate. Same old, same old. But last night on Newsnight, the final piece was from Salam Pax, the Blogger of Baghdad, who's been a humourous recent regular on the show. His presentation from yesterday was "Salam Pax's Guide to Having a Good Time in Baghdad." Understandably, his options were limited and, surprise, surprise, better under Saddam's rule when there wasn't a suicide bomber every day. One of his choices was to listen to music but he found very few record shops open, threatened by fundamentalists who have gained the upper hand since the end of the invasion. Pax had a look online to see why there should be some opposed to the record-selling. He found one Candadian-based Sheikh Kutty, who said that Western music was associated with 'diseases of the soul'. Was ever there a better description of Chas & Dave's work rendered? Possibly, no doubt by Germaine Greer or Mark Lawson. I must say, after listening to 'Snooker Loopy' on a loop I did feel a little giddy as if inebriated by tuberculosis. Sometimes, I have felt disappointed and confused in life as when listening to Shania Twain's 'That Don't Impress Me Much' which has a build-up of "so you're a rocket scientist... so you're Brad Pitt... so you've got a car." But why, why? Surely a logical progression would be "so you've got a car... so you're a rocket scientist... so you're Brad Pitt" or switching Brad Pitt and a rocket scientist, because being either of those two must, just must, equate to being a cut above owning a car. So the song ends, instead of climaxing, rather bathetically.
Perhaps this Sheikh Kutty could address his grievances by teaming up with Sean Paul to produce 'Kutty Rock', an album containing such international hits like "We be burning (Baghdad)." Or he could have his own show 'Trust me, I'm a muezzin' and could collaborate with Dr Fox (not a real doctor) of Magic FM radio, he of the words "It's a fact, you can't prove it and there's no scientific evidence, but it's a fact." Kutty doesn't realise the only words associated with 'diseases of the soul' are his own and, having lived in Canada, hasn't it been impossible to quarantine himself from it. What if he was walking down the street and he heard one of J. S. Bach's melodies wafting through an open window? Would that throw him into a paroxysm of fury or lay him low for years with depression? If so, there must be something seriously wrong with him. Salam Pax said, however, that Sheikh Kutty's was just one opinion. Pehaps I could suggest to Kutty the inoculation of Jesus Christ.