Cheb Khaled and Pitbull: Rai and the World

Cheb Khaled’s latest studio album, C’est la vie, was released in September this year. The album features signature Khaled songs such as Wili Wili that are slow and catchy, reminiscent of hits like Aicha and also songs like Hiya Hiya which are upbeat dance tracks similar to previous chart toppers, Didi Didi.

Most of the songs on the album consist of the quarter-tone notes (Langlois pg.265). These are a rather rare feature in Rai music considering the element of fusion with Western instrumentation. The use of the derbukka (goblet drum) is also prominent in some of the songs on the album.

Khaled has followed the trend of merging the local and global and ‘East’ and ‘West’ (Langlois, pg. 259) in this album. This sort of musical style is not new in the Rai musical scene where previous experiments by artists like Cheb Mami and Sting have proved to be very successful in the form of hits like Desert Rose. This particular type of collaborative art between the different regions has elevated the status of the Rai music scene in the ‘World Music’ business. Khaled’s song Hiya Hiya in this new album, is in line with the tradition mentioned above. The song features Pitbull, who is a hip name in the world dance music scene. Pitbull’s musical affiliations and marketing strategies are interesting to note here because he uses various alcoholic beverages as elements of product placement in his videos. The implications of this kind of collaboration with an international artist like Pitbull on Rai music will be an interesting subject to study. Previously collaborations between the Rai music producers and the ‘West’ have also been seen as having certain political connotations. An example is Rachid Taha’s song Barra Barra that was featured in Ridley Scott’s film, Black Hawk Down (Swedenburg pg. 183). Critics comment that this application has relevance to the political contexts of that time, that is, the Iraq war. These kinds of examples are recalled as the ‘cultural resistance’ feature notably present in the original Rai music forms. The joint production with Pitbull can also be regarded as a return to the roots of the Rai music that goes with its association with spaces such as nightclubs (Langlois pg. 260). However, such premature conclusions are inadequate, as a confluence of forces such as globalization, glocalization and cultural hybridity are at work here. This album presents a unique situation in terms of the merging of East with the West. But this phenomenon is not entirely new as pointed out above. It is a definite recommendation for those who want to get a sense of the typical Rai dance tunes sprinkled with English verses sung by Pitbull at different points, leading the music to be relevant across different cultures.

Coke Studio

Coke Studio has not only revived the Pakistani music industry but has given the cultural aspect of the music in the country a relatively new twist. Coke Studio is a Pakistani music television series sponsored by the Coca- Cola Company under the able watch of the renowned producer Rohail Hyatt (former member of the legendary pop act, Vital Signs). The show has developed some amazing pieces of fusion music over the course of its past five seasons.

Fusion music, in my opinion, is not a new concept. Fusion of various genres, for example, the Western contemporary rock with Eastern classical has been experimented by the likes of the Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and Michael Brooks. Then what is Coke Studio doing differently that these previous tries in the art of fusion did not accomplish?

First, Coke Studio’s name itself is a self-fulfilling prophecy of success. The partnership or support, if you may by a global brand like Coke is a definite marker of a comfortable jump-start by the musical venture. Throughout history Coke has come up with some of the most innovative and stylish ads.

Coke in Pakistan has always endorsed the strongest forms of material culture, that have been found to be relevant throughout generations, for example, the use of the sport of cricket in many of their advertisements. This provides a great marketing strategy for Coke, which uses the undying passion (non-material culture) for cricket (material culture) in Pakistan to spearhead their product in the market. As suggested in the first reading for the class (Youth Cultures in the Middle East), there is no denying that there is a relationship or overlap between the material and non-material cultures.

So swinging back to Coke Studio, such a partnership with Coke (who are always coming up with new advertising strategies) coupled with talented artists (ranging from the greatly revered performers like Atif Aslam, who have enjoyed immense success in Bollywood and folk singers such as Ata-Ullah Khan, who bring to life the ancient poetry of the Indus) from across the board in Pakistan is the pointer for Coke Studio’s success in Pakistan.

Second, as much as I have mentioned that fusion music is not a new concept, it does need its recognition as one of the core ingredients of Coke Studio’s success. Fusion music used by Coke Studio can be classified under the umbrella of glocalization and cultural hybridity. Robertson recognizes glocalization as ‘recontextualization of global phenomenon with respect to local cultures’. This is exactly what Coke Studio is doing. It merges the Western Pop/rock with the Eastern folk/classical to form this novel genre that reminisces somewhat of the psychedelic rock movement in the 1960s. This is not to say that the fusion music developed by Coke Studio is rip off of the psychedelic music but it is to put Coke Studio in a greater framework of glocalization and cultural hybridity which hints towards borrowing various aspects of foreign cultures. One example of such a musical piece from Coke Studio I find worth mentioning is:

This song incorporates various elements of Eastern folk and soul in the form of Qawwali combined with dominant use of Western instruments (electric guitar on WaWa pedal effect).

Third, Coke Studio has somewhat blurred the boundaries between the highbrow and the lowbrow culture. I am delivering this idea from my own observations and I have witnessed that music from Coke Studio has been played in low-key music stores in relatively low-income neighbourhoods on a high volume and I have also seen it being played during family gatherings of the upper class in some of the expensive hotels in Lahore. Qawwali in the Indian subcontinent is considered as the music of the people or the lower strata of the society. Rock music on the other hand is a relatively newer concept in Pakistan and is the music of the youth and the privileged half of the society. Coke Studio has developed a ‘common culture’ in the sense that both forms of music are not only accessible but also liked by the different social classes in Pakistan.

I think there are so many sociological and communications (media theory) layers to this cultural phenomenon in Pakistan that they cannot all be covered in a limited space. I leave you with some of the remarkable pieces produced by Coke Studio over the years so that you can get a taste of what this is all about: