Iraq 'N' Roll in the WSJ: Things were sort of better for Baghdad heavy metal band prior to invasion. But headbangers vow to persevere.

Iraq 'n' Roll: Band
Shows Heavy Mettle
As Its Gigs Disappear

After Saddam, Clubs Turn
Deaf Ear to Acrassicauda;
A Frontman Backs Out
By YOCHI J. DREAZEN
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
August 17, 2004; Page A1

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- When Acrassicauda ripped into a furious version of Metallica's "For Whom the Bell Tolls" at a recent concert, dozens of fans rushed the stage, jerked their heads to the music and slam-danced.

Midway through the set, a portly club official took the stage and ordered the crowd to sit down. The band ignored him and kept playing, and around 50 of the roughly 200 fans remained standing. The official ended the concert and angrily escorted the band off the stage. Faisal Talal, the band's singer and rhythm guitarist, shouted a string of profanities, drawing cheers from the crowd.

It was a classic moment of rock 'n' roll rebellion, but such gestures come at a high price in Iraq. The venues that Acrassicauda -- which may be Iraq's only heavy-metal band -- played before the war are now government compounds or off-limits because of street crime. The staid Iraqi Hunting Club, which hosted the aborted concert, says the band won't be allowed back. The group hasn't found a new venue.

"It's never been harder for us to play our music, but there's also never been so much of a need for it," says Mr. Talal, 21 years old. "There's a lot to be angry about these days, and we want to give people a way to get that out."

The members of Acrassicauda honed their English by singing along to black-market Megadeth and Metallica CDs. They developed their stage moves by copying what they saw on pirated videotapes of American rock concerts. Now they're learning a different lesson: the difficulties of reviving culture and entertainment in a society ripped apart by war.

The four members of Acrassicauda, which means Black Scorpion in Latin, hope they can prove just as resilient. The young men -- Mr. Talal, bassist Faris al-Lateef, drummer Marwan Mohammad Riyak and guitarist Tony Aziz -- met as high-school students and formed the band, along with another member, in 2000. Scions of prominent families, they were drawn together by their love of Western heavy-metal bands like Slayer and Judas Priest, which appealed to their feelings of isolation and disillusionment.

"It's about feeling powerless and lonely and wanting to scream out because no one else is paying attention to what you're feeling," says Mr. Lateef, 23, who has spiky hair, a goatee and tinted sunglasses that he wears indoors. "The songs were sung by Americans but they could easily have been written by us as Iraqis."

The music was a difficult and dangerous obsession during Saddam Hussein's regime. Many record stores refused to stock heavy metal because it was associated so closely with the U.S. Those that did stored the CDs in back rooms or under the counter and sold them only to trusted customers. Albums whose covers depicted religious, satanic or sexual imagery -- all mainstays of heavy-metal art -- were banned.

Performing posed a bigger challenge. The members of an earlier heavy-metal band, Scarecrow, had been dragged from the stage by Iraqi intelligence agents in 1999 and jailed for two months on sedition charges. The band later broke up. That episode led Acrassicauda to practice secretly in store basements.

On the advice of their music teacher and mentor, Saad Zai, the musicians wrote a tribute to Mr. Hussein called "Youth of Iraq." (Sample lyrics: "By following the leader Saddam Hussein/we will make them fall, we will drive them insane...") The lyrics to "Doll," a song ostensibly about a failed love affair, say it's "time to change the actor...it's time to say stop," which fans knew to recognize as a subtle attack on Mr. Hussein.

In late 2001, several hundred spectators packed the Orfali Art Gallery in the wealthy Mansour neighborhood for the band's first concert. It was an awkward affair: Fans stayed in their seats the entire show, and the band members, who had practiced together for 15 months, were too nervous to focus on stage presence or interacting with the audience, Mr. Lateef says. When the band played the Rabat wedding hall in late 2002 for what turned out to be its final concert before the war, the musicians saw young Iraqis swinging their heads and slam-dancing for the first time.

After the U.S.-led invasion, the band looked forward to a future free of censorship and other restrictions on its music, but the unrelenting tumult is taking a heavy toll. While band members say they haven't gotten any flak over their music from the government or religious leaders, some say their parents don't approve because of the threat of violence.

Mr. Talal says Acrassicauda had an easier time performing under Mr. Hussein, because it had been approved by the government and had its choice of venues. Today, the Orfali gallery has been turned into a government building frequently guarded by U.S. troops, and the Rabat hall is in an area of the city beset by street crime and political violence. None of the city's other clubs or halls are willing to book the band because of fears that a concert of American music would be targeted by terrorists.

Worse, the band's former lead singer, Walid Rabiaa, has gotten death threats as result of his day job as a translator for the British Broadcasting Corp. He is planning to move to Canada. Mr. Talal says he was so shaken by the sight of a severed head at the scene of a suicide bombing that he couldn't practice or compose new music for weeks.

Some former fans, meanwhile, say they no longer want to listen to songs about anger and sadness while they live in a country that has seen too much of both in recent months. "Heavy-metal music doesn't belong in Iraq anymore," says Ziad Ali, a mechanical engineer who walked out of the Iraqi Hunting Club concert before the plug was pulled. "It's a luxury we can't afford right now."

Amid the difficulties, Acrassicauda is trying to get its first record deal. Mr. Lateef e-mailed record producers in the U.S., U.K. and Australia, but none responded. A French producer told the band he wanted to include "Youth of Iraq" on a compilation, but the members refused because the song flattering Mr. Hussein carries unpleasant memories for them. "We don't want success from something we were forced to do," Mr. Lateef says.

In the meantime, the band has taken matters into its own hands. This spring, the young men crowded into Mr. Zai's small musical-instrument shop and recorded three original songs, "Underworld," "Psycho" and "End of the Beginning."

Mr. Lateef says the band dreams of playing overseas and presenting a different facet of their battered country to Western audiences. "I want people to know there are rockers in Iraq," he says.