Man, I used to listen to so much George Wassouf at one time:
Younger:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUDRi53hiJE
From around the time I got to see him live:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQYEyRAalSg
He really doesn't have the vocal control and perfection that's expected in the classical material he sometimes covers, but at the moment he doesn't sound too bad to me on these two songs. Plus I like some of the more upbeat Syrian/Lebanese style stuff he did. Incredible rhythms in much of this material.
― Rockist Scientist, Wednesday, 30 May 2007 03:12 (6 years ago) Permalink
Garahoona! Yeah! scott seward, you have to listen to this one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68DfwYKdXn0
That chorus is so stern.
― Rockist Scientist, Wednesday, 30 May 2007 03:18 (6 years ago) Permalink
This is an Oum Kalthoum cover. (I heard his cover first, actually, which was true of several songs by Oum Kalthoum and Warda and maybe Abdel Halim Hafez.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AHzRMz2o1U
(That's kind of what I meant by the gateway drug bit.)
― Rockist Scientist, Wednesday, 30 May 2007 03:44 (6 years ago) Permalink
How much more can George Wassouf's voice deteriorate? Is there no limit?
http://www.arabymusic.com/search_result.asp?Category=George+Wassouf
― _Rudipherous_, Sunday, 30 January 2011 20:04 (2 years ago) Permalink
I think I might have rented a video of this GW performance back in the early 90s, because I remember that weird brutalist sort of back-drop. And this is one of my favorite songs his. I can't remember if I've ever found any performances of this before but this song is incredible:
― _Rudipherous_, Monday, 31 January 2011 00:37 (2 years ago) Permalink
There's one song from this concert (if it's the same one I'm thinking of it) which, in this performance, starts with a sample in English that goes: "Psych-socialism. . . Now you see it, now you don't." Very WTF.
― _Rudipherous_, Monday, 31 January 2011 00:39 (2 years ago) Permalink
Some of the best fucking rhythms ever.
― _Rudipherous_, Monday, 31 January 2011 00:43 (2 years ago) Permalink
If this doesn't make you want to be a belly dancer, you are insensate.
― _Rudipherous_, Monday, 31 January 2011 00:44 (2 years ago) Permalink
― _Rudipherous_, Monday, 31 January 2011 00:48 (2 years ago) Permalink
This is totally the same video (not the one immediately above, but the other). I'm sorry, but this is pretty mind-blowing to me. I borrowed this from a middle eastern grocery store in like 1993 or 1994, and I'm seeing it again for the first time on youtube.
― _Rudipherous_, Monday, 31 January 2011 00:50 (2 years ago) Permalink
Oh wait yeah that is the same concert. Sorry, I'm kind of a mess as I somehow always am on my Arabic music video threads.
― _Rudipherous_, Monday, 31 January 2011 00:58 (2 years ago) Permalink
Also, I have a bunch of this concert on cassette, on the Blue Cassette, I think. Funny because I don't think I recognized it at the time I rented the video, yet I'm pretty sure I had that cassette by that point. Maybe not.
― _Rudipherous_, Monday, 31 January 2011 04:18 (2 years ago) Permalink
I strongly suspect 1991/92 was his peak. I love how there are always people coming up onto the stage, or in this particular clip flowers being delivered from audience members. Always some crazy stuff going on. When I saw him, they showered him with money, and I he drank out of a glass (of champagne, I would guess) piled on top of other glasses, with the drink spilling into all the other glasses.
― _Rudipherous_, Monday, 31 January 2011 04:56 (2 years ago) Permalink
Kind of awesome young GW clip. Do I like singers who are bad actors or something? He does seem like a bad actor a lot of the time, and yet somehow very forgivably so.
― _Rudipherous_, Monday, 31 January 2011 16:17 (2 years ago) Permalink
Psychedelic surf intro., or something like that:
Another one I have on one or two of those cheap live cassettes I used to by. May all that music surface onto youtube!
― degrading the enemy narrative (_Rudipherous_), Friday, 25 March 2011 18:02 (2 years ago) Permalink
― _Rudipherous_, Monday, 3 September 2012 19:26 (9 months ago) Permalink
I'll say it again. The rhythms in the first embedded youtube video on this thread are like a direct hit on my pleasure center.
― _Rudipherous_, Monday, 3 September 2012 20:20 (9 months ago) Permalink
Also the second song (or second big section of one song?) on that clip seems like sleigh-ride music to me, of all things.
― _Rudipherous_, Monday, 3 September 2012 20:31 (9 months ago) Permalink