Norouz/Nowruz mixtape by Rebel Up SebCat

Norooz or Nowruz, also known as the Persian New Year, is celebrated every year on 20/21 March in different countries around the world such as Iran, Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, India, Iraq, Syria, Turkey and many more.

It’s all about celebrating spring, a new beginning of the year. Families normally celebrate this event together in parks or in their houses in a “festival-like” atmosphere. Unfortunately, with the current crisis, many countries and communities are in quarantine and many families can not celebrate together.

The Huna sounds collective is all about celebrating good times. They decided to do a live stream for Norooz and invite local & international DJ’s to play from home, featuring Ramin&Reda, Aso Asin, Mafi, Arian Zand, Kuryokin & Rebel Up SebCat.

This Norooz mixtape is made with Iranian, Kurdish, Iraqi and North Syrian sounds, nowruz mobarak! Also up for download, check it out >

Wedn 16 Oct > Rebel Up @ Le Lac w/ Sunn Trio (US), Hussein Rassim solo (IQ) and NGHE dj set, Bxl

Rebel Up, NGHE & Le Lac present: Arizona oriental psyche:

HUSSEIN RASSIM (IQ – BXL) concert time > 20h sharp
Hussein Rassim is a young Iraqi musician and player of the oud (Eastern lute), who studied at Iraq’s best music schools. Hussein is also a member of the bands Solo Baghdad, Arumbo and Nawaris. He has recorded an album titled Amerli with Refugees for Refugees, and Migration with Nawaris.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrSxShVRydU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vb_CoQBXwxw

SUNN TRIO (US) > concert time: 21h00 sharp
Sunn Trio hail from Phoenix, Arizona. Surrounded by deserts like the Middle Eastern guitar music that is one of the notable influences on their sound, along with free jazz and harsh exotica and touchstones as disparate as Sonny Sharrock ,John McLaughlin, Sir Richard Bishop and Thinking Fellers Union Local 282. Sunn Trio’s Fayrus album on the Unrock label last year is a kaleidoscope for the ears featuring sax, saron, gong, boning, lap steel, tambura, oud lute and even a Gameboy, echoing from behind a curtain of bitter haze and sun-beaten punk. In the words of Alan Bishop (Sun City Girls), “Wielding Indo-Arabian Saz & white lightning six-string shrapnel amidst an alligator snapping turtle’s rhythm section, this trio-quartet-sextet may also sprout horns, flutes, animal skins, or shadow gamelan to faithfully demolish that whiny and predictable listening experience of today’s tepidly lazy, underachieving experimental music scene. Not a “safe” environment.”
https://sunntrio.bandcamp.com/album/fayrus
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciZqzZdUaEU

19h > Opening set trance – drone – folk – arabic – fez noz expé by NGHE
https://www.mixcloud.com/mediatheque-nghe/compil-du-dimanche-3-__-un-dimanche-dhiver/
https://www.mixcloud.com/mediatheque-nghe/la-compil-du-dimanche/during/after >

After/between concerts: rumble folk sounds by SebCat (Rebel Up)
http://tiny.cc/wvkddz
http://tiny.cc/lckddz
http://tiny.cc/ndkddz

FB event
damage : 7 euros
doors: 19h > NGHE dj set
concerts: 20h + 21h

@ Le Lac
36 Rue de Witte de Haelen
1000 Brussels

Wednesday 17 July: Babylon Trio @ Zomer Van Antwerpen, Muziek in de Wijk, Stuivenbergplein, Antwerpen

hello hello Antwerpen!

This tuesday evening, Babylon Trio will finally play Antwerpen for the 1st time (yes Antwerpen is very late to the electro arabic sound, we must admit). Respect to Zomer van Antwerpen / Muziek in de Wijk and the folks of Het Oude Badhuis for putting them in their programme.

Catch them live at during the Muziek in the Wijk evening at Stuivenbergplein in Antwerpen Noord. They will play from 18h30 to 19h30, followed by Algerian female chaabi singer Djazia Satour who plays at 20h. Promises to be a special arabic sound evening!

FB event / website

@ Stuivenbergplein
Antwerpen Noord

Tue 16 Oct > Rebel Up records album release party of Babylon Trio @ Recyclart Bxl, w/ Praed (LB), Aymeric de Tapol & Drache Musicale

Rebel Up Records album release night @ Recyclart > the new album of Babylon Trio and special guests Praed (LB). FREE IN!

Praed (LB)
founded in 2006 by Raed Yassin and Paed Conca and is a group that explores popular Arabic music (or shaabi) and its interconnections with other psychedelic and hypnotic music genres, such as free jazz and psych-rock. Raed Yassin performs keyboards and vocals, Paed Conca, clarinet and electronic bass. The group performed during many festivals and toured Japan, Europe and Canada. Praed has developed an international network of famous musicians, raising musical collaboration to the umpteenth square. Their next album will be released on the Akuphone label next year.
http://www.paed.ch/praed/
https://praed.bandcamp.com/releases

Babylon Trio (IQ/Bxl)
plays an electrified mix of contemporary Iraqi and Arabic styles, such as choubi choubi, dabke, maqam and electronic hybrids that set the dance floor on fire. The debut album “Habibi” of the trio is filled with songs about their old life in Iraq and their new life in Brussels, Belgium, about topics such as separation, love, beauty. They have played Nuits Sonores festival, Forest Sounds, Gentse Feesten and Fete de la Musique to name a few. The band will present their debut album “Habibi” on the Brussels label of Rebel Up Records (with the help of Rebel Up, NGHE Mediatheque, Ateliers Claus and Angstrom Studio in Brussels), available in LP and digital and available on the spot this Tuesday night
https://babylontrio.bandcamp.com/


Timetable > > >
20:00 Doors + DJ Aymeric de Tapol
21:00 Praed
22:00 Babylon trio
after: DJs Rebel Up Nightshop / Drache Musicale

FREE IN!

FB event / website

@ Recyclart
Rue de Manchester 13
Molenbeek Bxl

Babylon Trio – Habibi > Out now on Rebel Up Records as vinyl LP + digital!

the debut album ‘Habibi‘ by Babylon Trio is out now on Rebel Up Records (RUP006)

The current political state of Iraq is a far cry from what the Iraqi people envisioned. While the western media have largely stopped reporting about Iraq, in the past few months many protests have flared up in the capital Baghdad, Basra and cities allover the country. Persistent water shortages, power cuts, the lack of work and political corruption have angered the Iraqi population and protests have been the general order of the day and increasing by the month. The political elite has dug themselves in, protected and comfortable in governmental compounds, ordering police and the armed forces to crack down on protests with a shoot to kill on sight policy. In 2015, this ignited the first big emigration wave of young people and families leaving Iraq for neighbouring countries and the west and continues to do so. For many, returning seems very unlikely for the time being.

The three Iraqi musicians of Babylon Trio arrived in Belgium in 2015 as refugees of this political and social unrest. Arkan Mushtak is the composer and pinnacle of the band. Like the other members he hails from Baghdad, where from a young age onwards he has been shaped into a talented keyboard and piano player by Iraqi master composer Noor Sabah. He is accompanied by fellow musicians Saif Al-Qaissy (digital percussion, djarbouka and backing vocals) and singer Walaa Saad (vocals) and occasionally joined by Mohammed Algareb (guest percussion).

Babylon Trio plays an electrified mix of contemporary Iraqi and Arabic music styles, such as choubi choubi, dabke, maqam and electronic hybrids that put the dancefloor on fire. The trio’s debut album “Habibi” features songs about their old life in Iraq and new life in Brussels, Belgium, with topics such as separation from loved ones, love, beauty, honour and pure Arabic party bangers. This year will mark the power of the contemporary Iraqi street sound of Babylon Trio throughout Europe and beyond. Get ready for fire!

Tracklisting:
A
1. Bye Bye My Love ( وداعا يا حبيبي )
2. Iraqi Dabka Choubi
( چوبي عراقي )
3. Spoiled For Your Eyes
( لاجل عيونك / مدلل )
B
4. Difficult Separation ( فركتك صعبة )
5. Iraqi Prestige ( المعزوفة )
6. My Crazy Lover (
حبيبتي المجنونة )
7. The Euro Syrian Dabka (
الدبكة السورية الاوربية )
8. Habibi Trio Mix (Rebel Up Duckfood remix) ( مزيج حبيبي الثلاثي )

Released by Rebel Up Records on 26 september 2018.

Out on vinyl LP in coated cover design, buy on the Rebel Up webshop or via Bandcamp
buy digital album via Bandcamp.
distribution worldwide: N.E.W.S

This album has been made with the support of NGHE Mediatheque, cultural venue Les Ateliers Claus, Angstrom studio and Soylent Green studio in Brussels and everyone who has supported Babylon Trio in the past year, promoting, motivating and organising concerts for them.

produced by Seb Bassleer for Rebel Up Records
recorded at Angstrom Studio by Aymeric de Tapol & Nicolus Ripitus
mixed at Soylent Green Studio by Aymeric de Tapol
mastered by Frederic Alstadt at Angstrom Studio
cover design ‘Tapis’ by Kalām Collectif
(facebook.com/kalamshift)
photo (backcover) by Robert Kroos (flickr.com/mentalyouth)

graphic design by Vanessa Verbeiren

Sat 29 Oct > experimental evening by Rebel Up! & Lexi Disques @ NGHE Mediatheque with Porest (US/IR), Blood Stereo (UK), City Hands (NL) & Benjamin Franklin (Bxl)

Salam!
14725767_1785415645009331_8060045096061241209_nOn Saturday 29 Oct, an experimental concert night in the NGHE mediatheque! Organised by NGHE crew, Rebel Up! & Lexi Disques.

From synthesizer sounds to global cut up music, weirdo pop and adventures in sound.

Porest (US/IR)
Mark Gergis is quite a catch; founder of the Sham Palace label, long time collaborator of Sublime Frequencies and member of disbanded Asian pop group Neung Phak. Porest is his post-globalized hate pop project, with cabalistic text-to-speech drama and violent tape music against soapbox anthems and swirling barbed-wire psychedelia that indulges in the trappings of art and politics. Listen here.
At 18h, he will show 3 short movies that he made in Syria, Cambodia and Southeast Asia, in true Sublime Frequencies style!

Blood Stereo (Brighton, UK)
The masked duo Karen Constance & Dylan Nyoukis explore hand-cranked 20th century technology in combination with epiglottal gymnastics and free music modes inherited as much from punk rock’s mutilated aesthetic as utopian art styles. Music here.

City Hands (NL)
Dutch sound artist Manuel Padding aka City Hands approach brings unexpected sounds, from calm atmospheres to trippy vibrations and even poetry. His narratives generally evoke a world where humans no longer prevail, a stream of words lurking into post-apocalyptic loneliness and colourful magic.

Benjamin Franklin (Bxl)
Casio keyboard player Benjamin Franklin puts out graceful and mysterious home-taped recordings of hypnotic melodies, sweet ballad and deviant pop. Perfect warmup sounds to gently shake body & mind.

> finishing at 22h30, so please come on time!
possibly there will some veggie food too for those who come early.

18h > 3 short films of Mark Gergis (Syria – Cambodia – Southeast Asia)
19h Benjamin Franklin
20h City Hands & Blood Stereo
21h Porest
ends at 22:30 >

We will continue the afterparty @ Via Via cafe (Quai aux Briques 74 / St Cat)
from 22:30 til 2:30, free in.
dj sets by Mark Gergis (Sublime Frequencies), Rebel Up! SebCat & Diego Armando.

6€
FB event
6, Rue des Mariniers
1080 Molem