Back on the tarbush/fez tip: Shafiq Husayn (plus Edward Said and a kufiya)

Thanks to Omar for turning me on to the video of Shafiq Husayn's "The U.N. Plan," from his album Shafiq En A-Freek-A.

I've mostly paid attention to the video and the general sound, so I'm turning to this account of the lyrics, courtesy The Quietus.

'The U.N. Plan' is about being stuck in a rut, "living in circles". A tight, delicious groove and surging drums accompany vocals about remembering to be a star. They duel with reflections in reverb, saying things like "her name was boo and she left me all alone to expand", as if a consciousness were struggling to put positive light on a situation.

As for the video, there are a number of intriguing elements. Shafiq appears in it in five guises: as a kind of Lonnie Liston Smith in red turban and camo fatigues; as a kind of Rasta-ish boho wearing a knit hat with Ethiopian colors; a somewhat similar look to the former, but with a red hat (you can see this guise in the frame of the embedded video above); in dark glasses and red beret; and finally, and most remarkably, as an old-school Afrocentric intellectual, complete with Malcolm-style glasses and a fez (tarbush).

The provenance of Shafiq's very intello look here is given in an earlier frame, with the titles for the video, when we see this title page, from a text by the Moorish Science Temple, founded by Noble Drew Ali. The fez was part of the outfit worn by adherents of Moorish Science. And in fact, in the photo above, not only does Shafiq recall Malcolm X, but also Noble Drew Ali (see the photo from this previous fez post.)

With these images Shafiq is conjuring with the racialist theories of Moorish Science, which proposes that African-Americans are of Moorish origin. But he also conjures up the image of post-Mecca Malcolm, who abandoned the racialist doctrines of Elijah Muhammad and advocated progressive alliances with peoples of all races. The gentleman sitting at the table with Shafiq-in-fez could be Arab or Hispanic or South Asian. The video also shows images of the Buddha and a text about Tibet.

And then the Shafiq-in-beret is shown with a woman wearing what may be an Islamic headscarf (worn pretty loosely). In one scene the two of them are shown in front of a mural that depicts a woman in red kufiya, who appears to be depicted with "African" features. (The woman also appears with Shafiq-in-red-hat.)

We see a shot of another page of a book toward the end of the video, another text that the Shafiq-in-fez is presumably reading.

Look closely, and you will see that it is the top of page 175 of Edward Said's Orientalism, from Chapter Two, "Orientalist Structures and Restructures." The passage is about Chateaubriand's visit to Egypt.

How cool is that, Edward Said in a music video? Of course, it would be a video from an artist who belongs to the afro-futurist ensemble Sa-Ra Creative Partners, a group that evokes the name, sensibilities, and mythologies of Sun Ra and his Arkestra. A group responsible for production on Erykah Badu's incredible New Amerykah: Part One.

There is no doubt more to say about how expansive and complex is Shafiq Husayn's "U.N. Plan," but I'll leave it there for now.

The Fez Series: Sun Ra & his Arkestra in Chicago, 1960, & the Tom Wilson connection

This is my reproduction of the inner tray card of the Sun Ra CD, "Music from Tomorrow's World" (Atavistic, 2002). L-r: Marshall Allen, Jon L. Hardy, John Gilmore, Sun Ra, Ronnie Boykins, George Hudson. (Credit: the original photo was transferred and restored by John McCortney, AirWave Studio, Chicago.)

Allen, Gilmore, Boykins and Hudson are all wearing fezzes (tarabish).

See my earlier post, where I quote Robert Campbell et al who write: "The [1957] photo that accompanied the Defender announcement showed Sunny wearing a fez, as he and the rest of the band had done for a little while the previous year. It is said that they quit after some of Elijah Muhammad's bodyguards showed up one night and told them, 'No more fezzes.' Apparently such headgear was reserved to the Nation of Islam."

I'm not sure how the chronology works out here, as the photo above shows the Arkestra still wearing fezzes in 1960. When did the NOI issue their threats?

And I wish the photo was a bit clearer--would like to work out what is on those patches sewn on the fezzes.

Do you think it's possible that über-cool Bob Dylan producer Tom Wilson was inspired to wear a fez by Sun Ra? (He wore one in one of the alternate cuts for "Subterranean Homesick Blues"--read more here.)

Wilson put out Sun Ra's first album, "Jazz by Sun Ra," on his Transition label in 1957. (He also put out records by John Coltrane, Cecil Taylor and Donald Byrd on Transition, whose catalogue was eventually purchased by Delmark.)

Then, of course, Wilson went on to produce several monster pieces of music. He added the electric guitars to Simon and Garfunkel's "The Sounds of Silence." His production credits include Bob Dylan's Don't Look Back, the Mothers of Invention's Freak Out!, The Velvet Underground's White Light/White Heat, and Nico's Chelsea Girl.

Why, for gods' sake, has no one written a biography of this amazing producer, arguably as important as Phil Spector and the like?

Wilson also produced Sun Ra's 1961 album, The Futuristic Sounds of Sun Ra.

And Wilson also produced one of the most unusual recordings (among a legion of them) that Sun Ra was ever involved in: Batman & Robin, by The Sensational Guitars of Dan & Dale (Tifton Records, 1966). The personnel on the album, in fact, was the Blues Project (whose 1967 album Projections was also produced by Wilson) and Sun Ra, John Gilmore, Marshall Allen and Pat Patrick of the Sun Ra Arkestra. Ra's Hammond B-3 organ playing is excellent! But it is definitely weird to hear the Ra men play together with the Blues Project, on songs that are mostly rock and blues.


Until I pieced all this together, I could not for the life of me figure out how Ra and the Blues Project appeared on the same album. Now I get it--it's the Tom Wilson connection.

And of course this all connects back to that fez scene in Mad Men. Season one, episode 8. When Don goes slumming with the beatniks.

Misc. #84.07: Edible Undies in Syria; 5% Fez; 'Democracy Now' Kufiya; Leila K

Continuing to purge the desktop:

1. I just came across this article, "Edible Undies in the Muslim World," at Salon.com, originally published in Der Spiegel. The title is misleading, it's all about Syria's lingerie industry, which exports elsewhere in the Arab world.

It's the "latest thing," Abdullah Hayek says, holding the garment up. It's an almost nonexistent bra and thong, which consists of strings and a tiny triangle. It's made, not of fabric, but of sugar fondant, which has been rolled out until it is wafer-thin, held together with elastic cords.

"This allows the husband to nibble the underwear off of his wife's body," explains Hayek. The garment, which costs the equivalent of about $3.90, is available in a selection of flavors, including pineapple, apple, honey, chocolate and mango. "I probably sell 15 of them a day," said Hayek.

It refers to the book, The Secret Life of Syrian Lingerie: Intimacy and Design. I met Malu Halasa, one of the co-authors, at a conference in Holland in 2007, and posted about the book here.

And here is another report, from Martin Asser of the BBC. It's somewhat sharper and less leering than the Spiegel report, and it has the added attraction of a bit of video, where Asser goes into a lingerie workshop to talk to a man who makes lingerie, and we see a singing g-string. The workshop owner, Ali Nasser, tells Asser:

"Our work is all about igniting the desires of a husband for his wife, so he doesn't go looking elsewhere. It's a good thing and there's nothing wrong it."

"There's no shame in religion," he adds...

2. I keep wanting to get back to the topic of the fez (tarbush) and its coolness. (Earlier posts here and here.) Here's a photo from the back cover of rapper King Sun's 1990 release, Righteous But Ruthless, which I have posted on previously, but without a photo. King Sun is wearing the black kufiya, and it's probably his producer King Shameek who is wearing the fez. King Sun belonged to the Nation of Gods and Earths (Five Percenters), as did so many leading rappers of the period. Although King Sun, like other 5% rappers, did not rap about the Middle East, the kufiya and the fez are examples of the 'romantic alignment' with Islam and the Arab world that was, and is, so common in Afrocentric circles. The album is well worth a listen, recalling the great work of Poor Righteous Teachers, who collaborate with King Sun on one track.

3. For the archive. You've seen it many times--every day, really: the kufiya that shows up in the opening to Amy Goodman's show, Democracy Now. It's a great image, no?


4. A posting on wayneandwax reminded me of Leila K , the Swedish-Moroccan rapper, of Moroccan origin, who came out with a quite wonderful 12", "Got to Get," back in 1989. It's very old school, it has some cheesy lines, ("I ain't down with no crack") but it is catchy and energetic. Check the video out here. Wayne's discusses another Leila K, "Open Sesame," which was a big dance hit all over Europe in 1992. Through one of the comments on Wayne's post, I learned about another Leila K hit, "Electric Power," from 1995 (watch the video here). It's decent, and like "Open Sesame," in the Eurodance vein rather than rap. Leila K is important, arguably, as one of the first, maybe the first, well-known rapper from Europe who was of Arab origin. And again, for the sake of the archive, here are the front and back covers of the "Got to Get" 12".

The dudes are Swedish producers Rob'n'Raz, who got equal billing with Leila K on this, her first release.

Sun Ra Fez alert!

This clipping is from the Chicago Defender, July 6, 1957, p. 30, and is to be found in the online version of From Sonny Blount to Sun Ra: The Chicago Years, by Robert L. Campbell, Christopher Trent, and Robert Pruter (Revised August 21, 2007). Regarding the photo, Campbell et al write: "The photo that accompanied the Defender announcement showed Sunny wearing a fez, as he and the rest of the band had done for a little while the previous year. It is said that they quit after some of Elijah Muhammad's bodyguards showed up one night and told them, 'No more fezzes.' Apparently such headgear was reserved to the Nation of Islam."

As far as I'm aware, the fez wasn't worn by the general membership of the Nation of Islam, but only by Elijah Muhammad and some of his inner circle.

Fez Alert: Tom Wilson in "65 Revisited"

I was alerted to this fez by Manohla Dargis' review of D. A. Pennebaker’s film 65 Revisited, based on footage shot for his famous Bob Dylan documentary, Don't Look Back. 65 Revisited includes an alternate version of the famous scene from Don't Look Back where Dylan flips through flash cards from the song "Subterranean Homesick Blues," while standing in an alley. Allen Ginsberg appears on the left side of the screen.

Here's what Dargis has to say about the alternate version:

The setup resembles the alley version — Mr. Dylan drops cards while standing (if visibly shuddering) on the right of the frame — though in this version his Columbia Records producer, Tom Wilson, makes a stylish stand-in for Allen Ginsberg. Wearing shades, an overcoat and an insouciant fez, Mr. Wilson looks as cool as it gets, cooler than even that poetic alley cat.

I believe the other guy is Bob Neuwirth.

What I find very interesting about Dargis' observation is that the "insouciant" fez worn by Wilson seems to be key to how cool he looks. How is it that the fez got to be so cool in the US in the fifties and sixties?

This is the question that I'm trying to work out. Tom Wilson, by the way, was extraordinarily cool, and deserves to be regarded as a producer on the order of Phil Spector. Among his production credits are Dylan's Don't Look Back, the Mothers of Invention's Freak Out!, and The Velvet Underground's White Light/White Heat.

Check out the Wilson-fez version from 65 Revisited here.

My first fez alert, prompted by "Mad Men," is here.

Fez: "Mad Men"

I've been watching the new AMC show "Mad Men" pretty faithfully, in part because I like the way it depicts gender relations in the early '60s.

I was struck by something in the latest episode (8), "The Hobo Code." Don goes to meet his on-the-side girl Midge and her beatnik friends at a flat (probably somewhere in the Village). They all smoke pot and listen to Miles Davis. Here's the thing, one of the guys is wearing a fez--green, I think. So now I'm dying to know whether this is "accurate" (the show prides itself on its scrupulously faithful attention to details of setting and costuming).

So, was the fez part of "hip" beatnik gear? Where did it come from? Surely not the Shriners--the epitome of un-hip.



There's a flickr fez pool to look at--but it doesn't really help.

I seem to recall photos of bebop artists wearing fezes, and then of course there's the Moorish Science Temple founded by Noble Drew Ali (pictured above), which was gaining white bohemian adherents in the fifties (see Peter Lamborn Wilson's Sacred Drift, p. 49).

And then there are Matt Groening's beloved Akbar and Jeff of Life Is Hell.

Stay tuned. Maybe I need to start a "fezspotting" series?