Victory Must Be Imminent: Iraq Has an Aspiring Boy Band

From the Saturday Wall Street Journal (subscription required), a neat story, though not my cup of tea:

The Iraq Street Boys
Five friends from Baghdad dreamed of fame when they started a boy band. The war pulled them apart; now an American backer is giving them another shot.

LONDON — In a dance studio here, five young Iraqi men lined up, fists held to their mouths like microphones. They swiveled their hips and sang their love song, “Hey Girl.”

As their British trainers applauded, the singers bowed with a grin. Then they sang “While We Can,” a song about war, loss and hope:

In the time of war, in the time of devastation,
When you seek the light, you long for salvation.

They should know. The band, “Unknown to No One,” is a musical anomaly: an Iraqi Western-style pop group that sings in English. Thanks to a wealthy American benefactor, its members have traveled from Baghdad, where they contended with a radio station owned by Saddam Hussein’s son and practiced without electricity over the sounds of gunfire, to a plush apartment in the British capital. Here, a team of voice, dance and physical trainers are prepping them for a shot at the big time.

Unknown to No One, a group of young Iraqis hoping for pop stardom, rehearses in a London studio.

The music world is filled with hopeful garage bands and erstwhile managers who believe they can turn them into stars. Few ever make it. While the novelty of being an Iraqi band might be marketable, the challenges they face in becoming the next Backstreet Boys are huge.

But the roller-coaster ride these young men have already taken gives a glimpse of the dreams that ordinary Iraqis carve out amid violence and suicide bombing. And not every garage band started out being forced to write a song for Saddam Hussein’s birthday just to get air time or now worries about the safety of their families in war-torn Baghdad.

“Our heart is heavy with the pain we see from Iraq,” says Art Hartounian, the 28-year-old keyboard player and founder of the band. “We want to show the world a success story, a happy ending.”

The band members almost mirror their country’s religious and ethnic composition: one is a Sunni Muslim; two are Shiite Muslims and two are Christians. In some ways, their hopes and disappointments since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq echo those of Iraq too. Like every Iraqi who accepts the help of an American, they’ve had to weigh a potentially brighter future against the additional dangers their families may face.

Seriously, this is a great story, and in its own way says a lot about how Iraq’s recovery from decades of oppression is proceeding.

The band formed 5 years ago. Under Saddam Hussein, in return for having a love song they wrote played on the air, the band had to write a birthday tune praising the Iraqi dictator (”Our love, you bring, All bells let them ring, As we all will sing, Long live dear Saddam.”) The band says the birthday tune was played 48 times a day for a whole week (that should be in the list of justifications for going to war–Ed.), and their love song just once.

I wish these guys all the best. I just hope they don’t take it personally that I’m not going to make listening to another boy band a high priority.