February 25, 2005

Choosing a Campaign Song

 by Jeremy

Shia Unity in Jeopardy

By JEREMY BROWN
Published: February 25, 2005

The delicate balance of shiite factions that made possible the triumph of the Shia United Iraqi Alliance party in the recent Iraqi election is now in danger of splitting down the middle, analysts say.

The crisis is being attributed to what some describe as a back room dispute between Grand Ayatollah Sayyid Ali Al-Hussaini Al-Sistani and the man who is likely to be Iraq's new Prime Minister, Ibrahim al-Jaafari. The conflict is over what inspiring anthem should be played in the background during festivities leading up to the next general election.

Mr al-Jaafari, 58, is the leader of the religious Dawa Party, one of Iraq's oldest parties, known for its popularity and close ties to Iran. He is insisting that the Alliance choose "We Are the Champions" by Queen.

An Irate Sistani has expressed outrage at this choice. "Let us put aside for a moment the fact that, for me, Queen has always been an over-rated band," he said last week, speaking in Arabic to an audience of his followers, "and also we can forgive the perhaps overly triumphalist energy behind that song. But the deal breaker on that song for me -- though I must say it is quite a delicious irony upon which I have ejoyed no small amount of mirth -- is that this was a song sung by a homosexual persian man [ed note: the late Freddie Mercury, born Farrokh Bulsara] who, to make matters still worse, was a citizen of Britain. This is a campaign song for Iraqi Shia? To poop on, maybe." The holy man shrugged, then waved off the idea with a dismissive sweep of his hand.

What would Sistani prefer? The Grand Ayatollah gave a private rendition, in English, to this writer during a telephone interview. He has requested that I not share the tape, but I have transcribed his treatment of the lyric:

Ain?t no stoppin? us now
We?re on the move
Ain?t no stoppin? us now
We?ve got the groove

Ain?t no stoppin? us now
We?re on the move
Ain?t no stoppin? us now
We?ve got the groove

There?s been so many things that?s held us down
But now it looks like things are finally comin? around
I know we?ve got a long, long way to go
And where we?ll end up, I don?t know

But we won?t let nothin? hold us back
We?re puttin? our show together, we?re polishing up our act now
And if you?ve ever been held down before
I know you refuse to be held down anymore, well

Don?t you let nothin?, nothin?
Stand in your way
I want y?all to listen, listen
To every word I say, every word I say

Ain?t no stoppin? us now (No, oh, oh)
We?re on the move, huh
Ain?t no stoppin? us now
We?ve got the groove, huh

Ain?t no stoppin? us now
We?re on the move (I know, I know)
Ain?t no stoppin? us now
We?ve got the groove (We got it)

I know you know someone that has a negative vibe
And if you?re tryin? to make it they only push you aside
They really don?t have nowhere to go
Ask them where their goin?, they don?t know

But we won?t let nothin? hold us back
We?re gonna put our show together, we?re gonna polish up our act, well
And if you?ve ever been held down before
I know you refuse to be held down anymore, well

Don?t you let nothin?, nothin?
Stand in your way
I want y?all to listen, listen
To every word I say, every word I say

Ain?t no stoppin? us now (No, no, no)
We?re on the move (We?re movin?, we?re groovin?)
Ain?t no stoppin? us now (We?re movin?, yeah, yeah, yeah)
We?ve got the groove (We?re groovin?, movin?, movin? movin? move)

Ain?t no stoppin? us now
We?re on the move (I know we?ve got the groove)
Ain?t no stoppin? us now
We?ve got the groove (We?ve got, got the groove)

Ain?t no stoppin? us now (No, no, no)
We?re on the move (We?re movin?, we?re groovin?)
Ain?t no stoppin? us now (We?re movin?, yeah, yeah, yeah)
We?ve got the groove (We?re groovin?, movin?, movin? movin? move)

Ain?t no stoppin? us now (Ooh, no, no)
We?re on the move (I?m on the move, I really, really got the groove)
Ain?t no stoppin? us now (And I know, I know we?ve got the groove)
We?ve got the groove (Makes you wanna really move)

Ain?t no stoppin? us now (No need in tryin?)
We?re on the move (?Cause I ain?t buyin?)
Ain?t no stoppin? us now (Don?t try to stop us, no, no, no)
We?ve got the groove

Ain?t no stoppin? us now
We?re on the move (I really, really got the groove)
Ain?t no stoppin? us now (No need in denyin?, well)
We?ve got the groove (I ain?t lyin?)

Ain?t no stoppin? us now [I know, I know]
We?re on the move (It?s been far too long, well)
Ain?t no stoppin? us now [Ain?t no stoppin? us]
We?ve got the groove [We?ve got the groove, there ain?t no stoppin? us]

Ain?t no stoppin? us now (It?s been far too long, y?all, ah)
We?re on the move [We?re on the move] (Just join me while I get in line)
Ain?t no stoppin? us now (Yeah, yeah)
We?ve got the groove (We?re leavin? the negative people way behind)

?Cause it ain?t no, yeah
{Don?t wanna stop, please don?t make me stop}
Please, please, please
{Don?t wanna stop, please don?t make me stop}
Don?t make me stop it
{Don?t wanna stop, please don?t make me stop}
See, I don?t know where we?re goin?
{Don?t wanna stop, please don?t make me stop}
Or where we?re gonna end up, yeah

[Movin? on, I?m movin? on]
[I?m movin? on, I?m movin? on, yeah]
But see we?re gonna keep tryin?
[Movin? on, I?m movin? on]
We?re gonna keep tryin?
[Movin? on, I?m movin? , yeah]
Over and over
[I said it ain?t no]
No stoppin? us [No]
See, said it ain?t no
No way, no way [Uh]
We?re gonna put our show together
Time to polish up our act
[See our time has finally came around, huh]

Ain?t no stoppin? us now (No...)
We?re on the move (Said we?re on the move, we really, really got the groove)
Ain?t no stoppin? us now (No...) [We?re movin? straight ahead]
We?ve got the groove

Ain?t no stoppin? us now (Oh...)
We?re on the move (Said we?re on the move, we really, really got the groove)
Ain?t no stoppin? us now [There?s so many obstacles might be in our way]
We?ve got the groove [but we?re gonna get there someday]

Ain?t no stoppin? us now (Oh...)
We?re on the move (Said we?re on the move, we really, really got the groove)
Ain?t no stoppin? us now [There?s so many obstacles might be in our way]
We?ve got the groove [But we?re gonna get there some day, some day]

Ain?t no stoppin? us now
We?re on the move
Ain?t no stoppin? us now [?Cause I?m on the move, ain?t no stoppin? us]
We?ve got the groove

Ain?t no stoppin? us now
We?re on the move
Ain?t no stoppin? us now
We?ve got the groove

How adamant is Mr. Sistani on this point? I wasn't certain myself until I heard the ringtone on his cell phone in the background of our call. "You like it?" The holy man asked, "Give me your email and I'll send it to you." Send it he did. I'll let you decide how committed his is to this campaign song.

* * * To see the previous posts in this series click here.

I don't know whether to laugh, or cry, or just sit down with mouth agape.

G.

Posted by: G M Roper at February 25, 2005 08:56 PM

It's strange, isn't it? I set out just to have a little fun with this post but then all these resonant connections and layers of meaning wormed their way in. If you read the entire set of lyrics all the way through it's almost impossible not to get a little choked up. I think most of those layers of meaning are in the song itself, though I never noticed it until today.

I have, however, noticed the parallels between the historic struggle of black people in America for civil rights and democratic reform and that of Iraqis these past couple of years. So the connection is there and thus it's startlingly natural -- though simultaneously funny -- to picture Sistani and that song in your head at the same time. And Cara pointed out that the ringtone version of the music has a quality that, to our naive ears, sounds almost Middle Eastern.

This reminds me of something that happened in a course I took on African and African-American poetry. The teacher (a black man from Granada) had a Jamaican woman (with a very strong accent) read aloud a poem that was written in slave-era Southern black dialect. All of those pronunciations came completely alive in her Jamaiican accent. This was the poem (probably a song):

We raise the wheat,
Dey gib us corn;
We bake de bread,
Dey give us de crust;
We Sift the meal,
Dey gib us de huss;
We peel de meat,
Dey gib us de skin;
And dat's de way
Dey takes us in

It was surprising but it just fit perfectly. And there was a spontaneous laugh of recognition from the whole class. It felt like a beautiful revelation. But the woman reading thought we were laughing at her accent and even the teacher (who had an equally thick accent) never fully succeeded in explaining it to her. Unfortunately, the power of shame (I mean the tendency to think people are likely to laugh at us for being ridiculous) has a tendency to trump a person's clarity in a situation like that. But it was a strangely similar phenomenon.

Posted by: Jeremy Brown at February 25, 2005 09:35 PM

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