Neil Turbin, you know the guy who sang on the first Anthrax album ‘Fistful of Metal’, including crowd favorite ‘Deathrider’, and now plays with his band Deathriders in backyards and parking lots is going to play a show with Philm, post hardcore side project of Dave Lombardo.
Read the press release after the jump.
“Soon after the establishment of the Islamic Republic in Iran on April 1, 1979, Ayatollah Khomeini, the Islamic leader of the new regime, issuing a Fatwa in response to the legal status of music in Iran, said that ‘music , in line with the (mourning anthem) for (then-assassinated Ayatollah) Motahari is permitted.’
Throughout the early years of the present regime, based on Khomeini’s Fatwa, most Iranian traditional music and all kinds of Western music were banned from the media; homes and cars were searched as music cassettes and musical instruments were confiscated and destroyed. Singers and musicians were imprisoned and forced to flee the country.
Banning music and dancing in Iran have been openly explained as necessary measures to stop people from displaying their happiness in ways ‘offensive’ to the religious rituals and prescriptions for human behavior, according to the interpretations of the new ruling class, and to stop corruption in the society. For many years following the 1979 revolution, musical instruments which were confiscated were introduced as incriminating evidence in revolutionary courts to condemn everyone who was destined for imprisonment or execution for a variety of reasons.
The importation or manufacturing of musical instruments along with related electronic devices were banned until public pressure forced their conditional legalization in the mid-1990s.
Today, within the Iranian media and in public, all kinds of dancing are illegal and punishable; singing by women is banned from all media, men and women playing music together, such as in a symphonic orchestra is technically illegal and very rare since 1979. All but the most traditional or religious singers and musicians are either in exile or performing in illegal and semi-legal venues inside Iran.
In an atmosphere encouraging sadness and mourning, where music, display of happiness and personal feelings are discouraged and illegal, the youth of Iran have been breaking all the rules — in their millions — and have displayed amazing zeal in espousing and performing Western music and in particular the most anti-establishment and counter-culture forms of heavy metal which is more offensive to the ruling class of demonic Mullahs than even love or laughter! The Iranian youth, risking prison and torture, hiding their feelings in their hearts, roam the Internet and hold illegal concerts in walled farms outside cities knowing that their fun is going to last no more than a few hours when they’re surrounded by the Islamic militia and branded as devil worshippers in the land of deceitful holiness and filthy purity. Within the last two years, over 400 heavy metal fans and musicians have been arrested in publicized cases.
These brave youths, were reportedly the subjects of an investigation and secret monitoring by the super-spooks of the Islamic Republic: the Basiji. This Islamic militia which operates directly under the IRGC, obviously didn’t have anything else to do other than carefully watching and filming (and perhaps secretly admiring) the ‘metal’ music and the ‘subversive cultural activities of these blood sucking beasts’ — for a whole year!
In just a few days, Islamic Republic so-called President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will travel to New York City and address the United Nations General Assembly.
Ahmadinejad is one of the leaders who occupied Iran and oversees unimaginable human rights abuses and he will soon step foot on United States soil.
We remember when on June 13, 2009 the world watched as Iranians stood up and spoke out against a corrupt political system. In the days that followed we all watched in horror as Islamic republic’s state police and their militia Basij, cracked down on Iranians who were only exercising their basic human rights, demanding freedom and a secular Iranian republic in place of the current theocracy.
The history of human rights abuses in Iran is long and bloody. For years activists have been subjected to arrests, beatings, torture, and disappearances. Religious minorities are subjected to persecution. Women have no protections against domestic violence and are routinely subject to discrimination. Racial minorities are often subject to mass arrests at community cultural functions and homosexuals are routinely executed.
In addition, Iran materially and financially supports international terrorist organizations which have murdered innocent men, women, and children around the world. That the Iranian regime is also pursuing nuclear weapons capability should concern freedom loving people around the world. The Islamic Republic has no problems sharing weapons including missiles to terrorist organizations, imagine what would happen if this regime were to get their hands on nuclear weapons.
It is time that we take a stand and speak for those that cannot speak for themselves.
Millions of heavy metal fans in Iran who live their freedom on the Internet and within the walls of their short lived concert farms will now scream with their strings and their voices: Free occupied Iran or face the millions!”
Eh, sure. And now a performance of Anthrax playing ‘Deathrider’ without Neil Turbin. Simply because it’s better that way.
