Scrambled Eggs
Post-Punk Rocking in Beirut

By Helena Forsell

It's easy to associate Lebanon with war, political turmoil, and civil conflict. And it is a fact that the small country at the end of the Mediterranean, squeezed in between Syria and Israel is struggling against a political and economical collapse. In spite of this, the underground music scene of Beirut is more alive and kicking than ever, producing high quality art and music. In the middle of it all, with a track record of 4 albums over the last five years, stand the pioneers of modern rock in Lebanon; Scrambled Eggs.

"We are the sound of Beirut," said the singer and guitarist Charbel Haber when i-94 met with him and the band members in Ashrafié, the heart of the French quarters of Beirut. He continues; "We're Arabs with a twist. Our music is the sound of the city, in an experimental rock music kind of way." Scrambled Eggs have been representing the Lebanese underground music for the last few years. With the release of their first album "Human Friendly Noises" in 2002, the band changed the way music sounded in Beirut. A sound described by Charbel as "Post Punk-No Wave-Experimental. Sonic Youth type of rock."

Scrambled Eggs consist of Charbel Haber, guitar and vocals, Marc Codsi on guitar, Tony Elieh on bass and Malek Rizkallah on drums. They're all 28 except Malek, who's 21 and the newest egg in the pan.

The group got together in 1998, at first covering Nirvana songs. But feeling that it was too much work playing covers, they soon switched to the task of creating their own songs. "If you play your own music, no one knows when you make a mistake," Charbel said with a smile. Upon their first album release, the band soon gained a following among the intellectual and artsy crowd in the war torn city. Since then the music has evolved from a very experimental kind of improvised rock into a much more accessible, but still poetic ass-kicking rock. Their trademark today is a mesh of guitars and noises, with a post punk attitude.

Beirut is a unique place with a combination of Muslims and Christians, international war correspondents and wealthy Saudi businessmen. East meets West in a way unlike anywhere else in the world. Walking the streets of the city, passing through the different neighborhoods, you are thrown between totally different cultures and ways of life. With its many bars and cafés, narrow streets and French colonial style buildings, the French speaking Christian neighborhoods of Gemmayzhe and Ashrafié host the places where the artsy intellectual crowd spend their time while in Beirut. This area is also the epicenter of the underground music scene in Lebanon. A scene that is very small and consists of an estimated 50 artists, among them the hip hoppers in RGB and Rayess Bek, the rockers in New Government and Scrambled Eggs, the electronica of Crtl Z and the newcomers of Lumi. Given the last couple of years of political turmoil, the country has been on the verge of a social and economic collapse, and the Lebanese middle and lower classes no longer have the money, nor time to spend on music. So, being an underground musician in Lebanon today means that your audience consists of the intellectual art-loving crowd of Beirut, and some French fans in Europe.

"The Lebanese people are in survival mode right now, which means that there are very few paying gigs and it's very hard to get funding for tours and travels abroad," explained Zeid Hamdan, musician, producer and owner of the record label formerly known as Mooze Records, now called Lebanese Underground.

Zeid and his record label are the core of the music scene of Beirut gathering most of the creative and talented artists under one name. He started out doing music in the late nineties, together with Yasemin Hamdan and their electronica duo Soapkills. They were groundbreaking at the time with their mix of Arabic and French sounds. Today Yasemin has left the country and Zeid moved on to other projects. One of them is the rock band, the New Government, of which the members are all close friends with the boys in Scrambled Eggs. The two bands help each other with production and promotion as well touring together. "We are all very close to each other. If one of us receive some kind of success, we all benefit from it in some way," Charbel said, referring to the fact that the two bands very often get booked for gigs together. "The good thing with the Beirut music scene is that it's so small that it's very easy to get attention. It's good for your ego, but bad for your wallet," sighs the Eggs' Codsi.

Lebanon has been suffering from internal turmoil ever since the murder of former president Rafik Hariri in 2005. The one month long war last summer against Israel didn't help to stabilize the situation either. Almost one year after the ceasefire, the country's social and economic status is suffering from the current political power struggle, making the future uncertain for the people. The government is limping and since December 2006, the opposition has been out on the street in the longest sit down demonstration the country has ever seen. "The artists are turning more and more into despair. Wondering what they will do in six months, scraping the walls to survive" explains Zeid. In spite of this, they keep on struggling.

"We can't give up now. In that case all these years would have been for nothing," Marc said, representing the attitude shown by a lot of Lebanese people in the country right now. New bars, bands, magazines, art exhibitions, and dance festivals keep on popping up all the time, even though they should all probably give up and leave the country. "Maybe were all bunch of dreamers. Who else would act the way we do?" Marc pondered.

Born during the 15 year long civil war, the members of Scrambled Eggs never hesitated to continue working on their music during the war against Israel last summer. "The war was frustrating and horrible. But you have to do your best to keep on with your life to avoid falling completely into despair," Charbel said with determination. So Scrambled Eggs kept on rocking throughout the war. They kept on rehearsing, doing gigs, and even recorded new tracks for their fourth album. Their rehearsal space was located at one of the worst places in times of war: on top of a gas station, where military tanks filled up their supply of gas. Charbel remembers those hot days filled with fear in the rehearsal room. "Sometimes we could hear the Israeli planes flying low over us, at the same time as Lebanese military tanks were parked below, filling up gas." The band's experiences during the war affected their music, the song "1984" being one of the most explicit examples. "When we recorded that song, we were pissed off, and frustrated." Tony said. But, just as a lot of other people in Lebanon, the Scrambled Eggs are tired of being connected with war, and they are tired of talking about it. "Of course it influenced our music. But still, it's boring to talk about. We are more than that bloody war."

Indicative of the band's experimental nature over the past few years, they did the soundtrack to a Lebanese movie called "A Perfect Day" by Joanna Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige in 2005. The movie takes place in Beirut over the course of one day, and the soundtrack is mixed together with the sounds of the streets. The combination worked out so well that the band got awarded with the prize for best soundtrack at the festival of Trois Continentes in Nantes, France in 2005.

Since the scene for underground music in Lebanon is small with limited paying fans, the bands are looking abroad in order to survive. "There are only so many times that you can perform to the same crowd in the same places," Zeid Hamdan said. The war and the uncertain times from which Lebanon is suffering bring a lot of international media to the country. Something from which Zeid Hamdan and the Beirut rock bands benefits; "International reporters like our music and report about it back to their home countries," Hamdan explained. Out of the 40 million Lebanese people currently in the world, four million are living in Lebanon. Given that fact, the Internet is another very important channel of distribution and promotion for bands like Scrambled Eggs. According to Zeid Hamdan almost all the music produced by the artists in Beirut are being sold through internet, with close to zero hardcopies of CD's being distributed. This means that they are skipping the distribution part of music production, which is something that Zeid is very content with. "Internet distribution of music is great. I think all music should be free, paid by adds."

Inside Lebanon the competition for bands like Scrambled Eggs is non-existent. The commercial side of Lebanon's music scene consists of pop singers targeted to the Arabic market. "We don't fight for the same audience at all," Charbel said. He tells about the star who shines the brightest right now; the Britney Spears of Lebanon, a young model and singer named Haifa. Voted as the sexiest woman in the Middle East 2006, Haifa has been on the cover of nearly every Arabic magazine since her debut almost ten years ago. "We all like her less or more. Marc is the only one who thinks she's still a virgin, even though she has a child!" Charbel laughs. "I suspect it was Immaculate Conception. But then again, she's shiia so that's not possible," Marc pondered with a smile on his face, referring to the fact that Muslims don't believe in Immaculate Conception.

Considering that all the band's albums have been produced in Beirut so far, the band looked abroad for inspiration and new partners last spring. "We want our music to be modern, to never stop growing," Charbel told i-94. In order to do so, the band found some producers in New York City that agreed to work with them on their upcoming fourth album. Everything was set to go in the Spring of 2006, but then war broke out, which put everything to a halt. But now, one year later, they are making plans again. "The producers are enthusiastic. We only need to get money for the plane tickets," Charbel said while lighting another cigarette, and getting ready for another night out in Beirut.