Heated debate

If anything could make the pain of the last few kilometres of the Amman Marathon bearable it was the pleasing lo-fi tunes coming out of the Roman theatre in the capital’s Downtown area. They were, we all later discovered, being produced by Jordan’s number one band, Jadal – the first local rock band to sing in an Ammani Arabic dialect. And judging by the amount of people easing their aching limbs on the stone steps to their laid-back sound, they have developed an appreciative audience. NOX sat with Jadal’s voice, Rami Delshad, to find out about the gig, the  album, and why they decided to give us an MP3 to give away on nox-mag.com.

NOX: That’s not a bad way to get people’s ears – right when they’re resting after running 10k!

Rami Delshad: Well, to be honest with you, this is the first time ever for our band to play in front of 12,000 people, and although it’s not a walk in the park – especially with this insane heat – you get a big feeling of satisfaction. I mean, I couldn’t hear myself singing because the crowd was singing along!

NOX: That has to be a good omen for the new album, though. Can you tell us about it?

RD: Well, it’s never a good idea for an artist to praise his own work, but we really did work hard on it, and we have to mention Hanna Gargour’s creative influence on the production side. And the fact that we had to pay for the production process didn’t help at all, but we managed. It’s called Arabic Rocks, by the way.

NOX: Do you have a label right now?

RD: No, not at the moment. We’re really looking hard for a company that doesn’t bind our creativity; we’ve reached this far on our own, because we sang what we liked. This is one of the most important things in a band’s career.

NOX: Any upcoming concerts to capitalise on the interest the marathon will have generated?

RD: For the next few weeks, we’ll be playing concerts in Beriut, Cairo and Dubai. Fans just keep surprising us with invitations from other countries.

NOX: And until then, you can visit our website...!

RD: Yeah, we have given you the song “Niyyalak” for your readers to download and listen to. It’s a pretty cool track in which two guys are having a conversation about what we learn from the losses in our lives.