Music Corner World

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Rachid Taha compares his music to a plate of couscous. Interviewed via transcriber from his place in France, the 49-year-old Algerian-born singer and planetary hood icon states he was happy to detect that "Frank Zappa had come up to the same decision when he said, 'How to depict my music? Difficult to explicate if you've never tasted couscous.' "

Known for playing a modified version of the oud called the mandolute, Taha states he stands for a nexus "between Africa, the East and the West. In the same manner as Omar Sharif is to cinema," he adds wryly.

A career-spanning Taha retrospective, "Rock Elevation Casbah: The Best Of," was released in the United States this month, in clip for a four-city circuit (which conveys him to San Francisco's Stern Grove Festival July 13). Like couscous, the 15-song cadmium pulls its spirit from many different elements. There's the hood side, represented by his famed version of the Clash's "Rock the Casbah" and the rabble-rousing "Douce France." Taha's love of traditional common people music come ups through on his screens of Farid Elevation Atrache's "Habina" and Dahmane Elevation Harrachi's "Ya Rayah." A philosophical, existentialist facet shows up in "Kelma" ("Thoughts"), and "Ida" ("If"). And "Menfi" - which translates to "The Exile" - computer addresses a outstanding subject in Taha's music, that of identity.

Specifically, the personal identity of being Algerian, Arabic Language and Moslem while life in a state that hasn't always been friendly to immigrants. Coming to French Republic from Algerie at a immature age, he says, "I knew what to expect."

Tradition plays a large function in Taha's music. Yet he's incorporated progressive elements into his style, paving the manner for such as future people as Natascha Atlas and Cheb Mami. In his solo career, he's worked extensively with manufacturer Steve Hillage, who, in improver to adding electronic textures to Taha's sound, "is a guitar-playing Peter O' Toole," he says. (Think "Lawrence of Arabia," not "My Favorite Year.")

Taha is proudest of the fact that his music have often served as a span connecting cultures. His version of "Ya Rayah," for instance, became an interplanetary hit and was used in "around 30" films, he notes.

"The song was No. One in Cyprus, equally among the Turks as among the Greeks," he says. "Not only in Cyprus, but also in Hellenic Republic and in Turkey at the same time. 100 million people vocalizing the same song at the same time! It's the lone thing in the history of this state that they've been able to hold about."

Taha have sometimes been associated with Rai - a genre originated by nomadic shepherds that became modernised during World War two when U.S. GIs landed in Algeria, bringing their instruments with them - and he's jokingly referred to himself as "Rai Orbison."

"Rai," he says, "actually intends 'opinion' and often rai vocalists utilize the look 'Ya Rai' - 'my opinion.' When I state Rai Orbison, I can also be saying Rai Cooder, or Rai Charles."

However, Chaabi - an earlier constitute of North African dad - is more than his style, he says.

"I happen the Chaabi more than rootsy," he says, "and more honorable somehow."

Still, Rai and Chaabi aren't all that far apart.

"Chaabi came first, and then morphed itself into Rai," he says. "But it's just a inquiry of evolution. And attitude."

Taha have certainly got plenty of attitude. As the Pb vocalist for Menu Delaware Sejour ("registration paper") in the mid-'80s, he remade Gallic balladeer Prince Charles Trenet's "Douce France" into a snarling hood anthem - the cultural equivalent of Jimi Jimi Hendrix acting "The Star-Spangled Banner" or Sid Barbarous vocalizing Sinatra's "My Way."

Playing in a French-Algerian hood set taught him one thing, he says: "You have got to remain punk!"

Few things are more than hood than vocalizing a Clang song in Arabic.

"During the first Gulf War," Taha says, "the immature American soldiers sang 'Rock the Casbah' as an anti-Arab hymn. I wanted to put the record straight. Originally, (the song) was an anti-war song."

Taha's version, called "Rock elevation Casbah," was approved by Joe Strummer's widow, Luce, and Clang guitar player Paddy Mother Jones (who have since appeared onstage with Taha on respective occasions). Taha executes the song in the Clang docudrama "Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten," and it have go one of his greatest international hits, earning him a BBC World Music Award in 2006.

Strummer made an "enormous" impact on him, he says, "in the same manner as Chow Berry, Elvis Presley, Bo Jack and Jesse James Brown." He's also a fan of Neil Young, whom he names "the ultimate punk."

It's somewhat of a platitude to name Taha a world-music version of Woody Guthrie, British Shilling Bob Dylan or David Bruce Springsteen, but he doesn't abound at being dubbed a protestation singer. Making music with a message is just a manner of trying to do life better, he says.

"We sing to better things, arouse emotions, give joy," he says, "so you could state that all songs are protestation songs."

Rachid Taha executes at 2 p.m. next Lord'S Day at the Stern Grove Festival, 19th Avenue and Sloat Boulevard, San Francisco. Free. (415) 252-6252, www.stern grove.org.

To hear samples of Rachid Taha's music, travel to .

Eric K. Matthew Arnold is a independent writer. E-mail him at pinkish .