Cairokee is an Egyptian rock band that was officially launched in 2003 but came to prominence with its
revolutionary music
Revolutionary songs are political songs that advocate or praise revolutions. They are used to boost morale, as well as for political propaganda or agitation. Amongst the most well-known revolutionary songs are "La Marseillaise" and "The Internatio ...
following the
Egyptian Revolution of 2011
The 2011 Egyptian revolution, also known as the 25 January revolution ( ar, ثورة ٢٥ يناير; ), began on 25 January 2011 and spread across Egypt. The date was set by various youth groups to coincide with the annual Egyptian "Police ho ...
due to its politically-inspired lyrics and
protest song
A protest song is a song that is associated with a movement for social change and hence part of the broader category of ''topical'' songs (or songs connected to current events). It may be folk, classical, or commercial in genre.
Among social mov ...
s released following the uprising. Their title song ''"Ya El Midan"'', featuring Egyptian singer Aida el Ayoubi who had previously retired in the 1990s, ranked number one on
Facebook
Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin ...
worldwide for downloads and number eight on
YouTube
YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second most ...
with morfollowing its internet release.
Background
The band consists of Amir Eid (lead
vocalist
Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or witho ...
), Sherif Hawary (
lead guitarist
Lead guitar (also known as solo guitar) is a musical part for a guitar in which the guitarist plays melody lines, instrumental fill passages, guitar solos, and occasionally, some riffs and chords within a song structure. The lead is the featured ...
), Tamer Hashem (
drummer
A drummer is a percussionist who creates music using drums.
Most contemporary western bands that play rock, pop, jazz, or R&B music include a drummer for purposes including timekeeping and embellishing the musical timbre. The drummer' ...
), Sherif Mostafa (
keyboardist
A keyboardist or keyboard player is a musician who plays keyboard instruments. Until the early 1960s musicians who played keyboards were generally classified as either pianists or organists. Since the mid-1960s, a plethora of new musical ins ...
), and Adam el-Alfy (
bass guitar
The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and s ...
ist). The initial band members were friends ever since their school days, and Tamer was already a drummer back then. In 2003, Eid and Hawary had started an English band initially called ''Black Star''. They started playing covers of English songs, with only one Egyptian Masry song called ''"Ghariba"'' that was highly admired by their audiences. They later decided to continue making Egyptian songs because they felt it was shameful to keep playing English music as it wasn't their mother tongue. They were mainly influenced by the works of
Pink Floyd
Pink Floyd are an English rock band formed in London in 1965. Gaining an early following as one of the first British psychedelic groups, they were distinguished by their extended compositions, sonic experimentation, philosophical lyrics an ...
and
The Beatles
The Beatles were an English rock band, formed in Liverpool in 1960, that comprised John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. They are regarded as the most influential band of all time and were integral to the developm ...
and regard Pink Floyd's music as an inspiration for their own musical career.
Career
Following the 2011 revolution, they released their first major hit ''"Sout El Horeya"'' (The voice of freedom), a joint collaboration between the band's main vocalist Amir Eid and music producer, sound engineer and vocalist Hany Adel of the band Wust El-Balad. The song had over 2 million views on YouTube and was reportedly ranked a world record as one of the most watched videos in the shortest period of time. Another hit song, ''"Ya El Midan"'' (Oh you, the Square), marked the return of singer Aida el Ayoubi after 20 years of absence from the stage. The song was a tribute to
Tahrir Square
Tahrir Square ( ar, ميدان التحرير ', , English: Liberation Square), also known as "Martyr Square", is a major public town square in downtown Cairo, Egypt. The square has been the location and focus for political demonstrations in Ca ...
, addressing and personifying it as another living and breathing member of the opposition, and its video clip documented the latest protests in an indirect way as the camera was apparently filming inside a protester's house and it roamed over clothes riddled with bullet holes, medical white coats, onions and types vinegar (substances that defuse the effects of
teargas
Tear gas, also known as a lachrymator agent or lachrymator (), sometimes colloquially known as "mace" after the early commercial aerosol, is a chemical weapon that stimulates the nerves of the lacrimal gland in the eye to produce tears. In ad ...
) and the plastic shields of the
CSF
CSF may refer to:
Biology and medicine
* Cerebrospinal fluid, clear colorless bodily fluid found in the brain and spine
* Colony-stimulating factor, secreted glycoproteins
* Cancer slope factor, estimate the risk of cancer
* Classical swine fever ...
. On 24 January 2012, marking the first anniversary of the revolution, a video was released on YouTube for the song ''"Ethbat Makanak"'' (Hold your ground) and featured prominent Egyptian satirist
Bassem Youssef
Bassem Raafat Mohamed Youssef ( ar, باسم رأفت محمد يوسف, ; born 21 March 1974) is an Egyptian comedian, writer, producer, surgeon, doctor, media critic, and television host, who hosted '' El-Bernameg'' (''The Show''), a satiric ...
who joined the work in order to support independent voices in the media who were attacked by the former military government because of their work. Cairokee released their first album ''"Matloob Zaeem"'' (Leader Wanted) in June 2011, with sponsorship from
Coca-Cola
Coca-Cola, or Coke, is a carbonated soft drink manufactured by the Coca-Cola Company. Originally marketed as a temperance drink and intended as a patent medicine, it was invented in the late 19th century by John Stith Pemberton in Atla ...
after spending years without any support to release an album. The title track with the same name was an instant hit and was considered an employment advertisement preceding the 2012 presidential election, describing the qualities of the country's next leader in the producer's point of view. During the
June 2013 Egyptian protests
The 30 June protests occurred in Egypt on 30 June 2013, marking the one-year anniversary of Mohamed Morsi's inauguration as president. The events ended with the 2013 Egyptian coup d'état after mass protests across Egypt demanding the immed ...
, they performed on a stage in front of hundreds of thousands who were protesting against President
Mohamed Morsi
Mohamed Mohamed Morsi Eissa al-AyyatThe spellings of his first and last names vary. survey of 14 news organizations plus Wikipedia in July 2012main presidential palace in Cairo's Heliopolis suburb. The band was invited by volunteer organizers and had tweeted earlier that they would "join the Egyptian people at Ittihadiya (name of the palace)". While performing, the people were singing along with them and served as backup singers with lyrics such as "we are the people… and our path is right" and "you say ‘justice’, and they call you a traitor". The band called their audience during the performance "the best in the world".
On 21 March 2013,
Red Bull
Red Bull is a brand of energy drinks of Austrian company Red Bull GmbH. With 38% market share, it is the most popular energy drink brand as of 2019. Since its launch in 1987, more than 100 billion cans of Red Bull have been sold worldwide, inc ...
organized an event in which Cairokee played against Wust El-Balad dubbed "Red Bull Sound Clash" where the spectators were the judge and the winner would be declared according to the intensity of the crowd's cheering. ''
Daily News Egypt
''Daily News Egypt'' (''DNE'') is an English-language daily Egyptian newspaper established in 2005 and relaunched in June 2012. Under former owner Egyptian Media Services, it was distributed with the '' International Herald Tribune'' as a suppl ...
'' noted that "it was clear from the beginning of the evening that Cairokee had the edge on crowd support, although Wust El-Balad had a strong fan base at the event". The concert also featured popular
sha'abi
Shaabi ( arz, شعبي'' '' ) is an Egyptian musical genre. It is a form of popular working-class music which evolved from Egyptian Baladi in the second half of the 20th century, it's the core of Egyptian people music in streets and wedding ...
singer
Ahmed Adaweyah
Ahmed Adaweyah ( ar, احمد عدوية) is a prominent Egyptian actor and singer of Egyptian ''Sha'abi'' music. He also starred in 27 Egyptian films.
Biography
Adaweyah was born in 1945 in Minya Governorate, Egypt, to a livestock dealer, and ...
who performed in Wust E-Balad's act and at the end of the event, no victor was announced but the spectators were apparently left highly satisfied with both performances. Cairokee also performed at the
Jordan
Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Ri ...
ian Dum Tak Alternative Middle Eastern Music Festival, along with several Egyptian bands including Wust El-Balad and
Massar Egbari
Massar Egbari is an Egyptian Rock band that was officially launched in 2005 from Alexandria, Egypt. The band consists of 4 musicians: Ayman Massoud (Keyboards), Hany El Dakkak (Guitar and Lead Vocal), Ahmed Hafez (Bass guitar), and Tamer Attalla ...
as well as many other Middle Eastern bands such as
Lebanon
Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Republic of Lebanon () or the Lebanese Republic, is a country in Western Asia. It is located between Syria to Lebanon–Syria border, the north and east and Israel to Blue ...
's
Mashrou' Leila
Mashrou' Leila ( ar, مشروع ليلى, link=no, Latn, ar, Mashrūʿ Laylā, ; sometimes transliterated as Mashrou3 Leila or translated as Leila's Project) was a Lebanese four-member Rock music, indie rock band. The band formed in Beirut, Leba ...
.
In early 2014, Cairokee released their third album ''"El Sekka Shemal"''. The album featured collaborations with different artists, including Algerian singer
Souad Massi
Souad Massi (سعاد ماسي; born August 23, 1972), is an Algerian Berber singer, songwriter and guitarist. She began her career performing in the Kabyle political rock band Atakor, before leaving the country following a series of death thre ...
, Abdel Baset Hammouda and Zap Tharwat. This year also brought Cairokee to the record label Sony Music Middle East. The partnership led to the band obtaining its own
Vevo
Vevo ( , an abbreviation for "Video Evolution", stylized as VEVO until 2013) is an American multinational video hosting service, best known for providing music videos to YouTube. The service is also available as an app on selected smart TVs, ...
channel on YouTube, the first deal of its kind for any artist in the region. The album was their most successful to date, with its first copy entirely sold out in the first three days only, topping the charts on the
iTunes Store
The iTunes Store is a digital media store operated by Apple Inc. It opened on April 28, 2003, as a result of Steve Jobs' push to open a digital marketplace for music. As of April 2020, iTunes offered 60 million songs, 2.2 million apps, 25,00 ...
and in the music market of Egypt and the Middle East. It became the album with the highest number of downloads and purchases on iTunes by the end of the first week. It was also featured in the first episode of the third season of Bassem Youssef's highly popular show '' El Bernameg''.
On July 20, 2017, Cairokee hit the summer season with the release of their latest album, Noaata Beda, or Drop of White, which consists of 10 songs. The main song, Noaata Beda, received 11 million views on YouTube.
Members
*Amir Eid - Vocals, songs writer and acoustic guitar
*Sherif El Hawary - Electric guitar
*Tamer Hashem - Drums
*Sherif Mostafa - Keyboards, mix and production
*Adam El-Alfy - Bass guitar