Long time no see – plans and wishes for 2015

Dear friends and fans, this is a personal little blog with some reflections on my plans for the coming year. First of all, I wish you all a successful 2015, in good health and prosperity, and a continued dedication to supporting the Palestinian struggle in all the various ways that you do.

You may have noticed that my online activity had decreased significantly in December 2014. It was a period of reflection, and a focus on my regular job which was quite busy in that month. However, the decrease in online presence also created some extra time that I used for composing a new song, which has already been announced on my website and my page: Rising Tide.

December 2014 also marked 14 years since I started combining music and activism. You can see from my large number of followers that these activities have not been without success, and I thank you all for your support. Still, I also wish to announce that there are some planned changes for the coming year, which are rather significant.

When I consider continuing in the same way, I can’t help but feel a sense of fatigue, and after some reflection, I have discovered that this feeling has a well-defined reason. It’s not an entirely new experience, but it has been creeping up on me slowly over the past few years. It stems from being in that unique spot of being a ‘protest musician’. This, as time has passed, has now become a place that I find difficult to stay in.

The reason for this is that activists have their own specific and varying wishes when it comes to protest songs, and this creates a pressure on the songwriter that has proven to be rather unpleasant over time. They will either only support it if it is hip-hop, or if it is folk music (two musical styles that are generally accepted by the public as suitable genres for protest songs – or must it be trash metal or punk?), or they will for instance insist that it must have an Arabic theme.

There was a time when I truly didn’t care about that, and just did what I felt was right. This was a very productive time, and it has had its merits, but that’s not where I am today, both emotionally and rationally.

Of course, it is this attitude of stubbornly doing my own thing that I owe the large online presence of ‘Doc Jazz’ to. I am thoroughly aware of this. However, there is a reason that my turnout of songs has become reduced to only one song per year, and I have now realized that the wish of trying to cater to the activist audience’s expectations has now become the main limiting factor of my productivity.

If it wasn’t for my deep love for and dedication to the struggle for the liberation of Palestine, I would probably be able to brush this aside and continue in the same way. However, since this is definitely not the situation, I have now decided to separate the music from the other forms of activism, in an attempt to save and improve both.

I wish to be free from the judgmental minds that feel that they should decide whether what I produce is ‘good’ or ‘bad’ from an activist perspective. From now on, I want to be able to simply make the music that I like, and present it in the way that I like to present it. Like all other musicians, I want to be able to completely ignore the negative critics, simply because what they are saying does not carry any more relevance than a personal opinion, and a matter of taste.

This doesn’t mean that my songs to come will no longer carry any message, not does it mean that Palestine will be left out of the picture. That seems to me to be pretty impossible: I am Palestinian, and a part of Palestine as much as it is a part of me. I however wish to free my mind from the sense of duty of utilizing my music as a vehicle for the cause, hereby opening the door to criticism from fellow activists that mixes their personal opinions with judgmental verdicts from a quasi-collective sense of duty. I am tired of it, my friends. All this does is kill my creativity.

Rising Tide will be released very soon. Yes, it is a protest song, but not in the way that most of you would define protest songs. It is just an expression of my feelings and my wishes, in my own way, and yes it is a danceable and positive song of determination that does not fit the emotions of most (rightfully) angry activists who may feel that such emotions have no place in the mind of people who are dedicated to a struggle. And to those I say: that’s your opinion, your problem, and you are free to simply ignore it and turn away.

By freeing myself from the duty of ‘making good music for the cause’, I am also doing something for you. I am freeing you from the responsibility of helping to share and distribute a ‘musical vehicle’ of our struggle. We are done with that now, and this is better for you, and better for me.

So, when I release Rising Tide, I expect nothing at all from you. Rising Tide is the transition to the new definition of the music of Doc Jazz, which comes not from duty but simply from creativity.

Just like any other musician, I will put out a song that you may like, or that you may not like, and that you may share because you like the melody, the beat, the music video, the guitar solo, or whatever usually motivates you to like songs. And perhaps you will share it because you support its message, which is great, but nothing other than that. And you may  simply ignore it, of course. It wouldn’t be the first time, right?

Whichever criticism you may have, will be your absolute right to have, and even to express, but I will tell you up front: from now on, I couldn’t care less about it. If your critical response will relate to how the song does or does not serve the cause, I will also reserve the right to ignore it, remove it, or even laugh about it. And the same goes for all other potentially negative vibes. There is no song or singer in the history of music that does not have its haters, and that is completely fine: that is simply how this world spins.

My plan for 2015 is to continue to be dedicated to the Palestinian cause, and also to put out more songs than before, by just separating the two from each other. I feel like enjoying the process of songwriting, performing, mixing, and mastering, and I am looking forward to a year that is hopefully full of creativity. If I find you there with me, this will be a lovely thing to see, and if not, may God bless you nonetheless.

Having written and expressed this, I am already feeling free. There will be no more thoughts or plans of performing in activist venues, no more wondering how I can best express our collective feeling for the cause in music. There will just be me, my creativity, and my studio where I forge my own various feelings into melodies, beats and rhythms, like any other musician in the world. What a joy it will be!

Again, wishing all of you a lovely 2015, and whoever is looking forward to the Rising Tide music video, get ready, it’s coming very soon now!