Post by skitter on Jan 31, 2006 15:12:40 GMT
Jewish Bob Marley Brings Kids Closer To Yiddishkei
I LIKE reggae, I like rap and I like Hassidus. So I was lucky to have got tickets to see the much talked about Matisyahu, whose first concert in Israel was sold out.
I walked the 10 minutes from my house to The Lab, a new and funky theatre and bar situated in the industrial area of Derech Hebron, an up-and-coming centre of Jerusalem nightlife.
This is on par with the clubs at the Tel Aviv Port I think, as I enter the circular building that reminds me of the Round House in Chalk Farm where, in 1976, I was one of the only white people at a Bob Marley and the Wailers concert.
The crowd of American yeshiva students, secular teenagers and a bunch of old hippies drink and dance to reggae played over the sound system while they wait for the concert to begin.
The lights dim and the band runs on stage. They start up a catchy reggae beat. I’m excited.
It’s been 20 years since I was at a rock concert. Kids are jumping up and down and holding their cellular phones over their heads, taking photographs of the band.
Matisyahu begins the show. I like the beat, I like the music, but I can’t see the stage from where I’m standing – I can only hear the words “Moshe Rabbenu” sung in a Jamaican accent.
The crowd is going wild. I move up the stairs toward the back to get a better view. There is no black Rastafarian on stage, but a milk-white Ashkenazi yeshiva bocher wearing a big black hat, long beard and gyrating tzisis.
Instead of dreadlocks, he has sidelocks tucked behind his ears.
Matisyahu (originally named Mathew) has definitely got an important modern message to convey.
No drugs, no drink, but get high on God. He hands out bottles of mineral water (mayim chaim) and turns the crowd onto Torah with the lyrics.
“Me no want no sinsemilla, that would only bring me down.
Torah food for my brain, let it rain till I drown.”
Kids are crowd surfing. It looks a bit dangerous to me, but it is only when a young girl with long bare legs is held up over the crowd that Matisyahu asks the audience to keep their feet on the ground.
After a 15 minute brilliant beat boxing number, making sounds that range in soprano from chazanut and further down the scale to a high- speed train, Matisyahu slows the pace.
He pushes his glasses onto his forehead and covers his eyes with his thumb and forefinger and shouts out “Shema Yisroel.” Instead of saying Hashem Elokenu, he takes the Lord’s name in vain.
He may be the pride of Crown Heights and on a mission from God and he may have Lubavitch permission to do this in order to bring the kids closer to yiddishkeit, but I don’t like it.
Matisyahu, nominated for an MTV Woodie award, ends with a number about bringing Messiah and building the Third Temple.
I have to admit that Chabad has really got a winner here and when I hear the kids screaming, caught up in a religious frenzy, I even consider that maybe there could be some truth to the insane notion that the late Lubavitcher Rebbe IS Moshiach!
As I walk out of the Lab, the crowd dispersing, I can’t help but feel that there is one vital thing missing here. It’s not that I didn’t enjoy the concet. For an American Ba’al Tshuva, Matisyahu did a great job at making Rasta music. It’s just that the words ‘Is this love that I’m feeling’ keep buzzing around my brain. Beause deep inside, I’m longing to hear the sound of the true Lion from Zion.
Reva Unterman
I LIKE reggae, I like rap and I like Hassidus. So I was lucky to have got tickets to see the much talked about Matisyahu, whose first concert in Israel was sold out.
I walked the 10 minutes from my house to The Lab, a new and funky theatre and bar situated in the industrial area of Derech Hebron, an up-and-coming centre of Jerusalem nightlife.
This is on par with the clubs at the Tel Aviv Port I think, as I enter the circular building that reminds me of the Round House in Chalk Farm where, in 1976, I was one of the only white people at a Bob Marley and the Wailers concert.
The crowd of American yeshiva students, secular teenagers and a bunch of old hippies drink and dance to reggae played over the sound system while they wait for the concert to begin.
The lights dim and the band runs on stage. They start up a catchy reggae beat. I’m excited.
It’s been 20 years since I was at a rock concert. Kids are jumping up and down and holding their cellular phones over their heads, taking photographs of the band.
Matisyahu begins the show. I like the beat, I like the music, but I can’t see the stage from where I’m standing – I can only hear the words “Moshe Rabbenu” sung in a Jamaican accent.
The crowd is going wild. I move up the stairs toward the back to get a better view. There is no black Rastafarian on stage, but a milk-white Ashkenazi yeshiva bocher wearing a big black hat, long beard and gyrating tzisis.
Instead of dreadlocks, he has sidelocks tucked behind his ears.
Matisyahu (originally named Mathew) has definitely got an important modern message to convey.
No drugs, no drink, but get high on God. He hands out bottles of mineral water (mayim chaim) and turns the crowd onto Torah with the lyrics.
“Me no want no sinsemilla, that would only bring me down.
Torah food for my brain, let it rain till I drown.”
Kids are crowd surfing. It looks a bit dangerous to me, but it is only when a young girl with long bare legs is held up over the crowd that Matisyahu asks the audience to keep their feet on the ground.
After a 15 minute brilliant beat boxing number, making sounds that range in soprano from chazanut and further down the scale to a high- speed train, Matisyahu slows the pace.
He pushes his glasses onto his forehead and covers his eyes with his thumb and forefinger and shouts out “Shema Yisroel.” Instead of saying Hashem Elokenu, he takes the Lord’s name in vain.
He may be the pride of Crown Heights and on a mission from God and he may have Lubavitch permission to do this in order to bring the kids closer to yiddishkeit, but I don’t like it.
Matisyahu, nominated for an MTV Woodie award, ends with a number about bringing Messiah and building the Third Temple.
I have to admit that Chabad has really got a winner here and when I hear the kids screaming, caught up in a religious frenzy, I even consider that maybe there could be some truth to the insane notion that the late Lubavitcher Rebbe IS Moshiach!
As I walk out of the Lab, the crowd dispersing, I can’t help but feel that there is one vital thing missing here. It’s not that I didn’t enjoy the concet. For an American Ba’al Tshuva, Matisyahu did a great job at making Rasta music. It’s just that the words ‘Is this love that I’m feeling’ keep buzzing around my brain. Beause deep inside, I’m longing to hear the sound of the true Lion from Zion.
Reva Unterman
