Sheykh Forever Wants the Earworm to Carry Something Uncomfortable
Punk Head: There's a fascinating contradiction at the heart of Fire in the Master's House: the music wants you to move, but the subject matter gives you plenty of reasons to stop and think. Do you see the dancefloor as an escape from the world or a way of confronting it?
Sheykh Forever: Art has to transcend its context to be worth anything. Picassos are timeless because they manage to be whimsical and poignant at the same time - not because they’re hung in pretty frames or in nice museums. I don’t know if modern dance floors are still places where ideas are confronted or wrestled with, but it’s a nice thought.
Punk Head: I’m your history opens the album with a confrontation over home, belonging and historical memory. Why did that song need to be the first thing the listener hears?
Sheykh Forever: When I was growing up I had this wonderful friend with all these weird habits and idiosyncrasies. He would make up these funny slogans or physical tics based on all the things we saw over the course of a day. It’s hard to describe because it was sort of childish but also very creative. He really was unlike anyone I’d ever met. Something he said once was “I like to be as weird as possible when I meet people, so that they aren’t surprised later on.” Now he could be a pest, and some of his antics rubbed people the wrong way, but he was honest, and people knew who he was, and I admired that about him.
I’ve never wanted to give people the impression that I’m there to comfort or cajole them. I need people to understand upfront what this is about, because our time together is short and we may not be here tomorrow. This really is, as you’ve said, about home, belonging and memory - other people write songs about heartbreak or one-night stands. That’s also fine.
Punk Head: Which comes first for you: a groove that feels physically irresistible or a lyrical idea that you can't leave alone?
Sheykh Forever: Almost every time - the groove. But if the lyrical idea doesn’t follow shortly after, it’s a no-go. I try to foster a sense of urgency when I create things. If that disappears I’ll move on to something else. I’m not making music for people to relax to, to have on in the background in cafes or to be marketed to vibe playlists and so it has to come from a place of urgency, of real importance. Everything you hear did feel, when I made it, like an emergency.
Punk Head: You're an Iraqi-born musician making this record in London, and the album engages with displacement, historical memory and the consequences of war. How do you negotiate the distance between what you know personally, what you've witnessed or absorbed through the world around you, and what you feel compelled to address as an artist?
Sheykh Forever: That’s a great question that I’m not really qualified to answer. I do think that to navigate this world successfully we have to repackage ourselves and our work a little bit for different audiences. But I refuse, and will always refuse, to dilute my message for any thing or person. The music is as pure and honest an expression of those difficult feelings as I can muster at any given time. So maybe the answer is - I don’t negotiate. I refuse. What you hear is what you get.
Punk Head: When you're making music about something as serious as war, do you ever worry about making it too catchy?
Sheykh Forever: I worry that it isn’t catchy enough. Nobody wants to think about war, not in any serious capacity, not in the way we need people to think about it if we’re going to clean up this mess. It’s much easier for me to bury these sentiments into earworms, something so infectiously catchy it’s impossible to ignore. What people do with that after is their business, but at least I’ve gotten it in there somehow.
Maybe you mean: do I worry about the music being irreverent or even disrespectful. But I come from that world and know people still in it, so I don’t feel I owe any explanations or assurances to anyone. The worst thing you can do about the suffering of others is to not think about it. Music occupies a space in most people’s lives, and difficult music is a way to think about and feel difficult emotions. That is my service to the unfortunate souls caught up in war, and to those who are abhorred by their own involvement in it, and to anyone who might watch an entire people wiped out in front of their eyes, and peering behind the anguished screams of mothers and the smoke, rubble and flames can allow themselves to think, ‘it could have been me, and therefore it’s all of us. We’re all connected in this.’
