jeudi 23 avril 2009

Profilage racial policier en Angleterre autour de la musique urbaine?

D'abord l'un des gros hit du UK Funky:

Attacca Pesanete : Make It Funky (Zshare)

Et ensuite cette note que je viens de trouver sur le blog d'un journaliste UK:



The Black music scene in the UK, or as some people would like to label it 'urban', has come up against many battles in its effort to become credible, from underground acts getting signed then dropped as soon as they don't gain a 10 hit, to club nights getting closed down due to the genre of the music getting played. The Metropolitan Police have recently set up a new system whereby all live music events that contain Bashment, Garage or R&B (and everything in between) music, will have to complete a form called ‘Form 696’, which is a document all promoters that will play such music will have to fill in. This is apparently due to the fact that many shootings and stabbings that have occurred in the capital have happened in and around club nights that people would like to call 'urban'. There has been outrage from unlikely people, such as former punk rocker and current CEO of the UK music industry representative, Fergal Sharkey, who has complained to the Equality and Human Rights Commission claiming that the Police seem to be focusing on music enjoyed by Black and Asian teenagers.

In a letter he wrote to Sir Ian Blair recently he stated, ''In explicitly singling out performances and musical styles favoured by the Black community: Garage and R&B, MC's and DJ's, we believe the use of the risk assessment Form 696, is disproportionate, unacceptable and damaging to live music in the UK.''

This issue isn't new to the urban music scene, back in 2006 Music Journalist and Ctrl+ Alt+ Shift editor, Chantelle Fiddy had to deal with something similar, where her popular Grime club night 'Straight Outta Bethnal' was shut down at it's resident nightclub 333, due to a shooting that happened elsewhere in East London at the same time people were enjoying a night full of MC based music). What must the urban club night do to save itself? I asked Pete Todd, the promoter behind London’s 100% Grime night, Dirty Canvas.

''When we first started our nights it was virtually impossible to put on a Grime night in London as clubs were too scared, we had to use Art galleries such as the Whitechapel and the ICA to put on the acts we wanted and even then we felt we were only one incident away from being shut down. Through our successful and trouble free nights we are now in a position to hold nights in most clubs, our most recent JME concert at Astoria felt like a big break through, as it was the first time an unsigned independent Grime act had headlined a concert there. Until recently it had felt like it was becoming easier to put on urban nights, but this form 696 seems to be another step back to shutting them down again. I think many artists will see this as an attempt by the government to close down their music scenes. The government has spent a lot of money on community music schemes in deprived urban areas, yet it is placing a hugely restrictive barrier from these musicians progressing and being heard and in the current music climate of downloads, live performances are hugely important both financially and for artists development.''

If you are partial liking a bit of Bashment or even some Grime every now and, then may I suggest you join the rest of people, in signing the petition to keep the 'urban' club night alive.

Sign up here: http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/Scrapthe696

Words: Joseph ‘JP’ Patterson

A version of this appeared in The Voice Newspaper

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