VARIOUS ARTISTS - HABIBI FUNK: BEIRUT CITY POP VINYL

Beirut City Pop brings together ten tracks from Lebanon's private press cassette scene of the late 1970s and 1980s, when short-lived bands and studio projects moved freely between disco, pop, soul, jazz, bossa, rock and AOR. Many of the musicians belonged to the same extended circle around Ziad Rahbani and his Bypass Studio, rehearsing, recording and contributing to one another's projects. Often copied at home and circulated among friends and musicians, many of these recordings remained within small local circles. This limited distribution was closely tied to the fragmentation of Lebanon during the civil war, when movement between neighbourhoods and different parts of the country was often difficult. Some tapes existed in extremely small quantities: Andromeda's album, for example, may have had a run of twenty copies or fewer, while several tracks on this compilation were never officially released at all, surviving only through tapes passed between musicians.

While many of the recordings were made at Bypass Studio, others, including Andromeda's recordings at Studio Farah, shared many of the same musicians and influences. The title *Beirut City Pop* reflects this shared musical language: a meeting point between pop, soul, jazz, rock and AOR that recalls the openness of Japanese city pop, despite emerging from a very different context. Some songs offered lightness and escape, while others confronted the realities of life during the civil war. Together, these recordings document a close musical community in Beirut whose friendships endured long after the tapes themselves had almost disappeared.