in 1996 amr diab managed to score a hit that was so big in the arabic countries it managed to cross over outside of the region. thanks to the diaspora mostly but some other reasons might had to something with it. the sound of record was the main reason as it sounded like a mellow gypsy kings record.
"nour al ain" (translation: "light of my eye") as the record is actually called really was everywhere that year and following. in common terms outside of the arabic countries it was known as "habibi" (translation "darling") since diab repeats the word constantly in the insanely catchy chorus.
i believe that it's with this song the dimuative phrase habibi-pop came about since it just personified the new type of arabic pop song that started borrowing influences outside of the region. much like the songs in the western pop charts happened to be about love (in one way or another) and repeated "baby", "darling" and other overused endearments the arabic songs started to use the same tricks
i never knew that amr diab even did a version with verses sung in english until i discovered this oddity on kazaa over ten years ago. i found the concept funny then and think it's still bizarre that this single had not just an english version (that was produced by none other than stuart chricton) but remixes by few of the big names at time (rhythm masters, klubbheads, matthew roberts/phunk phorce & shazz).
emi really tried to sell the record by making sure that if the beats were hot, people wouldn't mind the fact that diab's english verses were terrible. but then again most of the remixes focused on the hook beside shazz's main version. all off them who did the remixes in their distinctive sounds at the time. shazz with a lowkey deep house rerub, klubbheads doing a really stupid hard house meets speed garage version, rhythm masters with pumping house mixes and roberts going into 4x4 garage but with a slighty darker slant.
when i heard of the remix pack the first time the mixes i geared towards was rhythm masters but i can say nowadays that shazz's dub is great. i didn't like that one at all on the first listen but i think it's a great production but i'd liked a full instrumental since the occasional vocal stab just doesn't work.
however i figured out by doing some searching on junodownload that the remix is essentially a rework of one or two tracks from shazz's 1998 album. those tracks are "pray" and "escapade" and i'd play those two over this one had not it been a full instrumental.
but anyhow back to the rhythm masters main mix since i decided to focus on it. their modus operandi at the time fast, funky, pumping, clubby house and this is no exception. they kicked up the tempo right up and worked that hook to it's fullest but sped up without timestretching. there is heavy looping to match the pounding tribal big room backing track.
that's the key word, "big room" since this track isn't subtle in any way, even their dub (it's known as the diskfunktional mix) is big and funky with loops, samples and filters worked over that pounding beat but the dub has a slighty quainter break but it's not classy, it's just a few notches down.
truth be told that i'd play the dub if i'd bust out some older olav basoski records but the vocal mix doesn't hold up. neither does the dub really in modern stylings but with context of those type of record it's a fish in the waters. like with most of those records, funky techno and harder french filterfunk tracks the key way is to actually not play the whole record but the best parts.
listen here (youtube)
noticed that i didn't go in depth about klubbheads or matthew roberts remixes? yeah, if the rhythm masters dub barely holds up, the version by former and latter really doesn't. well completely not true, the lesser vocal of the robert's mixes is decent. but none the less klubbheads remix is a steaming hot pile of turd.
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