Those of you unfamiliar with Jad Choueiri soon may be introduced to him. Jad is a young Lebanese singer known for his pop, as opposed to more Arab classical, music in the region. Unlike, say, Amr Moustafa or Amr Diad; Jad Choueiri is akin to his Western contemporaries. Which explains why I don’t care for him at all. He’s music is boring, unoriginal and way too “flashee”. You’ll see what I mean.

Jad is ambitious and the Arab world is not enough. He intends to conquer the American, or at least European, scene with an English language album which features some Western notables like Wyclef. The title track is “Funky Arabs” and is meant to dispel negative stereotypes of Arabs as terrorists and so forth. Jad sings instead that Arabs are cool, beautiful people who are as “funky.” When I first heard about it, I though this would be good. But then I saw the video:

“O’ dear Allah, No!” was my reaction. The video and song are just awful. The lyrics are crap, Jad sings in an annoying accent and the entire video is so cheesy. And who still uses a 1960s word like funky? But, then, Jad may have actually bettered the image of Arabs in the West. After all, the only impression that people will get watching this video is that Arabs are funny and somewhat cheesy. One laughs rather than being afraid.

Whatever reputation Jad will embed, it is an improvement from that of the crazy jihadi militant. I’ll take “funky Arab” over “terrorist” any day.