Rock the Casbah

[shoshi]

The Clash got the idea for this song from the Islamic revolution in Iran. Casbah is the living place of a Middle eastern ruler. I understand that during the Gulf War of 1991 when the US Air Force was going out to bomb the Casbah of Saddam Hussein this song was played again and again for them. Rock the Casbah was written on the first bomb dropped on Iraq. This is the original music video for the song.

 

[shoshi]

yes. The Islamic revolution was in 1979. That inspired this song.

 

[Moonglow]

This scenario was inspired by the ban on Western music in Iran after the 1979 Islamic Revolution. The song's lyrics feature various Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, and Sanskrit loan-words, such as "sharif", "bedouin", "sheikh", "kosher", "rāga", "muezzin", "minaret", and "casbah".

 

[shoshi]

In the song the people refuse to obey the ban. The song was used to inspire American pilots to rock the casbah of Saddam.