I was in Beirut a couple weeks ago just before the last flare-up. How strange to have just returned from this beautiful city with its great restaurants, fun bars, nice coast and true-to-name “Paris of the Middle East” neighbourhoods, only to hear that Hezbollah guerrillas were now occupying buildings around the hotel we were staying in.

That’s what makes this city unique: in the midst of all this tension construction continues at a feverish pace, nightclubs keep bumping, bars keep serving great cocktails, and pensioner joggers with their iPods bounce down the corniche.

That said, Beirut isn’t all fun and drink. The tension while we were there was real: the tanks were everywhere, people were maybe more reserved than usual, and roadblocks/sit-ins had all but closed large parts of downtown plus many other parts of the city. The drive from Damascus still offers views of the unfinished bridge that was blown up during the last round of fighting with Israel, and pock-marked buildings stand ominously beside new Starbucks, Lina’s and Virgin Megastores.

But the Beirut nightlife is no myth. I have this lasting memory of a group of four beautiful girls in a BMW convertible, hands in the air, dancing in their seats as they drive towards Monot street. Many of the bars we went to are definitely up to Paris standards. And while the scene is seemingly smaller than I had imagined, there’s no denying that this is a fun city. A classy city. My nights out there definitely reminded me of Tel Aviv bar hops a couple years back.

So we’ll hear one track today from an album that’s getting old but I still enjoy. Soapkills are a Lebanese trip-hop group featuring the lovely voice of Yasmine Hamdan over Zeid Hamdan’s beats.

The track you’ll hear is off their last release from way back in 2002, Cheftak. They should hopefully have some new stuff coming out soon. Check-out their MySpace page if you want to hear/learn more.

We can thank Mary Louise Congo for her wonderful eye on this and many other photos on this site.

Soapkills – Cheftak