Beyond pain: Palestinian electronic music’s shifting soundscape

“Everyone from Gaza always has an emergency bag ready, containing official documents and essential items, easy to carry. When the war started, I realised I needed a different bag as a musician. I packed my laptop, audio interface, and headphones, and left my house,” recalls Siraj Shawa, an electronic music producer from Gaza now based in Cairo, Egypt.

Siraj started out as a beatboxer in 2011, learning music theory through YouTube tutorials. He later joined a rock band, experimenting with drums and guitar, but the instruments never resonated with him. In 2018, Siraj downloaded Ableton, discovered dance music, and never looked back.

“I released my album ‘The First Ticket’ in 2022. I wanted to portray life in Gaza through a different lens than the stereotypical destruction and siege. I wanted to express ambition and a desire for freedom”, he explains. “The album was mainly progressive house. People were surprised there was music like this coming out of Gaza. How can you create beautiful things under these circumstances?” 

Soon after, the war began, and Siraj and his family faced constant displacement. He says, “I didn’t have the luxury to think about music. My priorities were the basics of life: saving my phone battery for calls or the news, and finding food, water, firewood, and a safe location to go next.”

Once his family reached a more comfortable location, he was able to return to music. “We felt broken, just trying to find any space to release our emotions,” he says. He reworked an old track into a more cinematic version “reflecting the fast and distorted events we were living. It felt like an action film, and I wanted the music to reflect that”. At one point, Siraj risked his life to record in a studio in Rafah. “I met up with an old bandmate to record, and the studio was located in a tower, usually one of the first things to be targeted. But we wanted to record, there was no alternative.”

Now in Cairo, Siraj collaborates with local artists and takes part in several music courses and programmes. In his quest to enrich his practice, Siraj has sought out Palestinian sounds and samples, making him more interested in Arabic music. “I found a treasure of sounds we’re not using. Why would I use a kick drum when I can use a duff, and get a punchier and more expressive sound?” 

His upcoming album, ‘Phoenix of Gaza’, blends Arabic elements with his signature electronic sound alongside samples from the war, like the buzz of surveillance drones. “I combine these sounds to tell the story of Gaza: tense and dark, but always with a trace of hope, something distant we keep reaching for.”