Over at The Long and Winding Road, Kris has a couple good posts on the difficulties some musicians are currently facing in Uzbekistan. This one gives a much more thorough account of the revocation of public performance licenses from a handful of pop musicians than I gave last week.
After its publication, “Uzbeknavo” (info in English), the state agency in charge of granting public performance licenses (including, to what I’ve discerned, the ability to be on TV and radio as well) pulled the licenses of the above-mentioned popstars. As a result, the young men all came to the newspaper’s office and began to threaten the journalist, Alijon Eshboy.
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Fans of the Shohruh and friends have been engaging in “telephone terror,” calling the newspaper and threatening Eshboy. However, the government is backing the newspaper in this case for once.
Going after the press? Well, there’s their chance to be a little harder than they currently are, perhaps even as hard as Flavor Flav.
I would be quite interested to know how widespread the telephone harassment by fans is. Many have noted the importance of rock music as an inspiration for resistance of communism. Is pop music what ignites young Uzbeks? (Not that I expect Shohruh or Jurabek to lead a march on the government anytime soon…)
Her other post, meanwhile, is on the trial of Dadaxon Hasanov, who was arrested for writing a song about the Andijon events.
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