« Les Préservatifs Sont Trop Chers ! » Ten Years Later

I walked out of the pharmacy that day with the eyes buried into my bill. The item I was staring at read: “Durex condoms – Pack of 3: 8,000 lira” (~5$).

“That’s nearly 2 bucks a piece”, I thought. And then a song popped up in my head. An old song from SoapKills, I remember the last one on their album Bater and their only one in French.

« Frères ! les préservatifs sont trop chers !

Moi j’suis jeune et j’ veux baiser »

(Translate : « Brothers ! The condoms are too expensive! Me I’m young, and I want to fcuk”)

The cover of unforgettable album Bater.
(Source: Amazon)

I froze for a minute as the song gave me quite an intense emotional flashback. It had marked me since the first time I'd heard it, with its daring lyrics and incredible composition. I was still under twenty back then. Always horny, often broke, and the condoms did seem too expensive at times.

It was 2001, a decade ago today – Damn!

That was the year when then hyperactive local electro pop band SoapKills released its third and highly acclaimed album, Bater. A memorable album named after a lovely village in the Chouf. SoapKills is no longer alive now, it was dismantled in 2005, but somehow it still lives on. It has become no less than a myth for many of us in the war generation…

Fortunately for Lebanon’s music scene, SoapKills co-founders Zeid Hamdan and Yasmine Hamdan both remain highly active on-stage as well as off- stage, each doing his own thing... but I can't help but think that gosh, weren’t they good together!

--by GiB#2

Frères - SoapKills (Bater, 2001)


Frères ! les préservatifs sont trop chers
Moi j’suis jeune et j’ veux baiser
Ma mère, ma sœur, mon frère, me disent de faire
Attention, clair
Mais moi j’veux pas m’laisser faire
Par la politique du cancer
Qui hausse les prix partout
« Des actes théâtraux dans une salle d’attente » *
L’attente, bruyante, fuyante
« Musique classique un hymne à la collectivité à 18h précises »

Frère, ne rate pas les combats
Qui auront lieu ici-bas
Dans les centres commerciaux
Pour adoucir les mœurs a scient *
Mais frères, La publicité réclame
Des actes théâtraux dans ma chambre
Des pièces de monnaie trainent flemme harem *

« Musique classique un hymne à la collectivité à 18h précises »

S’il pleut, couvre-toi.
Les préservatifs sont trop chers

P.S: couldn’t find the lyrics online but since I always thought they're so powerful and poetic, I thought I’d take a stab at them myself. The lines marked with a * are those where I’m still not too sure - if any fan out there can help perfect them, it would be greatly appreciated!