As part of Shubbak Festival 2023, Marsm is delighted to present the iconic Lebanese-American indie-rock musician Hamed Sinno as they debuts their solo material.

After leading up the most prominent indie-rock band of the Arab world Mashrou’ Leila, the prodigious composer returns to the stage with a new project co-commissioned by Shubbak Festival and the Barbican.

Poems of Consumption is a literary song cycle that explores the resonances between Amazon-era consumerism, mental illness, unrequited love, and environmental collapse, without purporting to have an alternative or moral high-ground. It’s a portrait of Nero, a desolate working-class melancholic crying at Whole Foods while the world outside comes to a boil. The compositions juxtapose the romanticism evoked by the sound of a string section, with hyper-industrial electronica created out of the sounds of consumerism (crumpling cellophane, bubble wrap, unboxing, ripping plastic) to swing between dancefloor & aural assault.

Co-commissioned by Shubbak Festival and Barbican.
Produced by Marsm.
Supported by Arts Council England, Bagri Foundation, A.M. Qattan Foundation, British Council, English PEN, Goethe Institute.