Afghanistan's anonymous Burka Band recently grasped internet attention for its creepy tune. But in this essay, we learn that the lyrics may be more revealing.
My social media feed is a catalog of headlines, clawing for clicks. And yet, one song, with a deadpan delivery and eerie pulse, branded onto me without begging—“Burka Blue,” by the intriguing Burka Band.
At first, the song seemed like the anthem for political protest against the Taliban. After all, they reclaimed a symbol of oppression—the Burka, an outer garment worn by some Muslim women— by using it as a tool to stay anonymous. But when undressed, and picked apart like an English reading, the song functions differently. It asks us to question ourselves.
This list contains lyrics from “Burka Blue” and two of the band’s more unknown songs, “No Burka!” and “I Care for You.” Still, I must note that, while my interpretations consider context, I can’t be sure that this is the intended meaning.
1. Verse 5, “Burka Blue”
You give me all your lovе
You give me all your kisses
And thеn you touch my burka
And do not know who is it
In 2002, after the fall of the Taliban regime, the Burka Band recorded this song. At the time, social intimidation in Afghanistan made women wear Burkas, even though it wasn’t mandated by law. Initially, I assumed that this verse just depicted the distance that a Burka creates between loved ones. While that may be true, the lyrics unsettled me for a different reason. After imagining myself as the women, I realized that people gave them affection without knowing their identity. They saw them as a body first and then a person.
2. Verse 2, “No Burka”
I understand their (advertiser’s) meaning
That soap is not for cleaning
And cars are not for driving
And bodies not for hiding
This verse illustrates the band’s founder Nargis’ (pseudonym) reaction to the hyper-sexualization in Germany—where she travelled to after a German record label picked up the band’s music. There, she saw people using their bodies to advertise, which she feels diluted the meaning of what is being advertised (EX: soap and cars.) The singer’s instinct to criticize sexualization gives me the impression that she saw the rhetoric in Afghanistan extend into a foreign country. That is, people saw them as a body first and then a person.
3. Verse 3, “I Care For You”
In time then of the virus
Where I had to hide my mouth
I wore the healthy burka
And you were so astound
At first, the phrase sounded like juxtaposition. The very act of calling a Burka, what I always saw for its oppressive nature, “healthy” felt tactless. The song “I Care For You,” released during Covid, changed this belief. The Burka, at its core, is a voluntary form of modesty in Islam, just like a mask became a means for protection during Covid. For many women, it is a way to preserve values, beliefs, and security. Choosing to sing in Burkas, the Burka Band reserved their anonymity but also attempted to protect the original dialogue of the Burka.
***
I’m analyzing the Burka Band’s song because the media’s oversimplification of their music never sat right with me. Before listening to these women’s voices, the media decided to praise their activism, to say they reclaimed their oppression.
Truth is, it was never the Burka that oppressed them; it was the men who tried to erase them.
And if we make assumptions about these women, without listening to them, aren’t we also erasing them?
