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Omar Souleyman Throws a Transportive Rooftop Show in ‘Warni Warni’ Video

Omar Souleyman, "Warni Warni" video, 'Wenu Wenu'

“It was weird to think that Americans would like an Arab to sing in America,” Omar Souleyman told SPIN of his entrée into the U.S. music business, in our just-published feature by Andy Beta. The stateside success of the Syrian musician’s hypnotic music remains unlikely, but today’s release of his Four Tet- produced Wenu Wenu album should confirm that it’s no joke. Stereogum points to the video for trance-inducing seven-minute track “Warni Warni,” a clip that emphasizes the surreality of it all. Directed by Cali Thornhill Dewitt, who earlier this year shot a short film for Danish punks Iceage, the video shows Souleyman reigning over a rooftop concert and dancing in a variety of far-flung, famous locales. If anyone can teleport, his confident mien suggests, well, why not Souleyman? When he gazes down on a giant bald eagle, it doesn’t even seem weird.