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TERRORISM

Spain jails second rapper for glorifying terror

Spain's top criminal court sentenced a rapper to two years in prison Friday for Twitter posts and a song it said glorified terrorism, the latest such decision against an artist that has raised free speech concerns.

Spain jails second rapper for glorifying terror
Rapper Pablo Hasél will serve four years for his tweets and lyrics. Artist photo/Facebook
Such was the uncertainty over whether the tweets of Pablo Rivadulla, better known as Pablo Hasel, were harmful enough to warrant prison that one of the three judges who oversaw his case made known her disagreement with the sentence.
 
In its statement, the National Audience said it had analysed 64 of Hasel's Twitter posts as well as a song's lyrics and found that put together, they not only went against state authorities but alluded “to the necessity to take a step further using violent behaviour, including using terrorism.”
 
The court gave as an example one 2016 tweet in which the rapper attached a photo of a member of the GRAPO, a once violent far-left group.
 
Hasel wrote: “Protests are necessary, but not enough, we support those who went beyond,” the statement read.
 
One judge, however, disagreed with the decision to sentence Hasel to jail. She considered that none of the tweets were “a call for violence,” according to a court document.
 
This is not the first time that Hasel has been condemned for glorifying terrorism. In 2014, the National Audience sentenced him to two years jail for the content of some of his songs. He did not serve time, as first-time offenders of non-violent crimes  with a sentence of no more than two years don't usually spend time behind bars in Spain.
 
But this time round, if the Supreme Court confirms Friday's sentence, he will be sent to prison for four years to serve both sentences.
 
The news comes just over a week after the Supreme Court upheld a three-and-a-half-year jail sentence for another rapper, Valtonyc, for lyrics they said glorified terrorism and insulted the crown
 
The sentences have raised concern over free speech in Spain, but terror victim groups argue they do not want to see violence trivialised.

CULTURE

New songs mark sixth anniversary of French star Johnny Hallyday’s death

Fans of the late Johnny Hallyday, "the French Elvis Presley", will be able to commemorate the sixth anniversary of his death with two songs never released before.

New songs mark sixth anniversary of French star Johnny Hallyday's death

Hallyday, blessed with a powerful husky voice and seemingly boundless energy, died in December 2017, aged 74, of lung cancer after a long music and acting career.

After an estimated 110 million records sold during his lifetime – making him one of the world’s best-selling singers -Hallyday’s success has continued unabated beyond his death.

Almost half of his current listeners on Spotify are under the age of 35, according to the streaming service, and a posthumous greatest hits collection of “France’s favourite rock’n’roller”, whose real name was Jean-Philippe Leo
Smet, sold more than half a million copies.

The two new songs, Un cri (A cry) and Grave-moi le coeur (Engrave my heart), are featured on two albums published by different labels which also contain already-known hits in remastered or symphonic versions.

Un cri was written in 2017 by guitarist and producer Maxim Nucci – better known as Yodelice – who worked with Hallyday during the singer’s final years.

At the time Hallyday had just learned that his cancer had returned, and he “felt the need to make music outside the framework of an album,” Yodelice told reporters this week.

Hallyday recorded a demo version of the song, accompanied only by an acoustic blues guitar, but never brought it to full production.

Sensing the fans’ unbroken love for Hallyday, Yodelice decided to finish the job.

He separated the voice track from the guitar which he felt was too tame, and arranged a rockier, full-band accompaniment.

“It felt like I was playing with my buddy,” he said.

The second song, Grave-moi le coeur, is to be published in December under the artistic responsibility of another of the singer’s close collaborators, the arranger Yvan Cassar.

Hallyday recorded the song – a French version of Elvis’s Love Me Tender – with a view to performing it at a 1996 show in Las Vegas.

But in the end he did not play it live, opting instead for the original English-language version, and did not include it in any album.

“This may sound crazy, but the song was on a rehearsal tape that had never been digitalised,” Cassar told AFP.

The new songs are unlikely to be the last of new Hallyday tunes to delight fans, a source with knowledge of his work said. “There’s still a huge mass of recordings out there spanning his whole career,” the source said.

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