ABSTRACT
Autobiographical narratives about person and place are stitched into the melodic and harmonic fabric of many of Tehran’s unofficial rock songs. As musicians perform, record and distribute their songs they give listeners insight into the socio-political, geographical and personal contexts that have inspired their compositions. In this chapter I study excerpts from the lyrics of two unofficial rock bands and one solo artist from Tehran. The musical examples I have selected tell us very specifically about what it is like to be a young, highly educated and creative Iranian male living in the capital city of the Islamic Republic of Iran. I also use statements made by the bands and musicians in focus group and e-mail interviews to support the argument that rock music, rather than being a Western construct, should be construed as a global genre that gains significance as it is lived out in a local context.
