Sound of defiance: Blue Pulpit and Dreaming Madmen keep rock 'n' roll alive in Beirut

BEIRUT — Metro al-Madina was buzzing with energy on Saturday night as two of Lebanon’s rising rock bands, Blue Pulpit and Dreaming Madmen, shared the stage for the first time.“Performing is a form of resistance,” said Dreaming Madmen’s lead singer, Christopher Abou Jaoudeh, reflecting on the dual reality of making music as “such horrors are happening next door.” A few hundred audience members filled the once-abandoned, now revamped, Aresco Theatre that Metro al-Madina has called home for the last year and a half. Voices blended with the thrum of guitars, shouting every lyric back to the stage, their energy defying the tension gripping the country.“Ultimately, music is important,” the 29-year-old singer stressed afterward. “We have to try to keep the music business alive in the country.”Lebanon has been grappling with a severe economic...