Waleed’s band played their first post-war gig yesterday. Acras Sicauda, named after the Latin classification for the black scorpion, is an Iraqi heavy metal band. No longer compelled to mention Saddam in their songs, instead they sing about death, teenage angst and against the occupation.

The improbable backdrop to strobes and headbanging boys included coloured streamers, a dangling strawberry and a bingo game board. An unrebellious sounding 4pm start was necessary because it’s impossible to get a taxi late at night.

The five strong band started in 2000. Waleed and Faisal have started a few bands before. Marwan, the drummer, dropped out of school. Tony has been doing teacher training. Firas is at the college of fine art. Waleed and Marwan do most of the songwriting between them.

It used to be that the government was keeping an eye on what they did. Waleed said he once supplied the Ministry of Information with approximate translations of the songs. The ostensibly pro-Saddam song was in fact, Waleed says, critical, while others had concealed attacks on the president. Younger people are sometimes less self-censoring than those who have had more time to internalise the fear of retribution.

One of the new songs, joy of retribution, includes the lines:

“They want a war for the rest of the future
They said you don’t need it much longer
They want a war but you want peace
But you know you got to kill that beast
…
This stone is cheap and it’s all I need
One step for victory, one step for death
Yes, it’s worth it.”