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"If you want to sing, sing" – late, Cat Stevens aka Yusuf Islam has returned to his old self. The Wanderer between the worlds is now 70.
– Cat Stevens is back. With his album "The Laughing Apple" (2017), he joined his previous work, though innocent, with thick brushstrokes and primary colors, as he describes in a "TED Conversation": "Be present in the world, smile, Do not worry! "
Today, Saturday, July 21, the eternal seeker celebrates his 70th birthday
He grew up as Steven Georgiou at the restaurant of his parents in the West End of London, with a Greek Cypriot. Father and a Swedish mother: "I was raised religiously.I went to church frequently."
The Beatles inspired the teenager to learn guitar and write his first song , "Mighty Peace". He later told The Telegraph, "This song embodies my entire catalog.It's all that I've written, my goals in life are all there.And your goals do not really change.Just like your soul. "
The song" Matthew and Son "from his eponymous debut album made it in 1967 as Cat Stevens to Popidol the teenager. The song "The first cut is the deepest" later became a cover version of the worldwide hit. But exhausted early, he became so severely infected with tuberculosis that he had to spend a year exposing his spiritual streak.
Folk replaced Pop and made him known in the 70s all over the world as a soulful singer and songwriter, albeit happy, though among other things for the soundtrack of the black cult comedy "Harold and Maude". From his quest for the meaning of life, he creates ointments such as "Tea for the Tillerman", followed by hit songs such as "Peace Train" and "Moonshadow".
But at the height of his glory, he returns to the world of music. and Greed "and retired for 25 years." Trigger was a deadly experience – he almost drowned in the Pacific at Malibu. "The moment life would go away!", he recalls in a "Conversation TED "." I lost control, I had no power – and at that time I found God. "His brother gave him the Quran to read six months later , in 1977 he converted to Islam and Cat Stevens became Yusuf Islam
Sänger donated royalties to all Muslim songs that were not up to his standards. new beliefs, to Muslim charities – about 40% of his work.He told the "Telegraph" that there are still some that he would not play today: "Bring another baby bottle "would probably be one!" And her tube "Lady D'Arbanville" on an ex-girlfriend – "out Respect for my wife."
For a few years, he gave up completely music and mainly defended Muslim education and Islamic faith, with Bart, in traditional costume, without humor and with controversial statements about the fatwa against Salman Rushdie frightened Many of his fans, and today, he attaches great importance to following a spiritual path with his first songs before discovering the Quran: "If I really wanted to say what I wrote, it meant taking what I think – otherwise, I would be a hypocrite. "
Later he began writing religious and educational music for children, but did not play the guitar for 20 years until his son secretly inserted an instrument into This changed: "One morning a few years ago, his guitar was dragging and it was hard for me to ignore it," he told NME music magazine. I picked up, I remembered the chords, and I started to sing a few words that I had written.It was like opening a lock. "
His gradual return to world of materialistic music began. In 2003, he recorded a new version of "Peace Train", in 2006 he released his album "An Other Cup", the first in a series of four albums. The last appeared in 2017 – "The Laughing Apple" – and for the first time since 1978 with the name of Cat Stevens on the cover – next to Yusuf: "The world has changed, so I changed," he told the Telegraph. "But my center has always been the same, in search of peace."
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