If you fancy a listen to The beatlesâ âHey Jude,â the Eaglesâ âHotel Californiaâ or Taylor Swiftâs âShake it Off,â donât plan a trip to Chechnya after June 1.
Thatâs when the Russian republic will start banning music that is either too slow or too fast, NPR reported.
For the record, âHey Judeâ is too slow, while âHotel Californiaâ and âShake it Offâ are too fast.
Beyonceâs âTexas Hold âEm,â the Bee Geesâ âStayinâ Aliveâ and Led Zeppelinâs âStairway to Heavenâ are just right.
The Chechen Ministry of Culture announced the ban last week, by the order of Culture Minister Musa Dadayev in conjunction with Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov.
âMusical, vocal and choreographicâ works will be limited to a tempo of 80 to 116 beats per minute (BPM) to âconform to the Chechen mentality and sense of rhythm,â said Dadayev, according to the Russian state-run news agency TASS.
âBorrowing musical culture from other peoples is inadmissible,â Dadayev said, per a translation by The Guardian. âWe must bring to the people and to the future of our children the cultural heritage of the Chechen people. This includes the entire spectrum of moral and ethical standards of life for Chechens.â
This includes the customs and traditions and âfeatures of the Chechen character, which includes the entire spectrum of moral and ethical standards of life of the Chechens,â he added.
According to Russian media, artists have until June 1 to rewrite any music that doesnât conform to the new rule. How said rule will be enforced is not clear.
The governmentâs crackdown on tempos will do away with most modern music genres.
Electronic styles of music like house, techno and dubstep all tend to have BPMs of over 116, says the audio tech company Izotope, while the average tempo of 2020âs best-selling pop songs was 122 BPM, according to the BBC.
Chechnya is located in the North Caucasus of southern Russia and home to a vast majority of Muslims.
Other songs reported to be too slow, per NPR, are: âLittle Wingâ by Jimi Hendrix (71 BPM, âDonât Worry Be Happyâ by Bobby McFerrin (69 BPM), âRehabâ by Amy Winehouse (72 BPM), âImagineâ by John Lennon (76 BPM) and âHelloâ by Adele (79 BPM).
Those too fast include: âHere Comes the Sunâ by The beatles (129 BPM), âCruel Summerâ by Taylor Swift (170 BPM), âSmells Like Teen Spiritâ by Nirvana (117 BPM) and âToxicâ by Britney Spears (143 BPM).
