More and more, elite rock stars from the West are asking to collaborate with Rachid Taha

British rockers have found a kindred spirit in French-Algerian iconoclast Rachid Taha.

Increasingly, elite figures from rock's harder edge are collaborating with the rebel-outsider, who mixes Western and Middle Eastern instruments, and sings in Arabic.

Led Zeppelin's Robert Plant, the Clash's Mick Jones, Blur's Damon Albarn and big-beat vocalist Fatboy Slim have all appeared onstage with Taha in recent years. Brian Eno toured with him to St. Petersburg and Moscow.

Top U.K. bands the Aliens and Hard-Fi have performed with him and punk's godmother Patti Smith featured him at her 2005 London "Meltdown Festival," adding a U.S. connection.

"I'm here with Patti Smith's son (Jackson)," Taha said last week when reached by phone at his Paris home studio.

"He's a guitarist. We're recording together and getting ready for a special evening in September with different people for my 50th birthday."

Record stores tend to classify Taha as "world music." In April, he also won a BBC Radio 3 world-music award for Rock el Casbah: The Best of Rachid Taha, released in North America on Canada Day.

But no single term defines his style. He mixes North African chaabi pop and rai rock with elements of punk, techno, trance, hip-hop and electronica, and performs it all with wild, infectious energy.

A few years ago at Harbourfront Centre, Taha played a Sunday afternoon show at full blast, setting the crowd dancing as he charged around the stage, curly hair flying and eyes shaded with yellow wraparound sunglasses.

"I kiss on the mouth, not the butt," he replied in his madcap way when asked how he embraced diverse music styles, playing on the French word embrasser, to kiss.

Taha was born in the Algerian coastal city of Oran and, from the age of 10, grew up in Lyon, France. Racial prejudices hardened by the 1954-1962 Algerian War of Independence made him a target.

As a factory worker, he met immigrant musicians as angry and disaffected as himself, and formed his first band, Carte de Séjour (Residency Permit).

In 1986, they announced themselves. They recorded "Douce France" (Sweet France), a patriotic ballad written during World War II and made famous by beloved chansonnier Charles Trenet.

"Sweet France, dear country of my childhood, cradled in bliss," the song goes. "I have held you in my heart."

The band put a backbeat and Middle Eastern instruments to it, but otherwise exercised restraint, making their version all the more powerfully subversive. For the music video, they stared dolefully into the camera.

The response was outrage. French radio effectively banned the song, which helped propel sales.

In 1989, the band broke up, leaving Taha to form another group billed simply as "Rachid Taha."

With it, he has continued to refer to racism against immigrants in such songs as "Voila, Voila" and "Hey Anta (Hey You)," both included along with "Douce France" on the best-of CD.

"I am French for every day and Algerian forever," he said lightly when asked why, after 40 years in France, he has yet to take out French citizenship.

More seriously, he recalled his uncles.

"My uncle fought in the Indo-Chinese war on the side of France," Taha said in French. "He fought in the Second World War as well.

"When he returned to Algeria, even though he risked his life for the French, he found himself discriminated against."

In the independence war, the uncle took the Algerian side and the French came looking for him, Taha said. When they couldn't find him, the French tracked down another uncle and tortured him instead.

"Do you know the movie The Battle of Algiers?" Taha said, referring to the classic 1965 film by Italian director Gillo Pontevorco. "It is used by the CIA as a model of how to torture people."

Taha's career highlights include the landmark 1998 concert "1, 2, 3 Soleils" at Bercy Arena, Paris, in which he starred with fellow Algerian singers Khaled and Faudel.

In 2001, the Black Hawk Down movie soundtrack included his song "Barra Barra." Last year, The Hunting Party, with Richard Gere, did the same.

Part of Taha's unique sound derives from the bendir, or North African hand drum, and the mandolute, a North African guitar resembling an oud with frets.

He appears in Toronto as one of seven onstage – "the Seven Pillars of Wisdom, the Seven Samurai, the Magnificent Seven," Taha said in his jocular, culturally inclusive way.

-by John Goddard