History
Although Native Hebrew hip hop gained popularity only during the 1990s, stemming from global influences, traces of it could been found during the mid 1980s. Yair Nitzani, then a member of the Israeli rock group, "Tislam", released an old school hip hop parody album under the name "Hashem Tamid". Nitzani was mainly influenced from New York old school Hip Hop. On 1993 Nigel Haadmor and Yossi Fine, influenced by Eric B & Rakim and Flame-3 of the TPA Crew and other late 1980s Hip Hop, have produced the album "Humus Metamtem", which was released by Yair Nitzani. Yossi Fine later on immigrated to New York, where he played as a bassist with artists such as David Bowie, Naughty by Nature and Lou Reed. Nigel Hddmor is the pseudonym of Yehoshua Sofer, a Jewish-Jamaican Broslov Hasidic Jew who was born in Jamaica and raised in Jamaica, the U.S., and Israel. Influenced by his mother, who listened to Jamaican ska at home, Admor produced a unique sound based on his Caribbean roots living in the Jewish state.
In 1995, the Beastie Boys toured Israel and were interviewed by Quami de la Fox (Eyal Freedman) on Galgalatz, the Israeli Army’s radio station and most popular radio station of that time. After the interview, Quami de la Fox created a Hebrew parody of their song “So What’cha Want” to promote their tour in Israel. Later that year Quami de la Fox collaborated with DJ Liron Teeni, also a host on the Galgalatz station, the vice-station of Galei-Zahal, to produce Esek Shachor (Black Business) – the first all hip hop radio show in Israel. Playing a mix of Hebrew, Arabic and English hip hop, by 2000 Esek Shachor “was the most popular program on Galgalatz and today remains a leader in Israel’s hip-hop world.”
Just as Kool Herc is credited in America as being a founding father of hip hop, DJ Liron Teeni is given similar credit as the pioneer of Israeli hip-hop. His major role in the process of making Israeli hip hop the popular genre it is in Israel today was the transformation of the lyrics to the mother tongue of Hebrew. Kids would come on his show on the army radio station in order to showcase their rapping skills, but when they would start rapping in English, he would make them translate it into Hebrew. Because rappers began to rap in English, it was seen as an American export which was not authentic to the music of Israel.
Popular rock band Shabak Samech began rapping in Hebrew in 1995. Influenced by the Beastie Boys, their lyrics did not have any specific political or social message and were mostly party lyrics. Israeli listeners initially rejected their music. Chemi Arzi, one of the band members, recalls, “‘They said you just can’t rap in Hebrew; it doesn’t sound good.’” Shabak Samech continued to produce Hebrew-language rap songs in efforts to promote this new style of Hebrew and Mediterranean hip hop. The band is credited with not only being the first Israeli hip hop group, but also being the most responsible for the progression of Israeli hip hop. Although these teenagers from Yavne were initially marginalized due to the belief of Israeli DJs that their audiences would be lost, Shabak Samech persevered and eventually reached great success.
While Israeli hip hop may be seem to have common underlying themes with US hip hop and they share the main elements of hip hop, mainstream hip hop in Israel tends to deal mainly with the situation in the country, spirituality, or politics. Israeli rappers talk about more personal issues such as the struggles of growing up in Israel. Most Jewish Rappers tends to disregard the political situation between Arabs and Jews, yet they refer frequently to the economic situations in the country. Since 2001, with the rising of new Hip Hop acts, most issues are dealing with creation, essence of Hip Hop, street culture, drugs, hedonism and etc.
Some of the songs also gear towards more religious themes since many of the rappers are Jewish or Muslim. Israeli hip hop has such a motivational theme behind it that local governments support the Hip Hop movement that has exploded among Israeli youth. The government has even supported Hip Hop groups who travel to other countries, viewing it as a good outlet for the rest of the world to view them through. Israeli Hip Hop is creating several positive movements among the people of the country that will continue to grow and become even more popular. Some of the things the Israeli rappers rap about can tend to be controversial as well. As far as media exposure of artists who address real issues like child abuse or the future of the state of Israel is concerned, Israeli artists seem to have the same problems getting heard as artists in America; they address current issues but don’t get much attention from the radio stations that play popular music or television stations. Before Hip Hop was considered a genre in Israel, pop and disco music were the only genres being played on the radio. When Hip Hop songs started becoming popular, the radio stations refused to play them. They felt that Hip Hop didn't make people feel good so they would not play it. The songs spoke of everything from terrorism and religion to children speaking up about abuse in their home. And as far as the ongoing conflict between the Arab population and the Jewish population, hip hop music seems to document this more accurately from various viewpoints than any other popular music or news medium in Israel. Even the conflict between Arab and Israeli rappers is documented in films such as Channels of Rage which showcases Subliminal and an Arab-Israeli named MC Tamer Nafer whose friendship ended due to political tension.
Read more about this topic: Israeli Hip Hop
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