Monday

Bringing Hip Hop to India? How About we Bring India to Hip Hop!

Just recently on DesiHits, I read an article on bringing hip hop to India, and whether or not it would work. He quoted the New York Times, in their article about Akshay Kumar collaborating with Snoop Dogg, which said that “While a few Western acts like Madonna and Coldplay also sell well in India, Hip-Hop has traditionally had limited appeal.” Now here’s the thing, India itself is not exactly the market for hip hop. For those of you that have been there, I’m sure you can see that. It’s not something that can be instantaneously sprung on a community that doesn’t have the context for that sort of music.

I’m going to stray a little bit and talk about the evolution of the genre of Desi Hip Hop. When I was growing up, the only Indian rapper I could name was Baba Sehgal, and while he gave us some enjoyable tunes (Dil Dhadke), he wasn’t exactly pushing any boundaries on the hip hop front. In recent years, Indian rappers seem to be dropping out of the woodwork. I could honestly write for an hour and probably not list every Indian rapper I know. A lot of it began in the U.K., when RDB and other “bhangarage” producers were popularizing MCs like GI Jatt, MC Rydem Ryda, Lightnin MC, E=MC, and of course MC Metz & Trix. Then they began emerging in the U.S. and Canada, and if you’re familiar with the urban Desi scene, you know names like Nivla, Kidd Skilly, Bohemia, Blitzkrieg, and GOP Virk.

The problem is that these days, any fool with a microphone and Audacity (excellent program, by the way…it’s what I use) can record music and post it on the internet. I wish I had a nickel for every time I came across some cretin’s Myspace music page who has rhymes that sound as if a two-year-old wrote them and absolutely no flow. These guys are at a loss for their own identity, as they’re trying to imitate 50 Cent and Tupac Shakur (and doing a terrible job, might I add). That’s not going to get us anywhere. In fact, it’s digression.

Breaking the barrier is very simple: as Indians, we have to be ourselves. We’re not black, we’re not white, we’re not Hispanic, we’re not Eskimo; any time an Indian rapper is trying to be black, he’s failing himself and his people. India is one of the most artistic countries there is, we have no need to copy anyone else’s style. As a good example, let’s take a look at Kidd Skilly, a versatile artist who brings his flavor to hip hop. His lyrics are clever and catchy, and more importantly they’re truthful. Skilly spits in Hindi, Punjabi, and English, staying true to his identity as an Indian who grew up in America. Even when he featured Akon, an African American, he made him swing to his style. Kidd Skilly molds hip hop to express himself, as opposed to having hip hop mold him. The same can be said about Bohemia, who’s rapping in Punjabi. He was born in Punjab and immigrated to the U.S. as a child, and the blend of cultures shines through in his music. There’s no pretense, no posing, no artificiality. If there were more Indian rappers like Kidd Skilly and Bohemia, Desi Hip Hop would get more international respect and popularity.

Back to hip hop in India itself, there are a few rappers over there, although the only notable one is Ishq Bector. There’s a bunch of other wannabes I’ve heard on Soundclick and Myspace that are purely abysmal, especially when they try to rap in English with an accent thicker than your grandfather’s. Once again, they’re trying to be the American rappers. It’s disgraceful, really.

But to spread anything in India, there is no greater outlet than Bollywood. Back in the late 90’s, Bollywood songs started to increase their tempos and experiment with Western sounds a lot more, which evolved into Hindi songs over hip hop-esque beats, such as “Akhiyan Na Maar” from Ek Khiladi Ek Haseena and “Nakhre” from Barsaat. However, it seems to have become a trend to have cheesy English rap lines in Hindi songs that don’t fit in and just sound plain awful. An example is the “Shake your ass” part of “Ganpat” from Shootout at Lokhandwala. Ganpat served as a pretty good Hindi rhyme session, and the English absolutely ruined it, because it’s simply not us.

Abhishekh Bachchan’s “Right Here Right Now” for Bluffmaster was an excellent Hindi hop hop track. And now, as an admittedly biased Akshay Kumar fan, I’m going to say that he is most definitely spreading the genre. Akshay’s Punjabi rapping with Snoop Dogg on the Singh is Kingg soundtrack was innovative stuff for India. Snoop Dogg is internationally known as one of hip hop’s titans, and we had him bend to our style, and rap over an RDB beat. That’s what bringing India to hip hop means. Not to mention Akshay did it again in Chandni Chowk to China. In fact, Akshay Kumar is really a force behind getting Urban Desi music out there, since he’s always recruiting people like RDB, Bohemia, and Manak-E to do songs in his movies.

I’ll leave you with that to chew on for now, leave me some feedback on your thoughts. More to come on this subject soon.

And, on a closing note, I feel it is necessary to tell you that I think the first Hindi rapper was Kishore Kumar, in Do Aur Do Paanch. Take a listen. Pretty hardcore Hindi rhyming, jokes aside.