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The Bomb:
King Giddra anti-war video (2002) with translation
 Is
Japanese hip-hop political?
King Giddra's "911" reflects on ground zero and it's aftermath
in two eras: August 1945 and September 11, 2001. This clip of the first
and third verses of the song appears on their 2002 video Saishu Heiki
(Ultimate Weapon) (Defstar Records, Japan, DFVL-8052). In an effort to
bring more voices to the call for peace in these troubled times, I added
the translation, which captures only some of the subtlety of their lyrics.
CLICK HERE or ON IMAGE
TO OPEN VIDEO (Quicktime 6 movie, 6.4MB)
King Giddra is Zeebra, K Dub Shine, and DJ Oasis. Another song of theirs
from 1995 is featured below.
 Where
you're at:
This site aims to give a small introduction to the world of Japanese
hip-hop, including some of the music with my own translations. The music
and lyrics are for educational and research purposes only. I'm an assistant
professor of Japanese cultural studies at MIT in Foreign Languages and
Literatures, with a Ph.D. in cultural anthropology from Yale (1999). I've
been studying Japanese hip-hop since the summer of 1994, including intensive
fieldwork in Tokyo nightclubs and recording studios for 18 months, from
1995-1997. I have returned to Japan each year since then, and I am currently
writing a book about Japanese hip-hop.
A Brief History
 A
seminal moment for hip-hop in Japan was the showing of the film "Wild
Style" (Dir. Charlie Ahearn) in Tokyo in the fall of 1983. The film,
which follows a grafitti artist in New York City, features performances
by some of the early MCs (Busy Bee, Double Trouble), DJs (Grandmaster
Flash), and breakdancers (Rock Steady Crew). Some of these performers
came to Japan to promote the film and performed in Tokyo department stores.
Shortly thereafter, young Japanese took up breakdancing in Tokyo's Yoyogi
Park, where street musicians gather every Sunday to perform. Crazy-A (pictured
above with fists) was one of these first breakdancers, and now as the
leader of Rock Steady Crew Japan, he organizes the annual "B-Boy
Park" which happens every August, and draws upwards of 10,000
fans and dozens of groups. DJ Krush, now one of the leading world-class
DJs started out performing behind breakdancers in Yoyogi Park in the mid-1980s.
DJs were the next critical step in the development of Japanese hip-hop,
with a variety of DJs were performing on the radio by 1985. In 1986, the
first all-hip-hop club opened in the Shibuya section of Tokyo. Rapping
was slower to catch on. Why? Many in the music world doubted that it would
be possible to rap in Japanese, that is, to be able to perform with the
needed flow (rhythmic nuance) and rhymes, because the language itself
was viewed as deficient: Japanese does not contain stress accents and
sentences must end with one of a few simple verb endings. Nevertheless,
from the late 1980s on, a variety of rappers experimented with different
flows and rhyming styles, and a slow, but steady stream of CDs was introduced
by such artists as Tinnie Punx, Ito Seiko, Vibrastone (led by Chikada
Haruo), and Takagi Kan. As the 1990s progressed, a growing number of Japanese
youth have been participating in Japanese hip-hop, creating a diverse
and vibrant scene, that draws heavily on the music from the U.S. while
also trying to make something that is innovative while participating in
the global movement that hip-hop has become. Some artists I would recommend
include: Rhymester, King Giddra (including Zeebra and K Dub Shine, who
also have solo albums), Scha Dara Parr, DJ Krush, Tha Blue Herb, Dabo
(and other performers with Def Jam Japan), and there are many others whom
I plan to introduce in future updates.
Isn't it just imitation?
 In
an age when the global flows of media and commodities, particularly from
the U.S., are clearly influencing people around the world, an important
question concerns what kinds of effects these flows have. For some, the
presence of hip-hop implies a "loss of Japanese culture." But
what if hip-hop is used to express one's Japaneseness? In this song clip,
Kohei Japan plays on the idea of what it means to be Japanese by setting
up contrasts with "Western" foods. He proclaims that he eats
"rice, not bread, and fish, not meat" and so on, riffing on
the notion that being hip-hop and being Japanese are mutually exclusive.
CLICK HERE OR ON IMAGE for
third verse of Kohei Japan's "Hungry Strut" (Quicktime, 5MB).
Commercial or Underground?
In 1994, Scha Dara Parr, one of the must-hear groups out of Japan, created
a sensation with a hit song called "Kon'ya wa Boogie Back"
that featured pop guitarist-songwriter Ozawa Kenji (the nephew of famed
orchestra conductor Ozawa Seiji). The next year East End X Yuri broke
into mainstream consciousness with a couple of cutesy hits, "Maicca"
and "Da.Yo.Ne.". With these million-selling singles,
record companies briefly became interested in producing Japanese hip-hop,
though there was much debate about what "hip-hop" should mean.
Is pop-oriented "J-Rap," with its emphasis on party rap the
best style for a Japanese teen audience? Or must hip-hoppers engage in
protest as a way of respecting the struggles of African-American artists,
and therefore create a "Japanese hip-hop" that is underground
and hardcore? Which is more "real"?
King Giddra (1995) "Bullet of Truth"
 For
King Giddra, the answer was obvious. MCs Zeebra and K Dub Shine, both
of whom had lived in the U.S., were convinced of the necessity for hip-hop
to be about issues of social opposition. In the following example, KG
questions the education system that "crushes the dreams of children"
as well as the media overload, especially in terms of advertising, sex
and violence, which becomes a kind of mind control.
CLICK HERE or ON IMAGE FOR "Bullet
of Truth" (Shinjitsu no Dangan) by King Giddra (Quicktime movie,
4MB)
Please email me with comments, and
check back in the coming weeks for more information. Thanks for visiting.
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