More or less famous here are three verses that really worth your time. Either because it’s perfectly executed or because it brings a new breath to the medium, here is a list of three songs with a pinch of magic inside.
Lucio Bukowski on « Stress et Palettes » – Stress and Pallets
Lucio Bukoswki, a rappeur from Lyon, third french city, is a worker’s son. Through his work we can easily understand he saw his father getting damaged by his work and that’s why he decided to work in culture – he has a phd in music history – and hated everything nowaday capitalism brings. Luxury and bourgeoisies on top of it.
That’s where the title of the song comme from: Strass et Paillettes, which can be translated to rhinestones and sequins, is an expression describing the fame world. Here it’s a pun where stress and (industrial) pallets take places of the beauty saved for the high society, bu also an hommage to a famous french rap song Strass et Paillettes. With Robse, another Lyon’s worker, they depict here the daily life of many of them.
The song began with a brief extract from a training material for pallet truck, only to let Lucio began with a reference to Booba’s song mentionned above by reusing the chorus : « I leave and I can’t touch the bottom, fuck hinestones and sequins »1 only to follow with the hard reality « So I don’t speak about gold and don’t impersonate mobbs in jail but fathers with broken back in scealled warehouses »2
Abstract Keal Agram feat. Arm on Et la nuit s’éternise – And the night keep along
I like rap like my plates: made with surprising ingredients well mixed to surprise me. This is what I find in this track.
Produced by Abstrackt Keal Agram, a french abstract hip-hop group pretty confidential event in France lovingly mixing with the lesser known Arm. Arm was part of the group Psykick Lyrikah and has been in the rap scene for a long time with a unique style, never really slam, never just rap.
Put aside their love for convulated group names this association is in my point of view near perfect: opened with a spiky verse on a technic instrumental, arm still knows when he should stop him and leave the brass sing.
The chorus is one of these pieces of music where the beat seem to have made to complete the lyrics.
It would be too long to translate everything, but this track engraved for ever the high ending the chorus « lighting arms surrounding tree, they are dying, it may rain tears tomorrow where hear lays »3 with th flow growing slowly on the beat bringing both at an all time all… Before the night coming back. Brilliant.
NoS on Deconnecté – Disconnected
This is NOT the official clip. The music was blocked on YouTube… It even seem to be a bad rip here, I would suggest you to go on Spotify
I will come one day. PNL came from nowhere and changed for ever the French rap landscape. Summarize pnl to rap would be an awful réduction, and theses lines wouldn’t be enough to describe the vibrant brother trilogy they created.
What you need to know if after reaching the top of the charts like it was a child game they seemed bitter and that’s what we can listen to this track. Especially during NOS verse. The most depressed brother bring a elegant mix of spleen and auto tune like the French rap never heard before and may never hear again…
The first phase « my left devil make his selfies, this bitch whisper me « this life is yours, take it, fuck, I’m high I filled the void »4 show us that the music hasn’t bring anything, « the family is safe, I never healed my soul »5 at least not for him
The stronger the auto tune, the deeper the spleen: « Because I wanted my place in paradise, now I took everything it wasn’t enough »6 first milestone. « 3ami [arabic word meaning uncle] I don’t have any friends, because you know: life made me too 7ami [hot, skilled] »7 second step. « In the dark I see, they want to be like me. But you know at night, I feel blue »8 in a vibrant voice, in one of the last tracks of the last album. Just enough to keep fans worried about this disconnection..
Du coup, j’te parle pas d’or, et j’représente pas d’caïd en calèches Mais des pères au dos pété dans les entrepôts scellés De ta démocratie libertaire qui effrite des pauvres ↩︎
Des bras de lumières saisissent les arbres puissamment, ils se meurent, il se peut qu’il pleuve des larmes demain là ou la peur demeure ↩︎
Like many teen stories, babysolo33s began in a room during summer. From her room, hanging on Tinder, she was already promoting her single Blue Heart. She then quickly released her first EP Solo2019. Today after more than two years she comes back with the first album SadBaby Confessions, installng the solo universe.
The trailer was introducing us to this world, half from the prom bal in the skin tv show half french ghetto life made from loath and weed in front of the blocs.
she borrows themes to french hardcore rapper. Even going to reference the well known song from the ghetto rap band 113 Les princes de la ville – Prince of the city – with « Princess of the south, Princess of the city »Princesse du South, princesse de la ville
Then, everything is drowned with glitter and teen obsessions as we can hear in Nelly Kelly« Everyday I look at the mirror, I’m not comfortable with myself » or in lecon2princesse Contenu de l'infobulle« With my girls we flex, they see us as brats »J'me regarde dans le miroir, je suis pas à l'aise avec moi même, « Since young we want to make the money, we want to be princess in the recreation course »Depuis petite, ce qu'on veut c'est faire les sous, c'est faire les princesse dans la cours
This get at the top with phrase like « Fake eyelashes, fake Glock » or in the song 33story. With Loki and Le Chamal featuring she tell the tale of a teen couple, lost both of them, trying to make few bucks. Babysolo is in love with, as she said Contenu de l'infobulle« I got my top boy »Faux cils, faux Glock, she also knows to read deep in his mind « In his eyes I can see he endured a lot … He puts his money and tears in a big glass jar ». Everything lies here in an destructive couple answering themselves without listening, Stan way. Here again, everything is salted with ghetto obsessions from her two friends Dans le quartier j'ai fait l'tour, il me faut juste des mnms« In the hood I went around, I only need mnms to get out of this crap », « Everyday I only think about money »Dans mon regard j'peux voir qu'il a beaucoup souffert ... Il range ses sous et ses larmes dans un grand bocal en verre and « Every day BAC bullys youngers » – BAC, as Brigade Anti Criminalité, is a special police unit working in a kind of undercover deployed especially in dangerous district, which is often accused of violence and abuse.
In this hard environment, even liking glitter, destiny’s child and boys, baby isn’t letting people to take advantage of her, Jenny is making this clear. Tout le lycée est en deuil depuis l'incendie, depuis que j'ai tué Peter« All the high school is grieving since the Fire, since I killed peter » and Contenu de l'infobulle« I got blood all over my lips, and to kill me you’ll have to stab me in the hearth »La BAC hagar (slang derived from Arabic word) les petits and even in the last track, describing herself as « I’m here as a warrior, I wake up the morning »Je suis là comme une guerrière w je me lève le matin
In all this, we hope Babysolo33 will not grow too fast and keep providing us views from the sparkling dream she seem to be trapped in
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“The most talented group, here is what we certainly have been”Le groupe le plus talentueux, voilà certainement ce que nous fumes. That’s how Rochdi introduces himself and his -late- group Krystal on total eclipse, one of the track which define the most Rochdi’s style: on an unusual production composed with a techno sample from Laroux, he unleashes a flow with many images describing the rapper’s lifestyle. Work, sex, hell and Paris while we hear a scanding voice naming Rochdi’s band: Krystal. Moreover this is a featuring with some, at this moment, unknown rapper: Jok’air, from the 13th borough where the two rappers are coming from.
The 13th borough of Paris is unique in his style, it seems to be the result of two worlds fighting each other. If you come in from porte de choisy you may discover populars streets where lives mostly former vietnam war refugees with old and used blocks. But on the other side, close to the Seine there are corporate district where many companies are settled with a futuristic architecture and, thanks to the National Library Bibliothèque François Mitterrand, almost dystopian. And you can feel it, all Rochdi’s work is sweating from this atmosphere.
The epic tale seems to begin after Rochdi released an album with his band, and as the market is cruel, the album stayed under the radar and never been known by the average rap fan. Too dark ? Too street ? Nobody will really know what happened but that’s where the lyricist finds his anger to begin walking alone. Everything is compiled in rapport de guerre a street freestyle introducing himself. Rochdi raps his will to success : “If the record company doesn’t want us we will come from the backdoor, as with the virgin and the transgenders”Si les maisons de disque nous recalent, c'est pas grave, on passera par la porte de derrière comme avec les pucelles ou les trav', “If the beatmakers are too greedy I will rap only on side B”Si les beatmakers sont trop gourmands, j'kickerais que des faces B, “I write a verse everyday since I’m 23 years old”j'écris au moins une mesure tous les jours depuis que j'ai 23 ans but that’s also where he claims the loosiness of his life “My love for rap music never brought back any money”Mon amour pour le rap ne m'a jamais rapporté un centime or “There are some evening I feel lonely as in Akon’s music clip”Il y a des soirs où je me sens seul comme dans le clip d'Akon. As he launched his career from the street, Rochdi operates a real mutation from the beginning to the end.
The first album: Hardcore, released in 2012 talks about itself. There are few featuring with hardcore frenches rap star like LIM, 16ar (From l’Skadrille) or Alk’pote. The album’s theme are about street violence, alcohol – No champagne here, only flasks of cheap alcohol drinked alone in small alley – or girls fucked in some dark place of Paris. Violently singed on rough classics boom bap beats – almost academics – the album offers some masterpieces as Hardcore, a violent Diptych using your sister on youporn as a cornerstone. This is the first warn about rochdi’s love for multiple parts tracks, as you can see with Drive-by on the same album. This first release is the naive description of a young rochdi, lost in his poor paris district with no idea about what the future is made of “What will i do about my life ? My parents and brothers are worried”Qu'est-ce que je vais faire de ma vie ? Mes frères et mes parents s'inquiètent. But it already reveals the main themes rochdi loves and moreover about some of the things so specific about him, the love for long tracks with no chorus (Une ombre dans la ville) and an in-usual – not anymore now but wildly at the release date – use of house/electro beats with poesie en argot (Slang poetry) or total eclipse (éclipse totale) which we talked about earlier. The self named « Porn rap star », as you can listen on the tracks labelled the same way, talks about his relationships with women, we don’t know anything about them or few informations like name and if she sucked his dick or not. Julie is the only exception we will find in all his discography, but even here rochdi needs to use the sex to describe the loved one. However we can find some calm, but still sad, tracks, cutting with the brutality of the album: La veuve (the widow) or poussière de cristal (Krystal’s dust). With this album Rochdi delivers us a great first dive in his universe with an album Influenced by what was the standards at the year the album was released.
Rochdi’s track is full of obsession, traps and patterns. Patterns which are reflecting is the music itself, as if we had been trapped inside his head, always walking in Paris alleys. The second album presents some of them, like the atmosphere of the album. Hardcore was a rough album, drown in some violence Une ombre dans la ville can surprise with his melancholia and more smooth, ever maybe jazzy, instrus. Maybe it’s because of topics he chose, often about love and poetry -but not always ! – maybe it’s because rochdi is closer to his brothers, as Rochdi call them himself. Mike, Joubin, Madj and Le chat noir (The black cat) who are in featuring on 4 of the 13 tracks of the album.
Angoisses (Anguish) opens the album in medias res with rochdi’s thougts: « Longs night full of anguishes, boredom, worries and melancholia. Void days, uncertain futures and an iron constitution, future is mine »De longues nuits d'angoisses, d'ennui, d'inquiétudes, de mélancolie, Des jours plats, un avenir incertain et une santé de fer. Le futur m'appartient. These are four verses about a sad life with no options and only one thing to grab: oneself. That’s enough for Rochdi to say he owns the future, and that’s what he will show us along the play of the album. The track keeps going in the idea of fucking music industry while living under a death threat as the rapper lifestyle is « Fuckers like me ends with AIDS or prostatic cancer »Les niqueurs de ma race finissent avec le DASS ou un cancer de la prostate. Death coming right in the next track, as mentioned: someone died. Mes lèvres is a bitter track about life disappointing, « I got a ear cancer because of all the productions living only for the money »J'ai, contracté un cancer de l'oreille La faute aux productions qui ne vivent que pour l'oseille« Even in College, cultural place, it sweats imposture and fakes »Même à la fac, domaine de la culture Ca transpire l'artifice et l'imposture regrets madj, « We have only one life, I understood it since our friend left »On a qu'une vie, j'l'ais compris depuis qu'notre ami est parti feels like an epiphany, revealing at Rochdi that he need to keep building on himself, that’s why few words later we can hear « I quitted weed, this sheet slowed me. It’s life, I thougt, I react, now I need to become wiser »j'arrête de fumer le shit Cette merde m'a ralenti C'est la vie, j'ai réfléchi, j'ai réagi Maintenant, faut qu'j'réussisse à m'assagir. Everything can be sumed up from the chorus line, « I live only for music and love of poetry »Je n'vis qu'pour la musique et l'amour de la poésie: human condition is futile and only art will free us.
As to enforce the idea Rochdi evolved since his last track, in Le Prince Des Ténèbres we can hear many lines about a new beggining : « I got burned alive, I comeback from ashes »On m'a brulé vif j'renais de mes cendres et de ma suie, « Rochdi gets out from his cocoon »Rochdi est sorti de sa chrysalide, « Diviner talked, it’s R.o.c.h’s resurection time »Le devin a parlé c'est l'heure de la résurrection d'r.o.c.h and insisting about the dedication Rochdi decided to give on the art: « I sharpened my body so it became the metaphore of my rhymes »J'ai aiguisé mon corps pour qu'il devienne la métaphore de mes rimes, « Rhyme stick to my skin like alcohol sticks to the alcoholic’s one »La rime me colle à la peau comme l'alcool colle à la peau de l'ivrogne and then « My rhymes can only be beautiful, living on the beat until a bullet go through my abs »Mes vers ne peuvent être beaux que collés au tempo, jusqu'à ce qu'une balle traverse mes abdos. Until the death rochdi will stay in duty. Then come Mélodie du Calibre which impose a pace going faster and faster, capturing us in an oppressive dance in a night with rochdi. Atmosphere get heavier and heavier until… Lyriciste come as a breathing in this crazy night, sleep is laying on the beat as water in a river bed. Rochdi get unusually conscious : « A man froze to death in Saint-Lazare, F-16 are still bombing »Un homme est mort de froid à Saint-Lazare, Des F-16 lâchent encore des bombes, conscious of his limits: « Soon I will be dead »Bientôt moi aussi je serai mort, « My destiny is tragic, i slip in a botomless pit »Tragique est ma destinée, je glisse dans un puits sans fond and that it may reach him hard: « Violent will be my end, the diviner told me that »Violente sera la fin, Voila ce que m'as dit le devin, « My illness, nobody can heal it »Ma maladie, personne ne peut la guérir. Death of his friend really changed the rapper’s mind, the shadow of this event on every track. Next track Desert Eagle works like an echo of Lyricistes preceding track Mélodie du Calibre as it work on a same rythm, simple on which lyrics are rough. We can notice the verse « Slap in your head, melody from a desert eagle »Une baffe dans ta gueule, mélodie du desert eagle, more than a clever rhyme it’s a foreshadowing of what rochdi will encounter later in the album.
The album end on two antagonistic tracks: Une ombre dans la ville 2 et Les aventures d’un chien errant. Both tracks are about following Rochdi on his journey with his legs as well as his brain. But the mood of each is radically opposed: Une ombre dans la ville 2 as in his the previous one is a smooth walk about fragile parts of the life: love, familly, ending with a girl in the middle of the night. the second track, beginning with a girl in Paris night, is a crawling in the asphalt violence of Paris. Away from being a simple egotrip theses tracks see Rochdi growing. By his encounter with a poet teaching him « Drunk yourself »Enivrez-vous, then at the end of Les aventures d’un chien errant the rapper get trapped, in a verse hot as hell, by a vicious girl – like he talked about earlyier in the track « I heard stories with bad endings, often the girl is a bitch which hurts yourself »J’en ai entendu des histoires qui se finissent mal, souvent la fille est une pétasse qui te fait mal – in an ambush, with a men, armed and the whisky doesn’t help. The track ends like Rochdi said earlier: « Slap in your head, melody from a desert eagle »Une baffe dans ta gueule, mélodie du desert eagle and by the same time, his life.