>I agree fully and totally. Not only is the rhythm of french good, the
>possibilities of fooling around with pronounciation and double meanings
>are vast. Unfortunately I'm not french but from Sweden and our language
>could make the best rapper sound stilted. And finnish seems to me to be
>an even worse language. I've not heard many japanese rappers but I guess
>a sign based language could drive you crazy with all possible meanings
>of each word.
It goes without saying that different langauges deal with different
conditions when the artists attempt to adapt the language to confines
such as rhythm and rhyme. Japanese is actually, fundamentally, a very
rhythmic language, which turns out to be limiting since syllable parts
are meant to be pronounced at the same rate from syllable to syllable.
Still, the grammar is very malleable, and quite a long "idea" can be
communicated with few words. Poetic traditions such as haiku, waka,
and tanka (which as some of you may be aware, are confined to the exact
number of syllables from line to line) owe their possibility to this
fact, and its the malleable nature of the language that makes Rap in
Japanese not only possible, but often clever and "rhythmic." The
"sign-based" writing system actually has very little to do with rapping
per se.
Incidentally, I occasionally run across rap from other countries
here in Tokyo. I've managed to locate the recently mentioned
Malaaz (with prod by La Funk Mob), Sens Unik and Les Sages Poets
albums a couple months ago and additionally some Rap from Greenland
(Nuuk Posse), Turkey, Korea, Germany and others. My exposure to
the Swedish scene is limited to a single by Sherlock (who sound
like Tribe Called Quest in style and sound), and a "gangsta" group
called "Inifinite Mass" that I couldn't help but find a bit
laughable (probably because I never quite understand the appeal of
that sound, much less understand why anyone would want to mimic it).
Despite the relatively large availability of this stuff, it seems that
there's no place to purchase Fabe's album here in Tokyo. Would anyone
with access to this be willing to work out an exchange for a Japanese
release? There are some excellent releases recently I could recommend.
-b