Dam (band)
Dam ( Da Arabian MCs ; Arabic دام, DMG Dām ; Hebrew דם) is a Palestinian , three-piece hip-hop band whose members Tamer Nafar, Suheil Nafar and Mahmoud Jreri come from the Israeli city of Lod .
Career
The band was founded in the late 1990s in Lod , a city near Tel Aviv inhabited by Arabs and Jews in central Israel , where all three members were born and raised. Tamer Nafar (also: the angry rap star ) and his four years younger brother Suheil had been making rap music together since 1998. After Mahmoud Jreri joined the group as a copywriter a little later, they have been operating under the name Dam since then.
The name DAM is not just an abbreviation for Da Arabian MCs . This word has the meaning “blood” in both Arabic and Hebrew - both are Semitic languages - ( Arabic دم, DMG dam ; Hebrew דם). In Arabic, "permanent / immortal / everlasting" ( Arabic دام, DMG dām ).
"[W] hen put together dam has the total meaning, even if you attack us with blood, Da Arabic Microphone is eternal."
“When you put it together, it has all the meaning; even if we are attacked with blood, Da Arabic Microphone remains. "
The trio thematizes u. a. the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and names both American hip-hop musicians and Arabic music as influences. The attention that grew beyond their homeland over time led to an international record deal and the 2006 album "Dedication". Dam raps primarily in Arabic , but also in New Hebrew , English and French to appeal to an even larger audience.
Tamer Nafar
Tamer Nafar ( Hebrew ת'אמר נאפר, Arabic تامر النفار, DMG Tāmir an-Nafār ) is an Arab rapper who lives in Israel. He is considered the front man of Dam; The initiation of the "protest rap" of the Middle East or the "lyrical front" movement is attributed to him. He and the Israeli rapper Subliminal are the main characters in the Anat Halahmi documentary Channels of Rage .
Origin / life before rap
Born on June 6, 1979 in Lod, Israel, Tamer Nafar comes from a Palestinian family who suffered a fate that was not atypical: his grandfather was expropriated. In the Israeli school he attended, he and his classmates are said to have been forced to learn poems about heroes of Zionism . After school, Tamar Nafar earned his living mainly washing cars.
Career
Nafar's attention was drawn to hip-hop while working as a car washer; 2 Pac played an important role here . In 2000 he founded the first Palestinian rap group DAM together with his brother Suhell Nafar and family friend Mahmoud Jrere . In recent years, the group has played a leading role in Palestinian rap. The DAM members write their lyrics and compose their own music, the majority of the songs are in Arabic , but DAM also rap in New Hebrew and English. The work of the group is influenced by the Palestine-Israel conflict , but also by the struggle for equal rights for the Palestinian Arabs living in the State of Israel (within the 1967 borders) .
In 2001, the Palestinian Golden Globe winner Hany Abu-Assad became aware of Tamar Nafar, befriended him and added Nafar to his film Paradise Now .
Tamer Nafar is considered to be in front of the group. So far he has performed with her in both Palestine and Israel and has won many followers on both sides. Since DAM has attracted the attention of the West , the group has performed more and more in Germany (March 13, 2007 in the glass house of the Arena Berlin ), England, Italy , the USA and other countries west of Palestine.
In 2004 the group released their record “ Bornhere ” in Arabic and New Hebrew , along with a video clip co-produced by Juliano Mer-Khamis . The film was shot in various cities in Shatil (see web links).
The album "Dedication" was released in 2006, contains 15 tracks and contains both English and local language texts.
Socio-political position
Tamar Nafar himself repeatedly points to the "lyrical war" with the view that "injustice cannot be defeated with guns, but with paper and pencil". He emphasizes not to fight for a flag or a symbol, but for the people, the future of children. In interviews he demanded the Israeli government's admission to have expropriated and deported his compatriots in 1948 (to establish the State of Israel ), an apology for these events, and the return of the confiscated property. He organizes demonstrations, discussion forums and readings. In principle, he does not reject the coexistence of Jews and Muslims.
Tamer Nafar is also critical of US policy in the Middle East , but excludes American culture from it, “ Every culture has positive and negative aspects. If I can learn something from American or European culture and use it to enrich my own, it's fantastic . ”The musician also insists that hip-hop was first and foremost Afro-American and then American. "There's a big difference."
When it comes to equality for women in the Arab world, Nafar has taken a clear positive position. A position that has secured him the sympathy of many Arab women:
" I often talk to educated women [...] I talk [...] about women because I have a strong opinion on it and not because I think I can talk about it and women can't " [...] " Strong women know that no one has to represent them, especially not a man. In addition, it is not religion that restricts women, but religious people. That's a huge difference. Of course, this change is difficult to achieve, but if it doesn't work in this generation, then maybe in the next . "
Tamer Nafar plays the leading role in the film "Junction 48", which was shown at the 2016 Berlinale. Here some of his political ideas mentioned above are negotiated.
Discography
- 1998: Stop Selling Drugs
- 2001: Min Irhabi (or: Meen Irhabi , Who is the Terrorist )
- 2006: Dedication (Red Circle / Indigo)
- 2017: Dabke on the Moon / ندبك عالقمر
- 2017: Street Poetry / شعر الشارع
- 2019: Ben Haana wa Maana / بين حانة ومانة
See also
literature
- David A. McDonald: Carrying Words Like Weapons: Hip-Hop and the Poetics of Palestinian Identities in Israel . In Min-Ad: Israeli Studies in Musicology Online 7 (2): pp. 116–130, 2009.
- David A. McDonald: My Voice Is My Weapon: Music, Nationalism, and the Poetics of Palestinian Resistance . Duke University Press Books, Durham 2013, ISBN 978-0-8223-5479-6 .
- Caroline Rooney: Activism and Authenticity. Palestinian and Related Hip-Hop in an International Frame . In The Arab Avant-Garde: Music, Politics, Modernity , edited by Thomas Burkhalter, Kay Dickinson, and Benjamin J. Harbert, pp. 209–28. Wesleyan University Press, Middletown 2013.
- Caroline Rooney: Music sans Frontières? Documentaries on Hip-Hop in the Holy Land and DIY Democracy . In Popular Culture in the Middle East and North Africa: A Postcolonial Outlook , edited by Walid El Hamamsy and Mounira Soliman, pp. 33–45. Routledge, 2013, ISBN 978-1-136-22807-0 .
- Ted Swedenburg: Palestinian Rap. Against the Struggle Paradigm . In Popular Culture in the Middle East and North Africa: A Postcolonial Outlook , edited by Walid El Hamamsy and Mounira Soliman, pp. 17–32. Routledge, 2013, ISBN 978-1-136-22807-0 .
Web links
- Official website (English; Flash - browser plug-in required to view)
- Dam at Discogs (English)
- Dam on Myspace
Individual evidence
- ^ Ted Swedenburg: Palestinian Rap. Against the Struggle Paradigm . In: Walid El Hamamsy and Mounira Soliman (eds.): Popular Culture in the Middle East and North Africa: A Postcolonial Outlook . Routledge, 2013, ISBN 978-1-136-22807-0 , pp. 19 (English).
- ↑ About. damrap.com, accessed August 30, 2013 .
- ↑ a b qantara.de
- ↑ qantara.de
- ↑ zuender.zeit.de
- ↑ zuender.zeit.de
- ↑ www.berlinale.de