Hip-Hop From the Old Country

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

The New York Sun

On Sunday afternoon, teens and young adults packed the aisles of SoHo’s Puck Building, snacking on jelly doughnuts and picking up informational material about summer programs and study abroad programs in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

The occasion was the “Fall in Love With Israel Festival,” a day to celebrate all things Israel, encourage New York’s Jews to support Israeli companies, and, ultimately, promote travel to the country.

But while the event was intended to drum up support for Israel, its main draw, Hadag Nachash, a chart-topping Israeli hip-hop band, is certainly no government shill. Immensely popular in its home country, the seven-member band is widely considered left-wing, and its lyrics are barbed with frequent criticism of the government’s economic, social, and military policies, both at home and across the Green Line.

The band, which was founded in 1996 and has recorded four best-selling albums, blends elements of rap, funk, jazz, electronica, and Middle Eastern music. Playing rap staples such as the turntables, keyboard, guitar, bass, and drums, and joined by the trombone, saxophone, and clarinet, Hadag Nachash is at the vanguard of the burgeoning Israeli hiphop scene, selling out venues across Israel and America — Sunday’s performance was the kickoff of the group’s three-week American tour.

Hadag Nachash has come to represent a critical voice for young Israelis, yet their bitingly sarcastic lyrics and fresh sound resound with energy and hope for the future. Unlike its stateside hip-hop counterparts, the group eschews misogyny and foul language, opting instead for political barbs.

On Sunday, the mixed Israeli and American crowd — in yarmulkes, baseball caps, pony-tails, and dreadlocks — waved their hands and bopped their heads, as they sang along to lyrics detailing government corruption: “People, (you don’t really have an excuse), you know, (the suits don’t give a damn),” and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: “They blamed one another for all their ills, distrusted each other, got caught up over borders. They cried many tears over an ocean of victims, and didn’t learn a thing, nothing ever changed.” Band members — mics and instruments in hand — dressed in Israeli soccer jerseys and T-shirts.

But while the band’s lyrics were often not what one would expect at a pro-Israel event, that didn’t seem to faze the audience or deter its Zionism.

“They’re phenomenal,” Josh Harris, 17, said. “I’ve been to Israel and I listen to Israeli radio a lot, so I know their music. They have such a strong sense of Israeli identity, of the social and political issues.I connect to their music on a Jewish cultural level, and as a teenager. I love it.”

Hadag Nachash’s lead singer Shaanan Street embraces the larger role his group has come to occupy. “For the audience,” he said of Hadag Nachash’s performances in America, “we are ambassadors of Israeli-ness, of all the art and emotions and music,” he said. “Playing here gave me new emotions.”

Ultimately, Mr. Street said, the similarity between hip-hop in America and Israel is easily understood in both English and Hebrew. “They keep it real for them, we keep it real for us.”


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