Interviews

African Hip Hop Phenomenon Daara J has already taken Europe by storm with educational and engaging lyrics. They will soon land in Australia to support their album Boomerang with dates booked in at WOMADelaide next month. Mixing it up with ragga, jazz, Cuban and Caribbean sounds, their new album has been described in the pages of the UK Guardian as "a revelation". Daara J paves the way for a new hip-hop... "a perfect reflection of the world today.." says Freddy from the group. Cristina Dio talked to Freddy on the phone just a few days before their arrival...

CD: We look forward to your show…

Freddy: Yeah its gonna be the first one. After what we’ve heard about Australia, the boomerang, the kangaroo, the sunny country, we really can’t wait to go down there and see what’s gonna happen…At the moment we are based in Dakar, the capital of Senegal but we go back and forth from Europe to Africa and from Africa to America and all over.

CD: Was there ever a temptation to move to Europe or America like many other African artists?

Freddy: People ask us to go… to be based in other countries like America but it really feels good in Senegal and combined with the warmth … where we are is the land of hospitality, the land where we grew up. It feels really good to be in Senegal, despite the fact its good anywhere else but in Senegal it really feels better. It’s the land where we recharge our batteries.

CD: You’ve said in previous interviews you don’t necessarily align yourselves with the rap/hip hop movement of the States where the message can be more aggressive.

Freddy: There is so much trouble in this world we live in and I think that bringing out an aggressive message of gangsters or killing or putting money above the human being… could that be a good idea to give that advice to the youth? What I think is more constructive is to try to take another direction … to deal with messages that will help people elevate their mind and souls.
I think we are living in a very difficult patch and people need to know themselves, know their culture, to accept the difference and be tolerant instead of solving any problems by aggression. I think it only brings the world down.

CD: Despite this you do feel solidarity with the mainstream hip-hop movement of America?

Freddy: Yeah of course, because even though we’re claiming that hip-hop was born in Africa, the first artist we heard that made us revive the hip-hop culture is Grandmaster Flash. He gave us the music that reminded us that rap was an oral tradition.

CD: So what are Daara J’s values?

Freddy: Joining the concept of the group is the learning. The name of the group is Daara J and “daara j” means the “school of life”. In our view, life is a school where we never stop learning and every breath must be an experience and the more you learn, the more you’ll be able to understand the life you’re living and understand yourself – and keep ourselves humble, you know, trying to learn.

CD: How long have you guys been together?

Freddy: We’ve been together for a long time now. 11 years since the day we met at a club in Dakar. We still stick together just like we’re brothers and now there is a very strong relationship between each other. Not only do we belong to the same band but we’re friends and each one comes to the side of the other one’s problems, you know, and for us the most important thing is to be blunt with each other.

CD: What is it like in Dakar these days?

Freddy: Unemployment… youth who don’t have work – and who really wanna pull through … and lots of groups … from 5000 to 8000, and all them is a way out. Lots of youth trying to build and set up new structures just to help themselves. We are expecting nothing from the government or anyone because we are the generation after independence, the generation that don’t want to be dependent on anybody. We don’t wanna depend on anybody to do our thing.

CD: How did hip-hop evolve in Senegal?

Freddy: You know its gonna be really hard to say because for a long time hip-hop was underground because people considered it marginal and therefore it was very difficult to say. At the time they were trying to incarnate that style, they were copying America so people didn’t allow it to really take steps to develop. For a long time hip-hop was slumbering in the background.

After a while it blew out because the youth had a great desire to express themselves and the problems of the country. The most important thing is the message. From the beginning we realised that the message was the most important point to develop and from there all the rappers go with a rush to deal with a good message, a constructive one that convinced the whole country that rap music was a legitimate music and nowdays the rapper is respected according to the importance of his message.

CD: So could you say the rapper is like a modern day griot?!

Freddy: Yeah, why not, because the role of the griot used to be like a camera of the realm… in those days they called the kingdom a realm… they used to get documentation of the history and the news that was going on in the country together and report it to the whole realm. And nowday the rappers are like a camera taken out to the street just learning what is really happening down in the city and reporting to the whole country to let the people know the truth.

CD: Do you feel there is a black consciousness that exists in parallel across the African diaspora?

Freddy: Yeah, its very important you asked me that question because wherever you go your gonna find negativity. What’s more important is not the colour, not the barrier. It’s what people have in their heart. People should look at themselves deeply in the mirror and chase away the negative part cos there’s no need to claim no blackness, no whiteness… the colour is not important. What is more important is we got the work to live in harmony and peace. Listening to the human rights … there is no other man who is above the other. We are all one … we are all similar. We have to love each other and accept the differences.
We must accept the differences and be able to love each other. We’re here for that mission … the aim is to learn love and be able to own it someday.

CD: Do you think mainstream hip-hop has become conservative?

Freddy: Some may feel like they’re conservative towards hip-hop, trying to bring barriers through music, but people have to know that music is for freedom and music and any other tool used to get freedom is not supposed to be incarcerated so let’s cut the music free from any dogmatic conception. I think hip-hop is one of the most open music so why do we try to put it behind bars? That’s why we think that as the meaning of getting the people together, why not try to deal with all the different influences across the world to make it more free?
And why try to lock down yourself? I think it’s important to realise the whole, to realise the gracefulness of the freedom and go to the edge of our freedom and not try to incarcerate yourself in a concept. We’re free … we are born free and we aren’t gonna go into that point in our life and look down on a music that is supposed to set us free.

CD: Do you guys come from a musical background? What should we expect to see from your Australian show?

Freddy: It’s true that we are musicians ourselves. We play guitar and drums and we are music producers ourselves. When we are in Australia we are gonna bring a guitar and a DJ. Nowadays music has another side. Now things have changed. We used to play with a band but now the new option we’re taking is to play with a DJ. I know they won’t be disappointed because the most important is what we’re bringing on the stage and that is what we really intend to give to Australia.

CD: What do you cite as your influences?

Freddy: The African new generation is curious and very interested in everything happening around the world. I know that we’ve been colonised but that colonisation has given us another chance to develop other languages and has opened our intellect to what is going on in this world. We are tending to computerise our lives too but at the same time the life that we have here is a very rich culture with great influences and artists like Fela, Youssou N’Dour and Miriam Makeba. You know you have a lage amount of inspiration to build with so bringing together all this… the result would be a compromise of modern music like hip-hop or reggae, mixed with traditional music… and I think that it’s the perfect reflection of the world of today. The world of today is mixed. Our music is international with a cultural African background.

For DAARA J show times and dates click on the WOMADelaide link on our home page (Feb 2005)