"DJ Krush"- Chord Magazine, 10/06
800-word feature on Tokyo hip-hop icon DJ Krush, in response to his latest album release. Published in Chord Magazine for October/November 2006.
It’s 1983. DJ Kool Herc, now known as the “God-father” of hip-hop, is still spinning house parties in New York. Run-DMC isn’t even on the map; their breakthrough album, "Raising Hell," is still three years off. In short, hip-hop is in its infancy. Finding an audience for hip-hop is nearly impossible outside of New York. And yet, this is the year DJ Krush would begin his career—in Tokyo, halfway across the world.
That year Krush, born Hideaki Ashii, witnessed the Wild Style world tour, which featured many of the seminal hip-hop film’s stars, including break dancers, graffiti artists, and of course, DJs. Krush left the show determined to become a DJ, but Japan wasn’t ready to respond as quickly as he did.
“It was completely alien, there were only a handful of people who knew of hip-hop at the time,” Krush said. “There was no audience.”
No hip-hop-specific audience, at least. But in a city as crowded as Tokyo, finding a crowd of people is never a problem, and in the early days, Krush wasn’t picky about he performed for.
“I still wanted to perform in front of people, so I went to the streets of Harajuku [one of Tokyo’s famous shopping and entertainment districts],” he said. “They close the streets on Sundays, and there are a lot of street performers, so I’d go there and play.”
According to Krush, DJ contests soon began popping up, and after winning a few, he started seeing offers from professional venues, and his career was born. Over 20 years later, he is the undisputed king of Japanese hip-hop, having been in the game longer than most rappers on American radio, and yet he still flies under the radar of many American fans. The artists, however, have taken note. On his latest release, Stepping Stones: The Self-Remixed Best, their contributions to Krush’s work serve to frame what has been an epic career in hip-hop, whether or not American kids care to acknowledge it.
The new album provides a nice retrospective, neatly divided between two discs with typically stoic titles—disc one is Lyricism; the second is Soundscapes. Long time Krush fans will find the separation convenient, as vocals tend to completely change the mood of his work. Instrumental, it’s dark and introspective, but as soon as an MC steps in, the mood lightens, and his love for hip-hop becomes more evident.
Spread out over the course of eight albums and nearly two decades, Krush’s collaborative efforts seem to be few and far between, but Stepping Stones lines them up nicely, and makes for an impressive list of friends. Black Thought and Malik B from The Roots are here; Company Flow, Mos Def, Aesop Rock and Mr. Lif are all on board as well—and that’s only the Lyricism disc. On the producer-oriented Soundscapes, The Roots are represented again, this time by ?uestlove, alongside notable appearances by Chicago production team The Opus and of course, Krush’s American counterpart, DJ Shadow.
Despite the fact that he can’t converse freely with his American collaborators (he regrets never having learned English), Krush has managed to build lasting relationships that produce great musical results.
“Once I get into the studio with them, language isn’t really a barrier,” he said. “You can understand each other through music.”
Some artists might panic with their albums’ vocals being spoken in an alien tongue, but for Krush, it’s all part of the creative process.
“Before I start working with the MCs, I convey the overall concept of the album,” he said. “But I never tell them to write specific things. When collaborating with other artists, I put the water in the pool, and let the artists swim in it any way they want. I don’t tell them how to swim.”
As Japan’s hip-hop scene is finding its own voice, Krush is finding more artists that speak his language, literally. MC Kan of the Japanese group MSC makes an appearance on Stepping Stones, but Krush seems equally excited about the latest MSC release, which he describes as “kind of hard core, but really cool.”
Japanese hip-hop has been somewhat notorious in the past for trying to emulate American trends (with predictably cheesy results), although it could be argued that most American hip-hop acts today are also based on impersonation. Having been there from the start, though, Krush has been able to see his scene build from the ground up, and is excited about the future.
“I think the scene in Japan is the same as in the U.S.,” Krush said. “The scene is really divided between the mainstream and underground. And the artists in the Japanese underground are really trying to bring up their individuality through their sound and lyrics. They’re not singing about money and girls anymore.”
Stepping Stones: The Self-Remixed Best is available now on Sony/Red Ink.
It’s 1983. DJ Kool Herc, now known as the “God-father” of hip-hop, is still spinning house parties in New York. Run-DMC isn’t even on the map; their breakthrough album, "Raising Hell," is still three years off. In short, hip-hop is in its infancy. Finding an audience for hip-hop is nearly impossible outside of New York. And yet, this is the year DJ Krush would begin his career—in Tokyo, halfway across the world.
That year Krush, born Hideaki Ashii, witnessed the Wild Style world tour, which featured many of the seminal hip-hop film’s stars, including break dancers, graffiti artists, and of course, DJs. Krush left the show determined to become a DJ, but Japan wasn’t ready to respond as quickly as he did.
“It was completely alien, there were only a handful of people who knew of hip-hop at the time,” Krush said. “There was no audience.”
No hip-hop-specific audience, at least. But in a city as crowded as Tokyo, finding a crowd of people is never a problem, and in the early days, Krush wasn’t picky about he performed for.
“I still wanted to perform in front of people, so I went to the streets of Harajuku [one of Tokyo’s famous shopping and entertainment districts],” he said. “They close the streets on Sundays, and there are a lot of street performers, so I’d go there and play.”
According to Krush, DJ contests soon began popping up, and after winning a few, he started seeing offers from professional venues, and his career was born. Over 20 years later, he is the undisputed king of Japanese hip-hop, having been in the game longer than most rappers on American radio, and yet he still flies under the radar of many American fans. The artists, however, have taken note. On his latest release, Stepping Stones: The Self-Remixed Best, their contributions to Krush’s work serve to frame what has been an epic career in hip-hop, whether or not American kids care to acknowledge it.
The new album provides a nice retrospective, neatly divided between two discs with typically stoic titles—disc one is Lyricism; the second is Soundscapes. Long time Krush fans will find the separation convenient, as vocals tend to completely change the mood of his work. Instrumental, it’s dark and introspective, but as soon as an MC steps in, the mood lightens, and his love for hip-hop becomes more evident.
Spread out over the course of eight albums and nearly two decades, Krush’s collaborative efforts seem to be few and far between, but Stepping Stones lines them up nicely, and makes for an impressive list of friends. Black Thought and Malik B from The Roots are here; Company Flow, Mos Def, Aesop Rock and Mr. Lif are all on board as well—and that’s only the Lyricism disc. On the producer-oriented Soundscapes, The Roots are represented again, this time by ?uestlove, alongside notable appearances by Chicago production team The Opus and of course, Krush’s American counterpart, DJ Shadow.
Despite the fact that he can’t converse freely with his American collaborators (he regrets never having learned English), Krush has managed to build lasting relationships that produce great musical results.
“Once I get into the studio with them, language isn’t really a barrier,” he said. “You can understand each other through music.”
Some artists might panic with their albums’ vocals being spoken in an alien tongue, but for Krush, it’s all part of the creative process.
“Before I start working with the MCs, I convey the overall concept of the album,” he said. “But I never tell them to write specific things. When collaborating with other artists, I put the water in the pool, and let the artists swim in it any way they want. I don’t tell them how to swim.”
As Japan’s hip-hop scene is finding its own voice, Krush is finding more artists that speak his language, literally. MC Kan of the Japanese group MSC makes an appearance on Stepping Stones, but Krush seems equally excited about the latest MSC release, which he describes as “kind of hard core, but really cool.”
Japanese hip-hop has been somewhat notorious in the past for trying to emulate American trends (with predictably cheesy results), although it could be argued that most American hip-hop acts today are also based on impersonation. Having been there from the start, though, Krush has been able to see his scene build from the ground up, and is excited about the future.
“I think the scene in Japan is the same as in the U.S.,” Krush said. “The scene is really divided between the mainstream and underground. And the artists in the Japanese underground are really trying to bring up their individuality through their sound and lyrics. They’re not singing about money and girls anymore.”
Stepping Stones: The Self-Remixed Best is available now on Sony/Red Ink.
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