Tanzanian Rap and Vietnamese Pop?!

X-Plastaz

Finding music from Tanzania and Vietnam was surprisingly easy. Finding music that I liked, however, was a more difficult task. In fact, I never quite found any. The music I found is music I could appreciate but probably wouldn't play on my own.

I came across the Tanzanian Rap Group X Plastaz, a group of Six rappers who rap in Swahili and call themselves Maasai Rappers. The Maasai are a group of nomadic cattle herders. The group tries to merge traditional Tanzanian music and rap. The video I posted is great in that it shows some beautiful landscapes in Tanzania. The video opens with a view of Ol Doinyo Lengai, a mountain sacred to the Maasai. The group climbed six hours at night to film at this location. This video was made in honor of the lead rapper (seen in the video) who was killed by a drunken neighbor in a knife fight. This video gave me a good idea for the look of the country and of some of its inhabitants. I'd also never heard Swahili rapped before; it sounded interesting. I was also looking for music that wasn't the folk music that we commonly associate as African music. X Plastaz seems to be a pretty well known rap group, and is the first hip hop crew to use Maasai cultures and practices in their performance. The group raps about current political issues including AIDS, poverty, and hunger. I appreciated this, however I was unable to find a copy of the lyrics to translate, leaving me to wonder what this song was about.  X Plastaz have released four records and has toured in Europe. 

I found the second music video for Dam Trong Tim's "You Hurt My Heart." Unfortunately, I was unable to find any other information about her. Everything I found was in Vietnamese. This song is about a girl who is mean to a boy who is interested in her. When he leaves she realizes that she is in love with him. She sings that she will wait for him to come back. A universal message or what?!