The Arab Rap Family

The Family started back in 2002 with the two main members Mc Monadel and Dj Nadoo. They hooked up for the first time on an underground song called "Ana Arabee" (I'm Arab), and from there, the family started in the game of Arab Rap. They continued making music and rapping about life, where they're from and how they were brought up as two Egyptians, one raised in Egypt and the other in the States. They use rap to talk about their personal experiences and many political issues about Arabs and the political situation in the Arab world.

But they do admit that there are initial hurdles to deal with: “Rap music is more complicated and people are not used to listening to it,” says Monadel. “So when you’re singing they miss some words. So we are working to get people to love it through our live shows.” Seeing the Arab Rap Family live does live up to their own billing. With the both battle and synchronized rap comes jokes, break-dancing and audience members [dancing] on stage. Interaction with the crowd is key and hugely effective in engineering a relaxed, humorous and highly visual show. And they do attract a varied demographic, the dad and children, middle aged and youthful guy and girl - with and without hijab - are dancing or clapping in response to the group’s protestations for audience activity. “We’re trying to have a good show and to jam,” says Nadoo. “We have good musicians and we can just flow on them.”

In this style they have been influenced by their American counterparts, but only to a certain extent. “How they do the whole thing in rhyme, that’s what I take from American rap,” says Nadoo. “It is the art of the poem and how you can deliver it that makes people feel it. “But American rap - Tupac, N.W.A. - is mostly violent and negative. We’re not trying to have any negative rap or anything like that; we’re just trying to keep it positive. We’re trying to talk people’s language and have fun.” Such positivity has taken them this far and sees them billed at Sakia in the coming months, on the play list at Egypt’s Nagoom FM and being invited to the International Pop Music Festival in Rome in September. Here the distinctiveness of their sound will be just as evident as in Egypt, and it is what they will remain proud of, no matter who is listening.

Source: The World Press