MC Solaar..(Le context es plus forte que le concept)

MC Solaar is a fantastic French rap and hip-hop artist. If you haven't listened to him before, you should. He's one of the most thoughtful and talented rappers I've ever heard....his lyrics read like poetry and are full of literary references, puns, and clever multi-lingual wordplay. Unlike most mainstream rappers (who, regardless of how they started, eventually evolve into 'hardcore'), the background samples to MC Solaar's songs usually contain soft melodies or beautiful orchestral arrangements.

Here's a sample of his work: one of my favorite songs, Inch'allah.

Ok, yes, the lyrics are in French, and I'm guessing most of you don't have a clue what he's saying. You've got three options: 1) get someone who speaks the language to tell you what he's saying. 2) pop the original perfectly constructed poetry into an online translator and end up with some horrifically mangled version that says "Under the false bottoms cortex without dancing the funky yet jerk. If this is you, courbe-toi walking low profile and be quiet”. Really, I online-translated lyrics and that’s what it gave me. Fucking ripoff. 3) Let the music speak for itself. This goes back to a recurring theme in my blogs of appreciating the beauty of international music containing language that typical American listeners don’t understand. Sigur Ros went so far as to use a fake language (Hopelandic) to emphasis this point: meaningful music is meant to convey ideas and emotion when the spoken word fails to suffice.

That being said, anyone can appreciate MC Solaar’s work even if they don’t understand his exceptional linguistic talent. MC Solaar wrote this song, Solaar Pleure (Solaar Cries), right after he broke up with his girlfriend of four years. The lyrics contain heavy religious references and convey a general mood of sadness, despair, and confusion that is also emoted in the music video.



For those of you who are interested, a quick biography: MC Solaar was born Claude M’Barali in Dakar, Africa in 1969. He moved with his family to France when he was six months old, and by the age of 13 was a talented football player and fluent in French, English, Spanish, and Russian. After adopting the stage name Solaar from his childhood graffiti tags, MC Solaar released his debut single “Bouge de La” (Take a Hike) in 1990 and was basically an instant success. The song later won him France’s “Victoires de la Musique” award. MC Solaar recorded a full album - “Qui seme le vent recolte le tempo”- which was released in 1991, and has recorded six other albums since….the latest of which - “Chaiptre 7” - was released in June 2007. Throughout his career MC Solaar has chosen to use his public influence to make political statements. He participated in Amnesty International’s project “30 Films Against Forgetting” in 1991, as well as appearing at dozens of international charity concerts. He stood publicly against illegal music downloading in 2003 with a special marketing campaign for his latest album, “Mach 6”. His label distributed 300,000 free CD-ROMs of the album around French suburbs – mimicking the free acquisition of downloading music online – but the tracks erased themselves after six days! Now the artist has a wife and a child and has settled down from touring – but somehow I don’t think he’s going to stop at a mere seven albums…..



A little international music will do you some good. I hope you liked this cultural diversion!