Poetry in motion
A Chicago born rapper has moved to the island and now swaggers his stuff in Greek and English
WHEN the first explosive sounds of rap rattled through the air waves they caused parents to shudder, with their commentaries on the hardships of ghetto life, drugs and vivid tales of teenage sex and lust.
Twenty years later and rap has crossed many boundaries. For millions, it is no longer seen as a purely ghetto genre and, if you are willing to excuse the verbal excesses of some of the gangster rap artistes, hip hop/rapping is now considered to be the acme of cool.
Billy Hatzidiakos was born in Chicago of Greek parents and started his rap career at the tender age of 13. Chicago then was a Mecca for hip hop rap aficionados and young Billy gained his stripes by performing at high school gigs with his own group Zontanoi Nekroi or ZN (or for those not entirely in the loop this means Living Dead).
Now married to a rather ‘hip’ Paphos girl, he is starting slowly but surely with efforts to bring rap into the mainstream Cyprus music scene. But is he up to the challenge, considering the local recording scene is rather moribund.
“Sure it’s a challenge but, we see our rap as highly individual, it also speaks to the young people here, we write our own lyrics in both Greek and in English and we record now in Greece with FM records,” Billy said. “Our first CD sold over 25,000 copies so we know there is a keen market out there waiting to hear more rap, in fact we were pioneers in this part of the world.”
With so much despair resulting from Cyprus’ growing drug culture, does the group have a truly positive message to put over, or are they merely ‘hopping’ around the subject?
“We wrote lyrics about a friend of ours who died from an overdose of heroin, we witnessed this. It wasn’t anything to be cool about; the lyrics condemn the traffic of drugs and warn of the dire consequences that result. That’s the beauty of rap, we can, and do, send messages, and they can be powerful ones, as well as being sad or angry.”
Now, after four albums and several backing numbers for other artists, plus solo turns for each of the group members, Billy and his group are contracted for two more albums, including a couple of tracks with Sub Division in the States.
Billy’s next two solo albums will be a mix of Greek and English and will feature two New York and Greek born rappers.
Great rap will always be about what you are saying. Billy and his piers are the new poet laureates or troubadours of our modern, media saturated, broken home, attention deficient world and they do need to be listened to.
The School is Billy’s current CD now available in music stores all over Cyprus. For more info www.hiphop.gr, www.hiphop.com.cy
Seven questions
What car do you drive?
A Toyota Corolla with enhanced sound system
Describe your perfect weekend
Me, my wife, close friend’s log cabin, roaring fire and board games.
Assuming you believed in reincarnation, who or what would you come back as?
Spawn- my favourite comic book character.
What is your greatest fear?
Not having anything to say
What is your earliest memory?
Being accidentally hit in the eye with a baseball age six.
What did you have for breakfast?
Coffee and cigarettes
What was the last item of clothing you bought?
Two pairs of e-nyce jeans – just the way I like them, nice and baggy
