Sh*t when the f*ck were we allowed to curse in this joint? Anyway, in addition to the names mentioned, let's mention some international rappers!
Chinese:
LMF- Lazy Motha F*ckas: Damn Cantonese sounds mad weird when they try to rap it. Their English ain't bad, since they from Hong Kong... but their English raps... HA!
Korean:
SeoTeJi Boys- They brought rap to Korea, supposedly he learned a lot of his stuff from Cypress Hill... either that or he ripped off Cypress Hill.
Deux- They used to be good, but one of the two guys (the better of the two) was murdered by his girlfriend... ouch.
Uptown- They grew up in L.A. I think, I heard their Korean sucks, but they pretty good at rapping in English, can't tell that they are Korean... (that's how I measure how good at rapping in English they are... if you can't hear the accent)
DJ Doc- They were outlawed and disbanded in Korea, but recently got back together, and into the underground scene. Their new album kicks ass.
Ok, those are four old school ones. Then here's how the rest break down. SeoTeJi Boys broke up, (there were three of them). The lead guy went solo... his music is really funky now, not really hip/hop rap or what not... the other two guys, one leads the Honey Family (underground, freestyle) and YG, the other dude leads the YG family (premeditated rapping, mostly performers, rather than real rappers)
Honey Family is the biggest well known group out of the underground, and they pretty much lead the underground movement. There's a bunch of groups... but since they underground, I don't really know their names all that well, think TEAM is one of them. DJ Doc is sort of a member. They release these albums every year that's a compilation of most of the underground groups. The compilations are called DAE HAN MIN GUK... 1999 was the first one, then 2000 had two different sets, released by two different groups. Go check out DAE HAN MIN GUK 1999 if you want to check out Korean rap/hip hop. Awesome stuff...
YG Family includes:
Jinusean- They grew up in Guam, so their English raps are pretty good. Their first album, and 1.5 album is awesome. If you want give Korean rap a try, check out their 1.5 album, basically it's their first album, but all in English.
Drunken Tiger- Duo group, very good rapping, don't know much bout them. Pretty good English, think they grew up in the U.S.
1TYM- Came out at around the same time Drunken Tiger came out. Don't know much about them either, pretty good English. Think they grew up in the U.S.
And they also released a compilation... think it's called YG Famillenium.
There's a bunch more... but I can't really think of them right now... have a lot of other stuff on my mind. If it comes to me, I'll update this thing... but for now that's it.
As you can see, the hip hop rap scene is thriving in Korea. I'm not Korean... I'm Chinese and even though I don't understand a damn thing they are saying, I love Korean music... the other Korean genres aren't bad either.
If anyone wants some more information, just ask... I'm happy to spread my love of Korean music. Got most of my other non-Korean friends hooked on it.
dc
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