bEN PLG 35
What can we say about this rising star of French Rap, except that he's a big a big music enthusiast? The rapper from Lille in Northern France has a passion for Rap in his blood and he clearly honors him in his first album Dans Nos Yeux. The one who describes this project as "a hymn to non-pudeur" is a true lyricist far from the misogynistic ideas sometimes lent to Rap. The one who puts his passion at the service of others, took the time to talk to A Rap & A Cup Of Tea before going to give a Rap class in prison. Mature, honest and true, Ben looks back on his promising career in the French Rap Game and his creative process. As he approaches his thirties, Ben reminds us of the importance he gives to the emotions conveyed in his texts and we can say that his pen has something to seduce you. Can you tell me about your background in music? My first steps in music were as a listener already when I was a teenager. I was very curious about what was going on in music and I listened to a lot of sound. As I grew up, I started to meet people who rapped, but I had never tried it before. One day, I went to a party with some guys who were rapping and they told me to write a lyric and so I did it. It's as if I'd accumulated years of lyrics in my head and I was waiting to put them to music. You'd say it came as a click? It's not really a click I think, because Rap is the thing I'm most passionate about in the world. I really love it! Before I never really knew if I was capable of doing it because I've always been concerned about legitimacy. I had the impression that it was not for me... In my music I don't make up characters, I just tell what I'm going through and what I see. And when I understood that this is exactly what could touch people, that's when I felt legitimate and I think that the real trigger happened at that moment. In the song 'Ton âme' you say "Child of the French middle-class who knows too much the taste of Lidl" [Low cost supermarket] and in 'Quitter la fête' you say "I lie in carpools when they asked my job" and I think that all these little details of "real life" hidden throughout the album show how much you are a guy like everyone else who simply tells his stories through a message that can be universalized. Is it something you wanted to highlight ? In reality there's no strategy, I never thought "Is this going to please people?". It's just full of little details of life that you don't necessarily notice and that I took the time to analyze. I find that too often we trivialize things that should not be trivialized. For example, a woman who decides to have an abortion will be told: "It's okay, I've had an abortion too" even though it can be dramatic for her psyche. The same goes for parents who get divorced, they'll say to their kids: "Don't worry, your friends' parents are divorced too". You see this kind of subject echoes in many people, but we don't really talk about it.
