Y-Love / This is Babylon
My knowledge of rap and hip-hop is extraordinarily limited. Many years ago there were some awful shtick bands replicating every possible to-be-forgotten bad Jewish stereotype using rap. Then we crossed some barrier and it seemed to be part of the vocabulary of Jewish music-makers. We not only got Jewish rappers in the mainstream media, but groups like the Hip-Hop Hoodíos, and Matisyahu, and SoCalled started doing something that sounded like the rap I hear elsewhere, but it had this Jewish content infusion. One of the most fascinating, so far, is a black kid, a convert to chasidism named Y-Love, who has been appearing all over the country, and who seems to have gotten the attention of anyone who pays attention to rap. Now a CD is out and I can hear why. Check it out yourselves, This is Babylon.