Hip Hop Concert
Last Friday, George “G” Yamazawa, a Japanese-American spoken word poet from North Carolina, performed in Agora, where he energized the audience with his charisma and his rapping. Yamazawa is considered one of the top young spoken-word artists in the country. He is a National Poetry Slam Champion and an Individual World Poetry Slam Finalist. In addition to appearing at the Sundance Film Festival, he was nominated for Best New Hip Hop Artist by the Carolina Music Awards in 2016.
Yamazawa’s music spoke to his experience as a first-generation American. According to Yamazawa, his identity “affects everything.” He elaborated on the advantages and disadvantages of his ethnicity: “I grew up with a real outsider’s perspective, which prevents you from feeling very included in many parts of American society. But at the same time, it also gives me a kind of freedom and access to many different cultures. People welcome me into their homes and their cultures, and I was able to learn more about what it means to be from the South and what it means to live in the Bible Belt as a Buddhist.”
The event kicked off when Aiden Wolff-King, a senior, introduced Yamazawa. As soon as Yamazawa started rapping, a group of lively students congregated right in front of the stage, bopping to his words. He promptly delivered an infamous punchline, “I don’t rap like you, cuz dawg I’m Asian, I eat cats like you!” The crowd hollered in appreciation. Yamazawa later explained that, depending on the audience, he can receive very different reactions when he says that particular punchline. “Out of all the poems I’ve written about cultural identity and about my grandma, ‘Dawg I’m Asian, I eat cats like you’ is the greatest one I’ve ever written,” he said. “I said that at a high school in southeast DC once, and I was like ‘yeah, I eat cats like you,’ and the whole lecture hall was like ‘Oh!’” Laughing, he also recounted a performance in Hawaii. In front of four hundred Asian-Americans, the punchline didn’t work out like he thought it would. “They looked at me like what? They were dead silent, and it was actually kind of a traumatic experience.”
“He used his smooth flow and cool beats to make some really unique music that was fun, while touching on more serious topics like his upbringing, immigration and even police brutality and race relations.”
One of the songs he performed was “Dining Room,” in which he described his parents’ Japanese restaurant and how his whole family worked there. In a touching verse, Yamaza praised his mother’s resilience and open-mindedness, “What a talent, to be openly sharing your culture with strangers...She showed me the way of the Shogun is patience.” In addition to discussing his family, Yamaza also injects a bit of social commentary into his music. In “Rich Chigga Freestyle, a “diss” directed at Rich Chigga’s music video, Dat $tick, Yamazawa began with a sarcastic reference to “Asians dropping n-bomb.” He continued, saying, “Best see you at the protest, front row.” With that song, Yamazawa offered a sharp criticism of those who liberally appropriate hip hop tradition without having a true commitment to combating racial injustice.
Students loved Yamazawa’s performance. Senior Ore Marie said that she particularly enjoyed his upbeat yet meaningful words. “He used his smooth flow and cool beats to make some really unique music that was fun, while touching on more serious topics like his upbringing, immigration and even police brutality and race relations. But even with that, his music didn’t take a serious tone, which is hard to do.” Lower Gabby Brown was one of the people in the first row. “I liked his song lyrics. I thought they were very meaningful. I feel like his writing had purpose, and he was very inspiring. He also had great energy,” she said. Prep Eman Noraga, who was also in the first row, said, “ I thought he was a really cool act to bring, and he was really different from all the acts [the Academy] usually brings. He also catered to my music taste. I thought it was pretty cool how he talked about so many issues, like the immigrant crises.”