Music
5 things you need to know about Swedish Hip Hop
We take you through the birth of the genre, in five steps.
Leila K and Rob n' Raz
© Unknown
1. It started with a dance
With the advent of breakdance in Sweden in 1979, the rest of the hip hop culture followed one year later and throughout the 1980’s the music was spreading. However, the first rappers were rapping in English only and some prominent figures where One Eye Que (later known as Ayo), Papa Dee and the producer duo Rob n’ Raz. With the international success of Neneh Cherry and her song "Buffalo Stance", the interest in Sweden for rap was growing. The first hip hop song released in Sweden was DJ René Hedemyr "Record Pool Rap".
The Latin Kings
© Aftonbladet
2. Welcome to the suburb
In 1989, the first rap song in Swedish was released. It was called “Jag Är Def” by MC Tim. The hip hop group Just D released several albums during the 1990’s, making Swedish rap more mainstream. Swedish producer Quincy Jones III moved to USA to work with 2pac, LL Cool J and Ice Cube. The Latin Kings released their album “Välkommen Till Förorten” (“Welcome to the suburb”) in 1994. With this record they marked a new era of Swedish hip hop with lyrics about violence, racism and drugs. The album was named the 6th best Swedish album of all times by Sonic Magazine (2013).
Petter
© Café
3. The sixth sense
In 1998, Petter’s iconic album “Mitt Sjätte Sinne” (“My Sixth Sense”) was released. In its wake the hip hop scene was enjoying a commercial success during the early 2000’s, with rappers such as Feven, Fattaru, Ken Ring, Ison & Fille and Organism-12. In 2000, hip hop was added as a category in the Swedish Grammy Award.
Woha.nu, where new hip hop was shared
© Woha.nu
4. The dark age
In the mid 2000’s the struggle was real for rappers, partly due to illegal downloading. The genre wasn’t prioritised by the major record labels like it is today. However, The Salazar Brothers (from The Latin Kings) kept on producing for other rappers, Petter released his album "Bananrepubliken" and Promoe was rapping in English with his Looptroop crew. Timbuktu released "Alla Vill Till Himmelen Men Ingen Vill Dö" and extended hip hop's popularity to include kids as well as grandmothers all over Sweden. The site whoa.nu laid the foundation to a growing phenomenon that was going to be hugely influential for the genre – the online communities.
Jireel
© Dopest
5. The golden age
During the 2010’s, Youtube and Soundcloud and eventually Spotify became important platforms for the Swedish hip hop/rap community. Rappers like Jireel, Cherrie, Lamix and Z.E have found a big part of their support through Youtube. Yung Lean started his career as a rapper on Soundcloud and has had international success together with Bladee, Thaiboy Digital and the rest of the Drain Gang/Sad Boys crew. Today, hip hop is one of the biggest genres in Sweden, and a big part of Swedish rap comes out of the Stockholm suburbs, but it’s not only a Stockholm thing – cities like Malmö (Ozzy, Guleed) and Umeå (Random Bastards, Fricky) are also important parts of the scene and the genre keeps on changing, with producers using influences by genres like dancehall, baile funk and R&B.