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The EP Clenched Fists (2021) announced it to us: Rocé, the French rapper with piercing eyes and a sharp verb, is preparing a 5th album. In the meantime, the child of Bab El Oued is exhibiting vinyls whose covers tell of the struggles for emancipation. Portrait full of hopes of an artist for whom the struggle is “a healthy lifestyle”.
An Algerian mother, a father of Russian origins, resistance fighter and expert in false papers, José Youcef Lamine Kaminsky, alias Rocé, arrived in France from Algeria at the age of 4. We are in 1981 and the family moved to Thiais, in Val-de-Marne (94).
First spotted by Manu Key (Mafia K’1 Fry) who invites him to include the track Respect on the album The urban rhyme (1996), Rocé released in 1998 his first tracks on Dj Medhy’s label. Me, I pass the baccalaureate!
24 years later, I’m damn proud to take you to meet an artist whose sounds I grew up in and who can boast of being one of the most beautiful feathers of French rap.
To his credit, four major albums: starting signal (2001) ; Identity in crescendo (2006) ; The Human Being and the Lamppost (2010) ; Gunz and Rocé (2013).
Also a compilation: By the damned of the earth, released in 2018 on his own label, Hors Cadres. 24 rare tracks from the 60s to 80s, a panorama of working-class songs, performed in French by artists from the former colonies.
A 5th album is in preparation and, in the meantime, Rocé has concocted an exhibition for us: “What the covers tell us”. It brings together a selection of vinyl whose covers tell a story that is too often overlooked. That of social, union, decolonial, feminist struggles… in short, emancipation struggles.
To discover it, head to Feu Continu, the cultural space of Verdragon: the house of popular ecology installed since the spring of 2022 in Bagnolet, in Seine-Saint de Denis, in the northeast of Paris.
And it’s Rocé himself who shows us around!
The exhibition “What the covers tell us” is open until July 15, 2022. Every Friday – in the morning for groups (by appointment), in the afternoon for all audiences. For any request: [email protected]. Verdragon is a space managed by associations Front 2 mothers (which works in the field of access to education) and The alternative (who works in the field of popular ecology).
SessionLab by Hortense Volle : a conversation in complete privacy and in 3D audio (spatialized sound).
A podcast to listen to, preferably, with headphones.
Achievement : Benjamin Sarralié
3D sound recording and mixing : Fabien Mugneret
Production : RFI Labo
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► Titles broadcast
Excerpts from the EP Clenched Fists (Excluding executives – 2021): clenched fists ; Capitxlistes ; Han Solo ; Stand up
Excerpts from the compilation By the damned of the earth (Excluding executives – 2018): White (Guyana 1988) – Léon Gontran de Damas; Mr Indian (Quebec 1972) – Peloquin / Sauvageau; It works, it works, and it shuts its mouth – El Assifa Troop
Excerpts from the album Gunz and Rocé (Excluding Managers – 2013): In apnea ; My rap is hanging by a thread ; Habitus
Excerpts from the album The human being and the street lamp (Big Cheese Records / Hors Cadres – 2010) :so few understand
Excerpts from the album Identity in crescendo (No Format – 2006) : I sing France ; The Metec ; memory problems ; One and many
Excerpts from Starting signal (Chronowax Music – 2001) : For the horizon ; Change the world ; We get used to it
And also :
The Immortals by Franklin Boukaka