A group of Indian musicians has released the Climate Emergency Mixtape, a rap album about the climate crisis. Its organisers call it India’s first multilingual rap album on the subject.
The album has six tracks. Rappers Kali and Abisha are among the artists, and both wrote songs based on their own childhood memories of water running out.
“If we want to reach out to people who are experiencing the climate crisis, we need to change how society tells those stories,” said Brikesh Singh of Asar Social Impact Advisors, one of the groups behind the album.
“Music, we felt, is an extremely powerful medium,” Singh said.
Kali’s song is called Neer Kodu, which means “Give Water” in the Kannada language. The 29-year-old’s real name is Akshay. He grew up in Bengaluru and has made music for more than ten years.
He said Eminem and Akon have influenced his music. As a child, he walked about 10 minutes to a public tap to fill plastic pots with water.
“We would always think… we should not waste this,” he told AFP at the album launch.
According to AFP, water shortages are a long-running problem in Bengaluru, which is India’s tech hub. Many people there depend on groundwater wells that often dry up in summer. Others pay for costly water brought in by truck.
Abisha’s song is Veppa Marathadiyila, which means “Under the Neem Tree” in Tamil. It is about how climate change hurts poor and marginalised communities.
The 26-year-old is a member of Sollisai Sistahs, the first all-women rap group from Tamil Nadu. She said she remembers water “reaching her doorstep” when she was about eight years old.
Two years later, the area had run dry, she said.
Abisha said climate change was still “not spoken about widely” in her community. She hopes her song will reach people more strongly than spoken words alone and help them understand the threat.
India has the largest population in the world. It is also the third-biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, and it is at risk from extreme weather.
Some parts of the country have faced drought. Other areas have suffered deadly floods and landslides caused by heavy rain. Rising temperatures and changing weather patterns could make water shortages worse, AFP reported.
Kali called on other artists to stop rapping only about cars and bikes, topics he described as “boring”.
“They should talk about something that actually matters, which is climate change,” he said.
Source: this article is based on reporting by IOL Entertainment. Image: IOL Entertainment. Written with the help of AI and published by the Tzaneen Voice Entertainment desk. See our Editorial Standards.
Rirhandzu Baloyi writes about entertainment for Tzaneen Voice. Rirhandzu covers South African music, film, TV, streaming, awards and celebrity news, from amapiano and local soapies to Showmax and Netflix releases. Stories stick to what happened, who was involved and when fans can watch or listen.