The Rap Star [EN]: Chapter 240

***

“What’s with that Chinky?”

Franco was a rapper who only performed in San Francisco.

He occasionally performed in neighboring Sacramento or Oakland, but that was rare, and he hardly ever left San Francisco.

However, that didn’t mean Franco wasn’t popular.

With a total of three albums released, his house held two platinum records and one gold record.

In short, he was a rapper who had San Francisco in his grip.

It was only natural that Franco would join the Curtain Call Tour, which came to San Francisco.

Franco was scheduled to perform twice in San Francisco and once in Sacramento, and he was currently preparing for the rehearsal for the San Francisco performance.

While waiting for his turn to rehearse, a certain Asian rapper caught Franco’s eye.

“Chinky? Who?”

Slum Duck, also from San Francisco, asked in response to Franco’s question.

Unlike Franco, Slum Duck was a musician who had participated in the Curtain Call Tour from the beginning.

“That guy rehearsing on stage. He is rehearsing now, right? Don’t tell me he’s participating in the tour?”

“Ah, Five? He was originally PP’s hype man, but he’s been participating as an opening rapper since the San Diego performance. PP must be dying inside.”

“Dying inside? Why?”

“He’s really good. It’s like trying to avoid a fox and running into a wolf.”

Franco gave a puzzled look at Slum Duck’s words.

He didn’t understand what the fox and wolf talk was about, but the Slum Duck that Franco knew would never attach the modifier ‘good’ to an Asian rapper.

In fact, black people often disliked Asians more than white people.

The influence of the first generation of Asian immigrants was significant, with many Asian immigrants looking down on black people while considering white people superior. Even if they didn’t show it, their unconscious thoughts were like that.

It seemed to be due to white culture like Hollywood movies, and from the perspective of black people, they couldn’t have good feelings towards those who flew in from countries they didn’t even know and looked down on them.

And this emotional rift remained even after generations.

Slum Duck was also one of the black people who hated Asians. That’s why Franco was puzzled.

Feeling Franco’s gaze, Slum Duck scratched his head and said.

“Five is… a really decent guy. When you talk to him, you sometimes forget he’s Asian. But when did I start feeling that way?”

When PP was scolding him at first, he felt a bit sorry for him. Although he didn’t like Asians very much, he hated PP more than that.

And then, watching him faithfully and perfectly perform his role as a hype man despite being scolded, he seemed to feel that he was a pretty decent guy.

Five was even paying attention to PP’s unconscious habits that he would inevitably miss if he didn’t do a lot of research.

After talking to him a few times, his pronunciation was also attractive, and his mental and skill aspects were also good.

When Five got on stage because PP cut off the opening rappers Black Connection and Deron, Slum Duck thought, ‘I hope Five does really well and screws over that PP bastard.’

‘And he screwed him over properly. Stupid guy.’

Slum Duck was surprised when he first saw the stage that Five had set up. Rapping well was one thing, but the career he had was by no means light.

“Anyway, Five is a really decent guy. Not just me, but everyone thinks so. If an Asian rap star can be born in America, he’ll be the first and last.”

Franco, who heard Slum Duck’s story, was inwardly surprised and began to focus on Five’s rehearsal stage.

And he could see why Slum Duck praised Five so much.

***

San Francisco

– The first port city on the Pacific coast.

– A world-renowned international port city.

– The second largest city in California after Los Angeles.

The , an extension of the and , arrived in San Francisco, which has various modifiers, on a day in early February.

– Kyaaaaaaak!

– Plan Paper!

– Franco!

Among the Curtain Call Tour lineup, the musicians who were popular in San Francisco were Franco and Plan Paper.

First of all, Franco had the title of ‘rapper representing San Francisco’ by showing his unwavering affection for the area, never leaving San Francisco.

Plan Paper was also a rapper who was active in San Francisco during his underground days.

Plan Paper originally worked in nearby Oakland, but the child he saved from being hit by a truck was a boy from San Francisco. After that, he was active in San Francisco, a larger city, until he joined Sony Music.

Thanks to Franco and Plan Paper, or because it was the first tour of 2008, the Curtain Call Tour in San Francisco, which was scheduled for two performances, was sold out.

The performances in Oakland and Sacramento, scheduled between the two performances that took place eight days apart, were also almost sold out.

The faces of EMI Music and Sony Music officials were naturally filled with smiles.

In fact, the Curtain Call Tour was, strictly speaking, a performance without ‘superstars’.

Eminem, Jay-Z, Madonna, Beyonce, who are mentioned when choosing rappers and singers representing the United States, could not be found.

However, the popularity of the Curtain Call Tour was as good as those super tours, and that was because of the recruitment of appropriate musicians.

For the San Diego performance, they set up a musician who was treated like a superstar in San Diego as a lineup, and when performing in San Francisco, they set up musicians who were popular in this area as a lineup.

Of course, there were musicians who were popular throughout California, and there were also old musicians who once dominated the United States, although their popularity has now declined.

However, they roughly made a judgment, ‘This friend will be the most talked about in this city.’

Except for one person who is showing an unexpected march.

***

The premiere began, and The Regency Ballroom, the largest concert hall in San Francisco, was heated up from the start.

The exciting stage of Rancid, a punk rock band formed in Albany, California, which was quite popular in the late 90s, although it is now withering, opened the door.

– Rancid!

– Rock & Roll!

The Curtain Call Tour, which started with Rancid’s stage, continued perfectly without any mistakes.

The staff said that they wished every performance would proceed this perfectly, so there was no need to explain the excitement that the audience would feel.

The ear-splitting shouts rang out without ceasing, and the temperature of the concert hall began to rise due to the heat emitted by the people.

The musicians also seemed to be impressed by the atmosphere of the concert hall and began to show more intense but flawless play than usual.

When the audience’s whole body was soaked with sweat, there were only three teams left in the lineup.

Franco – Slum Duck – Plan Paper.

The turn of the three most popular rappers in San Francisco had come.

“Hey, Emily. Did you do your homework? Oh, Jason. I saw you staggering drunk yesterday, but you managed to come.”

When Franco called out the names of the San Francisco citizens who caught his eye on stage, the concert hall went wild.

He was truly a rapper representing San Francisco.

In fact, Franco was the best in terms of popularity among Franco, Slum Duck, and Plan Paper. However, he was not suitable as an ending musician because he performed in San Francisco too often.

Franco’s stage, which started like that.

Franco began to show off an amazing stage as if protesting, ‘Why am I not the ending?’

To put Franco’s stage in a nutshell, it was a performance ‘that didn’t need a rapper’. This was because there were audiences who would sing along from the intro to the outro without missing a single word if only the beat was played out.

Franco even brought only one hype man and a band session, and did not receive any help from featuring at all. It was as if he was asking, ‘Why do I need help when I’m the king of San Francisco?’

After Franco’s performance ended, Slum Duck’s turn immediately followed.

Slum Duck’s performance was also great.

Unlike Franco, he actively used the featuring team.

From the opening, he hired an attractive soul jazz vocalist, and in the middle, many musicians began to appear on stage. On the last stage, Franco, who was thought to have left, came up and added a verse.

– Wow!

– Slum Duck! Franco!

Slum Duck, who finished the last song, enjoyed the cheers of the audience and then slowly opened his mouth.

“I think it’s been almost three years since I came to my hometown, San Francisco. As most of you know, I’ve been active in New York since I was twenty. And I succeeded, and I’m here.”

When Slum Duck opened his mouth, the audience became quiet as if by a lie.

Quite a few of the audience were close to Slum Duck. He’s on stage now, but when he comes down from the stage, Slum Duck is a friend, a friend’s son, or a son’s friend.

“What I felt in New York is that the world is so big. There are all kinds of idiots and all kinds of geniuses. I hope Franco comes to a wider world and feels the limit. As you guys know, Uncle Dunphy is about to die.”

Dunphy was Franco’s uncle and manager.

At Slum Duck’s words, there were shouts of ‘Go Out Franco’ from the crowd. It seemed that quite a few audience members wanted Franco to advance to the mainstream.

“Ah, I didn’t mean to say this… Actually, I don’t even know what I’m trying to say right now. I’m just so happy to be back in my hometown. I feel new. The world is so big, but Frisco (San Francisco nickname) is the best. You know what I mean?”

– You said it well!

– Frisco baby!

Slum Duck, who was rambling to express his feelings, suddenly opened his mouth as if he had thought of something.

“I said the world is big, right? That’s right. It’s so big. And this guy is also a guy who came from a wide world. Frisco bumpkins will think of Chinatown in downtown when it comes to Asians, but the guy who’s coming out this time is a Real Yellow Nigga.”

The audience did not react much to the ridiculous word Real Yellow Nigga. It seemed that they thought it was a simple slip of the tongue.

Slum Duck’s friend in the audience shouted loudly asking if he had smoked marijuana before the performance.

Slum Duck said that he didn’t smoke before the performance, but he would smoke a lot now that it was over, and laughed loudly as he went down the stage.

Slum Duck, who was rambling until the end, went down the stage, and the stage went dark for a while.

The blackout was not long. At most about 5 seconds.

After a short blackout, there was a video that appeared on the main screen.

Rappers are constitutionally far from flashy performances.

The genre of rap itself is about speaking, and there was no room for any other devices to intervene.

So, most of the rappers’ performances were focused on their appearance.

Like Snoop Dogg, he appears on stage in a car, or like Eminem, he flies in wearing a Superman costume (the symbol is not S but E).

Other than that, the most used thing was video.

A video of a rival gang member fighting with a gun in a place like a warehouse, killing the enemy, and opening the door was very common.

The method was that the rappers would burst out of the door of the stage, which was installed exactly like in the video, at the moment of opening the door in the video.

The current performance was no different from that.

It was just strange that KRS-One appeared in the video.

“Isn’t the ending PP?”

“That’s KRS-One? Is Teacher also in the lineup?”

The audience’s curious yet expectant gaze poured into the screen that was shining alone in the dark.

At that moment, KRS-One, who was rapping briefly in the video, turned around and put his arm around someone.

The camera angle turned following KRS-One’s gesture. And what appeared in the angle was an Asian man smiling.

The Asian man slightly shook off KRS-One and began to rap.

“Oh? I know this song…”

“Me too. What is this?”

“Ah! This is that. The one that was on the YouTube main page.”

“Ah! Was it ‘The Way We Live?'”

“But that was in another language?”

“The video is a bit different too? Is it a making-of film?”

The Asian man in the video rapped a few words in English and then made an awkward expression as if he had forgotten the lyrics for a moment.

At that moment, KRS-One in the video shouted loudly.

– Hey, Fivesix!

“Yes, teacher.”

– Stop playing around and do it right.

“Right?”

– Yes, right.

“Okay. Right.”

Right… Right… Right…

Someone’s voice began to echo over the stage in a dark state.

And,

Bang-!

All the lights turned on at once, and a rough drum exploded with fireworks.

Sanghyun’s English version of ‘The Way We Live’ began.

End

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