Mats "Daogen" Dawg

The Bergeners in the NMG / G-Huset have undoubtedly been Norway's most important rap label in the last five years. Critically acclaimed artists such as Lars Vaular, Store P & A Team, Jonas V and Flex have consistently shown themselves self-reliant and risky, and have jointly helped to open the Norwegian rap horizon against the American South and West Coast. Much thanks to them, Norwegian rap is healthier and more varied in 2018 than ever before.

But I can hardly take my mouth if I point out that the NMG artists also struggle with a somewhat problematic relationship with the world outside the house. For example, the A-team has gone hard in the media against the evil record company who tried to steer them from an office in Oslo, thus provoking all the inspiration. ISJ.

The outside community is also the driving force and review topic in virtually all the significant raftry that has come from the house in recent years. In the Vaular classic "In my apartment" (from "You Me Me"), no fewer than five paranoid (and stone) rappers sit in their bowels and sneak nerve out through the blinds against an evil and threatening world. And when Vaular moves out of the house, like last year's album "1001 Hjem ", it's usually to find outsiders - strippers, abused children and drug addicts - he can allies.

It is undoubtedly something beautiful and solidarity with this idea, but at the same time, the constant and insistent borderline between us and the others continues to be world-remotely, sentimental and regressive. Store P will, as you know, not be in your world, he has his own and thrives best under the dime with a flashlight, as it is called in the crowd's biggest 2014 hit.

Also, Mats Dawg's fresh debut EP for the NMG / G-House, "Daogen", has the contradiction between "me" and "the others" as hubs. But here's something going on. The opposites are not so bad anymore. The boundaries are moving.

Perhaps it's as simple as Mats Dawg has failed to grow up before he debuts. When he first became applicable, it was like a Norwegian Nate Dogg with "bodø" dialect. Now he is another and musically darker, but perhaps also mentally healthier. For example, in several places on «Daogen» we meet the rapper as a grandchild. He "rolled up the dummy in a Volvo with a double child seat", as it's called "Up in smoke" in the first place, and it sounds right in a post-Knausgard world.

Mats Dawg - En Vei

Mats Dawg - Sensasjonell (Official Music Video)

I hope you guys enjoy this even though it is in Norwegian! Tune in for more!

@kiimo