Rafał, a resident of Nowogrodziec, began listening to hip-hop when he was 14. In 2009, “Proceder” proved to be a revelation for him—the first solo album by Warsaw rapper Tomasz Chada, who had previously been associated with the legendary Molesta.
Why Chada in particular? “His lyrics are honest; they are the truth about life—there’s nothing made up,” Rafał says. “What is beautiful is that he recorded songs about what had happened in his life. But he also warned others not to make his mistakes or follow the same path. The songs have a message and are about life. He did everything from the heart; nothing was for show. Besides, he was a good person. He found his way back, got engaged and built a house outside the city. You could see that he had changed.”
“People generally did not like the fact that Chada kept rapping about the same things. But everyone has their own taste and listens to whichever rappers they want,” our fellow townsman continues. “I do my own thing; I don’t look at others. It’s my passion. Some of Tomek’s lyrics sound as if he wrote them about me. For example, the song ‘Z potrzeby serca’ [‘Out of the need of the heart’]:
I successfully closed
several stages in life,
spectacular blunders
also played their part in it,
I’ve had my fill of shame and fucking fear […].
And he adds: “There are no rappers anymore who reach me with their honesty in that way. I’m not really a fan of Auto-Tune.”
Last October, he set up a Facebook group dedicated to Chada: You will remain in our memories until the end (Tomasz Chada). It already has more than 1,000 users. “Quantity doesn’t matter to me; quality does,” the administrator explains. (To prevent random people from joining the group, membership is available only after providing the correct answer to a key question related to Chada.)
“I have wonderful people who run the group with me; I can count on them, and they can count on me. We support one another, and that is beautiful,” he stresses. “The users also motivate me. I am grateful to them as well.”
He never met Chada in person. He was planning to attend the artist’s concert in Wrocław, scheduled for the end of March 2018. Unfortunately, on March 18 he received the news that the musician had died. “I was overwhelmed by it; I couldn’t cope with it,” the hip-hop fan from Nowogrodziec confesses.
Rafał did, however, meet Chada’s parents, among others, as well as his colleague, music producer RX (that is, Rafał Sielawa), the Węgrzyn brothers, directors of “Proceder,” a film about the life of the rapper who died tragically, and the actor playing the lead role, Piotr Witkowski.
Our fellow townsman is not just a devoted fan, however. He himself—together with his friend Frist—is trying his hand at hip-hop. The duo Dwa Style plans to record a debut album. “I’m doing it out of a need of the heart. I’ve had a difficult life and I want to describe it,” Rafał explains. “We’re not trying to make it big. We’re doing it for ourselves.”
Rafał also wants to record a tribute song for his mother, who has been dead for 22 years.
Below is a track recorded with JotGie: