Rapper Morad: “Without knowing me, they have painted me as if I were the baddest in the world” | Culture | EUROtoday

Morad arrives an hour late for the appointment, however for a superb cause: he needed to choose up his little brother, who remains to be finding out, at his mom's home, and arrive on the Plaza de Europa in L'Hospitalet, with the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona at full capability, it’s not straightforward. Family is the axis round which the world of this concentrated rapper, with a taciturn air and little festive spirit, revolves, who neither drinks alcohol nor goes out to occasion besides out of necessity. He apologizes for the delay, orders a latte, and lights a cigarette. To chat, he prefers a raised concrete block, the place the solar softens the chilly of this February morning, the eve of a trial by which he faces six and a half years in jail for inciting younger folks from La Florida, his hometown neighborhood in L' Hospitalet (Barcelona) and from the place he’s banished, to assault native law enforcement officials.

The rapper, who at 24 years outdated fills stadiums all through Europe, as soon as once more faces the ghosts of a previous that he’s attempting to go away behind. It will not be straightforward for him as a result of the recordsdata in opposition to him are piling up on the courtroom cabinets. The Prosecutor's Office is asking him for six and a half years in jail for inciting public dysfunction and attacking with a harmful instrument as a result of on August 11, 2021, whereas recording considered one of his video clips in La Florida, he allegedly incited the gang in opposition to the police (“yes “You hold showing within the sq., this may finish badly”) and threw eggs and stones at them while inciting the others. In another procedure, regarding events that occurred just a month earlier in the same scenario, the Prosecutor's Office asks him for another six years in prison for “intimidating” two little ones with an electric defense.

Morad El Khattouti defends his innocence in these two cases that threaten to lead him to prison. And, with a new look at reality, the result of experience and his forced departure from La Florida, he wants to continue with a meteoric musical career that has made him one of the stars of urban music. He barely gives a smile to this serious boy, who is often indignant, who demands respect for his people and for himself, who believes he has learned from the mistakes of his adolescence but without flagellating himself for it.

Ask. He says he has matured. At what point in her life is she?

Answer. I never regret anything, but there are things I could have done better. I didn't have adolescence and, when I left the juvenile center, everything came to me at once, it made a world of sense to me. My failure has been not knowing how to cope with some things. Now I have learned not to put myself in situations I don't have to be in. But I have not robbed anyone, I have not hit anyone and I have contributed to many things in my neighborhood with my pocket, my heart and my desire.

P. He's been on tour all over Europe, and traveling tends to change people. Has this been your case?

R. I have sung all over Europe and Latin America, and seeing that there are people who cry for you, who queue up to listen to you, gives you enormous pride even though they say a thousand bad things about you. Furthermore, I have realized that there is also life outside the neighborhood.

P. A judge prohibited him from entering his neighborhood, La Florida, the setting and inspiration for his songs, for fear that he would instigate riots. How are you living that exile?

R. It is a very great injustice that makes me angry, because I could be happier being there. Even those who hate me the most recognize that it makes no sense to kick a person out of the place where they would like to be. I have seen people with more serious cases than mine, rapists and men who hit women or their children… And there they continue. In my neighborhood I was always surrounded by children, not gangsters.

P. Far from the neighborhood, are you afraid of losing contact with the street?

R. No, because eight people from my neighborhood always accompany me on all my trips.

P. Do you feel that, outside your circle, other people are approaching you out of interest?

R. Yes, of course, that happens even in the neighborhood. It's normal, it's life. I'm not spiteful. They once told me: “If you weren't a singer, posh people wouldn't ask you for photos.”

P. And it's not true?

R. Yes, but that's not bad. If, thanks to music, I have managed to make those people also connect with me, it is a source of pride.

P. To those kids from another social background who listen to you and who perhaps are not familiar with the codes of the neighborhood, why do you think they like it?

R. There are values ​​that all people share. Before I talked more about my reality in the neighborhood. Now I also write about loneliness, about helping yourself, about loyalty and betrayals of friends, about caring for a mother. A posh kid who is always taking care of a chacha and he doesn't see his mother, he can feel identified with my songs, because he wants his mother's love like a neighborhood child.

P. With neighborhoods there is often a love-hate relationship. What many kids want is to get out of there…

R. Everyone wants to leave the neighborhood, but not leave it. Have a better life, travel from time to time, go to the beach, have dinner in the center of Barcelona…

P. Do you think that a somewhat romantic idea of ​​the neighborhood has been fostered?

R. Now a thousand videos are made, podcasts and documentaries about the neighborhoods. Now that the neighborhoods are so popular and cool, we should invest more in them, give them a boost, so that everyone benefits from it; for example, with sports workshops. In the neighborhood there is perhaps more desire than in other places where they already have everything.

P. Leaving Florida [no puede entrar desde octubre de 2022] Has it done you good?

R. Since they expelled me from the neighborhood I have had the two best years of my career, I have traveled a lot, I have sung all over the world, I have met people, I have invested my money… Since they expelled me from Florida I have not had a job again. crime. I have traveled through Europe, Latin America and Africa and nothing has ever happened. Why did my only problems happen in a square meter? The neighborhood is the only place where I am not a singer and where the police do not treat me with respect.

P. Why do you think there has been this hostility?

R. I don't know, there are police officers who when they see me think “I'm going to step on this child.” I have never touched anyone, but if a police officer disrespects a kid or myself for no reason, I am going to defend him and we are going to argue.

P. Do you think there are people who are upset that you have succeeded?

R. Yes, and it doesn't make sense. There are people who do not live their own lives, who live criticizing those of others from the couch, thinking: “That is a scraphe does not deserve it”.

P. Have you felt like a sufferer of racism in Spain?

R. I don't assume there’s widespread racism. People typically are good. Four years in the past, I used to be no person. Now folks see me and admire me, they deal with me with respect and affection.

P. Now that he's wealthy and well-known, do they have a look at him in another way?

R. Clear. Sometimes they don't know you in a restaurant and so they don't wish to provide you with a desk. But then the waiter acknowledges you, tells the supervisor and he apologizes and allows you to in.

P. Isn't that perspective a bit classist?

R. Yes, it’s unhappy and indignant, however everyone seems to be the proprietor of their place. In mine I’d not let in an individual who’s racist or who treats others badly. Plus, life can hit you for appearing like this. If you deal with me badly after I'm no person, after I'm somebody I'm not going to go to your home.

P. Is it simpler so that you can really feel Moroccan than Spanish or Catalan?

R. Oh, I can't discuss that as a result of then they’ll say that I’m from one facet or the opposite. I’m from the city, from the road. I don't establish with nationalities as a result of all that’s blended with politics. I want to say that I’m Spanish as a result of I’ve lived right here, I went to high school right here, I had my past love right here, my mates, my falls… But it makes everybody really feel dangerous after I say it.

P. Do you’re feeling that, on the subject of your issues with the regulation, you might have been singled out extra harshly than others?

R. Much extra. With me it has been taken to a different stage. There are days when I’ve sat and thought: what am I, a singer or a prison? When I’ve executed dangerous issues, total tv packages have been broadcast, which don’t say the nice issues, equivalent to having executed a tour by means of Europe, with all of the tickets offered, which nobody in Spain does until you might be Rosalía.

P. This Wednesday he faces an vital trial, with jail requests on the desk, and others are to come back. What is your place?

R. What I’ve executed improper, equivalent to driving points and one thing else, I’ve accepted, I’ve complied and I’ve paid what I needed to pay. But there are issues that I’ve not executed and by which I’ve nothing to do, and I’m going to struggle for my innocence.

P. Do you concern that these processes will interrupt your profession?

R. It's not going to be interrupted, it's not possible. I've all the time had a number of music saved, folks know that.

P. Why does he barely snort, a minimum of in public?

R. Why I'm not glad. I work to be one sometime and to sleep peacefully. But it's okay, it doesn't trouble me.

P. What doesn't make you cheerful?

R. People's hatred, that has harm me lots. Seeing myself all the time within the information for dangerous issues, and seeing that my mom suffers due to it. Without figuring out me, they’ve painted me as if I had been the baddest on the earth. I’m powerful and none of that knocks me down, but it surely makes me indignant.

P. Where is your music going?

R. Towards what you’re feeling in the meanwhile. To dwell in actuality, dangerous issues have to harm you. And simply since you are well-known and have cash doesn't imply you don't expertise dangerous issues anymore.

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