By ANDREAS TZORTZIS
Published: August 9, 2005
BERLIN, Aug. 8 - Germany's most controversial rapper has five tattoos, stomach-churning lyrics, impressive record sales and, somewhat improbably, admirers among both immigrants and the neo-Nazi skinheads who rail against them.
Henning Schacht for The New York Times
The gangsta rapper Bushido, who has achieved chart success and, incongruously, acquired fans among Germany's skinheads.
He is also exceedingly polite and quick to refill a guest's glass of water, and he occasionally goes grocery shopping for his mom, with whom he shared an apartment until three months ago.
"In reality I'm a relaxed guy who likes to chill, who's funny and who's seen some stuff," said Bushido, 26, the son a German woman and a Tunisian man, whose real name is Anis Ferchichi. "But these people make me out to be the Devil."
In the past half year, Bushido and other gangsta rappers, largely from Germany's immigrant communities, have landed on a media watch list normally populated by right-wing neo-Nazi bands. They have attracted the wrath of politicians along with a following of hundreds of thousands of German youths mesmerized by their rhymes about dangerous neighborhoods, stab wounds and groupie sex.
A good 15 years after the music genre spread from the streets of American cities to tough neighborhoods from Rio de Janeiro to Marseilles, gangsta rap has hit it big in Germany, where tamer rap has been popular for years. Riding on the coattails of American rappers like 50 Cent and Eminem, German gangsta rappers have made a strong showing on the charts - where Bushido's last two albums have made their debuts in the Top 6 - and shaken a society not used to hearing ghetto tales of death and revenge in its own language.
German parents and the news media have expressed shock at hardcore lyrics, which, they say, glorify a dangerous American ghetto fantasy that doesn't exist in Germany and shouldn't be encouraged.
In response, the Federal Department for Media Harmful to Young Persons, an agency set up in 1954 in the sensitive era of post-Nazi reconstruction, has expanded its mandate to rap after spending most of the past two decades monitoring neo-Nazi music. Four rap titles have been added in the last year, joining seven others recently added to the more than 450 songs or albums the department has put on its list since the 1980's. Inclusion is more serious than an explicit lyrics sticker on a CD cover. It means that the offending album can't be advertised and stores can't sell it to anyone younger than 18.
"We put them on the list for many different reasons, but mainly because they discriminate against women, who are typically labeled prostitutes and hookers, and they advocate violence," said Elke Monssen-Engberding, director of the department.
The list features songs by radical right-wing bands like Aryan Duo and Reichsfront, offering song titles like "White and Full of Hate" and lyrics that glorify violence against immigrants. The fact that such bands are increasingly sharing space with people they spent most of their time railing against might seem strange. But to Ms. Monssen-Engberding, the threat from the two seemingly disparate groups is similar.
"The right-wing musicians are promoting an ideology, the rappers aren't promoting ideology; it's a type of dialogue," she said. "But it doesn't make it less dangerous."
In fact, there is some evidence that neo-Nazis relish the aggressive lyrics and image promoted by Berlin's gangsta rappers. Hannes Loh, an author of the book "Fear of a Kanak Planet: Hip-Hop Between World Culture and Nazi Rap," said some right-wing skinheads are abandoning jackboots and bomber jackets for the baggy pants and sneakers of the rap scene.
"We don't want to overexaggerate but it has become clear that it is moving in that direction," Mr. Loh said. "It's very contradictory, and very hard to understand."
Including for the rappers themselves. Bushido says skinheads cheered him at a concert he recently gave in the East German city of Chemnitz. After the show, they came up to congratulate him and ask for autographs.
"There is no trying to understand Nazis, but what are you going to do?" he said. "Are you going to ban them, put them in jail so that they hate you even more? If that guy is cool with me during the hour in which I'm giving my concert and respects the other people, then I think I've done a good job."
Ach und Bushido kommt vielleicht für fünf Jahre in den Knast, weiss auch nicht warum...
