Nana (rapper)
Nana Kwame Abrokwa ( born October 5, 1968 in Accra, Ghana), known by his pseudonym Nana (this is not a question to his first name, " Nana " is a worship name of the Ghanaian Akanvölker ) or the artist name Darkman Nana, is a German rapper and DJ. He became known in the second half of the nineties years. His lyrics focused on his relationship with God and his family, but also deal with issues such as racism and the Holocaust.
Life and musical career
The native Ghanaian retired at the age of twelve years with his mother and siblings to Hamburg. After finishing school Nana worked as a DJ in hip-hop clubs active and participated in the early 90 with some songs of DJ David Fascher as a rapper and co-producer with ( Here We Go, Make The Crowd Go Wild ), then under the pseudonym MC Africa True.
1990 first made an act of violence by Nana Abrokwa a stir: with a baseball bat the then 20 -year-old stormed a Turkish woman and beat her. The doctors diagnosed later a double comminuted fracture. A second Turk, who wanted to defend the woman, suffered a multiple fracture of the arm. As the Ghanaian attack a third victim, splintered baseball bat. Nana Kwame Abrokwa fled, leaving the injured man back. Although final judgment by the offender to prison for this act never had to, because he placed successfully for clemency and had always points to its social and affordable forecast on the basis of his musical activities. Even a sentence of three and a half years in prison for aggravated robbery had no consequences for this reason and was not enforced.
1995 True joined as a rapper at the Euro Dance Project Darkness, which was produced by Bülent Aris and Toni Cottura. The song In My Dreams was a club hit; as Nana, however, could not identify with this kind of music, the group parted again. However, his current nickname Darkman dates from this period.
In 1996, Aris and Cottura the Black Music label Booya Music, which Nana joined as the first artist. The first single Darkman made it straight into the top ten of the German sales charts; the successor Lonely was the most successful song of Eurorap era and spent several weeks at No. 1 in 1997 released album Nana moved somewhere between mainstream rap and U.S. Hip-Hop; as guests were heard numerous other members of the Booya Family - like Jan van der Toorn and Alex Prince.
The second album Father appeared in May 1998 and contained rather slow pieces with very personal lyrics. On board the young producer Neco Tiglioglu was brought, the short- then received his first gold record. Parallel Nana took the song Too Much Heaven and War on the tribute albums We Love The Bee Gees and Hands On Motown.
Nanas published in late 1999 single I Wanna Fly flopped after the public had by now lost interest in Eurorap and instead of German hip- hop music turned. Nevertheless, Nana took two more albums with Booya Music, which ( had the other participating producers and artists the label since left ) due to legal problems, however, no longer published.
In early 2001 the German published Nana Song You'll see that was recorded rather critical of the international fan base. Even this single was a commercial flop, and the work on the planned bilingual album Global Playa was set at the insistence of the record company.
In the summer of 2004 finally Nana was the CD All Doors In Flight No. on his meanwhile founded label Darkman Records. 7 issue. The album was produced in collaboration with Jan van der Toorn and Manual and was initially sold exclusively by mail order via Nana's website. Later, a publication by Sony BMG was announced, but never carried out for unknown reasons. 2005 Nana was represented on a compilation of underground DJs " Dj Desk" on the "essence Finezt Pt. Mixtape II ".
The third RTL Celebrity Boxing Darkman Nana defeated the actor Willi Herren. In 2007, he wrote music for a commercial.
2008 appeared a new album of Nana, 12 Y.O. the new tracks and arrangements of his greatest hits contains.