Forget everything
you know about France: the city of love, famous towers and haute-couture, France
is now the second market for Hip Hop in the world, right after the US!.
There, French acts sell gold and platinum albums, they have guests like Nas or
Wu Tang on their tracks and parties remind you of clubs like the Tunnel on a Sunday
night.
What's striking too is that record companies don't rely on US Hip Hop anymore
to make some dough : now French Hip Hop is taking over and thousands of crew have
emerged from all over the country.
The biggest structure here is undoubtebly Double H productions, they truly control
the country with their street teams, radio shows, parties and sales figures. Double
H Productions wouldn't be what it is today without its original members: DJ Cut
Killer and East (R.I.P.). Cut Killer is famous for the part he played in the menace
II society-like movie "La Haine" where he plays a DJ beatjuggling Krs One's "Sound
of tha Police" with an old classic song by Edith Piaf.
Cut Killer is called the "French Fukmaster Flex" and you'll understand why when
you see how active and busy he is.
In the magazine The Truth, Cut Killer sums up his evolution : "I started spinning
at parties, I've worked a lot, competed at the DMC championships and the transition
to producing came naturally". Then Cut built his own label : " Along with my man
East, we built Double H productions. At first it was just for the fun of it, then
it took more weight".
Year after year, Double H productions added more talented Djs such as Dj Abdel
to its team and produces songs as well as compilations. One of the most famous
compilations in France is the "Cut Killer Show" which is also the name
of his weekly show on Skyrock, the biggest Hip Hop radio station in France. Another
famous compilation is "Operation Freestyle "which helped discover groups like
113 or Double Pact.
One of the first Mcs to be signed on Double H is Fabe, known for his lyrical skills
and his commited topics. He dropped 4 albums so far, which places him right next
to French pionneers like NTM or IAM. But the biggest success
to date is 113. The name might be close to R&B act 112 but that's it for
the resemblance. With their hardcore rhymes and ghetto style, they managed to
get heavy rotation all over France and went platinum with their album "Les
Princes de la Ville". 113 also received a French music award for best new
group of the year.
Today Double H is a powerful structure with amazing Street Marketing techniques
for parties and artist promotion, it's impossible not to see a Double H sticker
when you go to Paris. Double H is also very active in the mixtape world where
you can find collabos between Cut Killer, Dj Abdel and Dj Mouss. Scratch DJs,
you need to cope the Double H Dj Crew mixtape if you want to get an overview
of what French Djs can do "scratchwise" and productionwise.
Double H has always managed to sign licence contracts with major record companies
like Sony or Universal to release Rap/R&B compilations where US groups as well
as French acts appear. The last one, Hip Hop soul party vol 4 (Universal) went
gold after only a few months thanks to a tracklisting featuring the dopest songs
of the year.
Cut Killer also played his own part in the Luc Besson movie "The Dancer"
and also Double H produced the soundtrack to the movie "La Squale".
Needless to say that Cut Killer and Double H productions are on their way to the
top, watch out for some collaborations with US groups like Blahzay Blahzay, I'm
sure you'll hear pretty soon of this label. Speaking of Blahzay Blah, check the
news to see that mc Outloud is not so honest..... Here's a quick discography of
Double H productions albums:
EASTWOO CUT KILLER SHOW Doudou Masta- TROP LOIN LE PROLOGUE OPERATION FREESTYLE HIP HOP SOUL PARTY I - II- II - IV Fabe : L’IMPERTINENT, DETOURNEMENT DE SON, LA RAGE DE DIRE 113 : LES PRINCES DE LA VILLE