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It Takes a Nation

Today on Tablet

by
Marc Tracy
November 23, 2010

Subliminal, Israel’s biggest hip-hop star, is profiled by Yoav Fromer today in Tablet Magazine. Born Yaakov “Kobi” Shimoni to immigrants from Tunisia and Iran, the 31-year-old isn’t literally a political conservative, but his message is unabashedly patriotic and nostalgic:

Subliminal’s self-proclaimed “Zionist hip-hop” has always followed an inverted model. (He half-jokingly told me, “I am the establishment.”) While Public Enemy called on listeners to “fight the power,” Subliminal instead decided to join it. “This is Israel, not America,” he explained. “If I see a cop chasing someone down the street, odds are, you will see me running along to help out the cop.”

Here is a new, unreleased track, “Fuego,” that Subliminal made available to us: [audio:https://www.tabletmag.com/wp-content/uploads/audio/mp3/subliminal_fuego.mp3]

Marc Tracy is a staff writer at The New Republic, and was previously a staff writer at Tablet. He tweets @marcatracy.