The fact that Symba is becoming the new important voice in German rap is no longer a secret. He seems to have noticed that too: SYMBA SUPERMANN is the name of the Berliner’s debut album, but after a sack of singles since 2019 and the seven-song “Teamboys undso” EP from 2021, it’s no longer the artist’s big Here I Come I moment , whose real name is Sylvain Mabe, but rather the consolidation of what has been achieved so far.
And that’s what it sounds like: The experimental elements in production, rap skills and text have been scaled back a bit, but the rapper, who has also worked as an actor and director, strolls all the more confidently over his playground, from which he gleefully picks current hip-hop clichés, but then plucks the bouquet properly. If you only listen superficially, the daring stuttering and staccato tricks, the tempo changes and internal rhymes over ridiculously smooth trap, which skilfully also leans on good old G-Funk, are still astonishing.
Never forgetting yourself, never just partying and never too easy to knit
But if you look more closely, behind the dropping of brands from Gucci to Mercedes to Fila, a differentiated character appears, who drives up in a chic red sports car, but admits in the same breath: “Symba doesn’t have a driver’s license”. CBD and CDU appear in the same song, weed is constantly smoked, kofta are eaten, everyday life is just everyday life, but slowly you have to deal with the fact that it can’t always go on like this: “Suddenly I should be an adult / I don’t even know what that means, Digger / The world out there can be stressful,” raps, No: Symba sings languidly, as if he also wanted to renovate German soul in “Leben istanger”, like Marterias once did “Kids (Finger On Your Head)” captures a generation and all of their doubts.
But Symba keeps it all in limbo: Yes, of course, this is a coming-of-age album, the farewell song “Bücherwurm” sounds like an entry in a poetry album, but Mr. Bean has the real swag. One can never accuse Symba of becoming too analytical, he’s never self-forgotten, never just partying and never too simple, never ironic and he never takes himself too seriously. Is the? Goes. When you’re so damn smart.
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