Authentik is the first album studio of the group of French Rap NTM, published in June 1991. In January 1992, at the end of the promotional tour of the album which had begun in March 1991, Authentik had been sold with 70  000 specimens. Fifteen years later, this album has the appearance of a pioneer in the landscape of the French rap, so much the kind, at the time, had not found its credibility yet. It is essential here forces some first of all near the public, the fame of NTM being forged with the wire of a vast promotional tour of the album begun in March 1991 and enclosed in January 1992 with the Zenith of Paris in front of a full house: with this date, Authentik had been sold with 70.000 specimens.

This album made following the exit in 1990 of very first the maximum four titles of the group, in particular comprising the title Le Monde of tomorrow , already under the label Epic Records of Sony. This maximum had been sold with more than 50.000 specimens before the publication of the album, its tone claiming and revolted coinciding with the tense atmosphere social which reigned in France this year with, between October and November, violent one confrontations between police officers and young people of the cities in the suburbs Lyon is born, with Vaulx-in-Vellum, and of the particularly virulent demonstrations of high-school pupils with Paris. A few months before, in the title Le Monde of tomorrow , NTM stressed: “Then will make a turn in the suburbs/Regarde your youth in the eyes you who orders in high place/My call is serious not does not take that as a play/Because the young people change Voilà what disturbs”.

At its exit, Authentik struck by the rough aspect and the violence perceived like disordered of its remarks. The style of the album, fact of texts hardcore stressed on happy fast, is very influenced by the American Gangsta rap . Following the example precursors New Yorkean of this style, the members of NTM use to them rap like a social and political “loudspeaker” with through which they launch their claims of exit of the ghetto in which the company locks up them.

Production and artwork

For many professionals of the sector, Authentik constitutes, in term of musical production Hip hop, at the same time a first in France and a small exploit, the sound engineers of the time still being then only familiarized very little with the specific type of work which the Rap implies, namely, for example, being able to advising the artist on the manner of posing its flow, of fixing perfectly this flow on the musical lead of vocal DJ or of managing the boost S of the singer. All these conditions are met here and, helped by the talent of their collaborators DJ Concepteur Detonator S and DJ Spank, under the aegis of the producer Fred Versailles, Kool Shen and Joey Starr sign with Authentik what much regards as the first succeeded album of the history of the French rap.

The “clan NTM” which takes part in the realization of this first opus gathers artists considered as belonging the most endowed to with their generation in the various disciplines of the hip hop: thus, the work of graphics related to the album (small pocket, logo and derivative products) is ensured by two artists graffiteurs who since became of the emblematic figures of the field, Mode 2 and Colt, shouldered by Jean-Baptiste Mondino.

Topics of the album

The album is composed essentially of songs with texts which approach expensive topics of company to the members of NTM, intersected with lighter pieces, sometimes very short, in the shape of covering joint of œils, such as for example Big Flap , the intro Test of the microphones or the final Dédicace . It contains also exercises of style, however rich of directions, with the image of the title '' Freestyle '', which are connected with a exercise of writing and of phrased Rap, carried out by Kool Shen, Joey Starr and Rockin' Squat of the group Assassin, or, to a lesser extent, Danse or Paix , which shows the virtuosity of the group in terms of flow and freestyle.

Among the topics approached, problems of the Suburbs S, and the questions which result from this, occupy a dominating place. Thus, '' Le Monde of tomorrow '' specifically deals with social difficulties which arise in the cities of suburbs. NTM apostrophizes there the policies as for their passivity and their indifference in this respect, protesting that “the delinquency advances and all this has a direction/Because violence runs in the veins of that which with hatred”. This piece was often quoted in the French press at the time of the riots of 2005 in the suburbs, which saw premonitory words there, such as: “Then reflect: How much is in my case/With the accesses of your roofs and if that is as that/It is that since too a long time/people turn the back On the crucial problems/the social problems which asphyxiate the youth/Which resides at the accesses in the South, the East, in the West, with North/you daily do not astonish Si the expansion by violence is such”.

Rising from this feeling of setting to the round of applause by the French company, the topic of exclusion is present in several pieces, as '' It is clear '', which asserts high and strong a step of fight against the Ostracisme of the nation with regard to the inhabitants of the cities and clarifies in the passing the direction of symbol NTM (“Contrary to what is said here or there/To in no case these initials of three does not address itself to you/Us, we denounce stagnations of the state/NTM fights for youth, to take advantage of its rights”), by announcing “constant vehemence/with respect to this France whose inclemency balances us /socially as excluded”. Exclusion constitutes also the fall of the title '' Soul Drunk person '', which however tells an evening of festival, and which is concluded in these terms: “Direct, clear the muddle leaves in testicles/Pas explanation, cool/One drives back us direction/the exit, go rolls! /All the time… /All the time… /And this evening still in the active of North/All the poses will be found outside”.

Form exacerbated exclusion, the Racisme is evoked particularly in '' Blanc and black '', which explicitly denounce the extremism Blancs side with Jean-Marie Le Pen and the National front, and Noirs side with Louis Farrakhan, just like the baptized islamist radical “pseudo-henchmen of prophets”, the Skinhead S or the Apartheid. Preaching the “ethnic difference, alliance of cultures/Here are the reasons of our progression, it is sure”, then playing of their difference of skin color, Joey Starr and Kool Shen stress as a refrain: “I is white, it is black, it is a lesson for the history/Blanc and black, the history is to be re-examined”. The title gratitude? '' expresses, in virulent terms, the feeling of revolt tested by Joey Starr towards France, initially at the time of its military service, protesting “that at all I share their ideologies/Which made ego only one paranoiac turned sour young person”, the piece continuing with corrosive words towards “the system” as a whole and concluding themselves on the topic from racism: “For this reason this rain of words/Adressée to my nation wants to be strong/Because I do not forget all these people/Who one day could close their door/Judging my capacities on my color and my ethnos group”.

In this context of social suffering, other titles express indéfectible solidarity and the political conscience of the artists concerned with the world which surrounds them, and which attacks them from its lack of comprehension and tolerance, and its will to keep away of the company the communities which do not tally with the secular traditions of the country. Thus, the topic of the sincerity of the rappeurs in their artistic step approaches: NTM is addressed here to the journalists and to the media in general, evoking the prejudices existing against the rap and to the culture of the street, on a tone which resounds like a warning statement: “Only here if you speak about me do not take a false step/Because to eliminate you not need for contract”. '' The Money rots '' people speaks about the misdeeds of the money, that it is badly employed by the governments to buy weapons rather than to stop the famine in Africa, than it serf to enrich the dealers by drug, than it pokes covetousnesses and generates acts of delinquency even between people of the bottom of the social scale or than it feeds the practices of corruption in policy. The singers of NTM, even if they feel rich their integrity, include themselves in the avid humanity of material profits, declaring themselves deluded and “put out of order by the system”, but conclude however: “I am in bottom, but much higher incomparable by their levels/Of people turn the back on the famine of their equal/Scorning their pars because, more they collapse under the money/Less is the world becomes real happiness? /Non I do not believe that the dough is a ransom of happiness”. Lastly, '' Of anybody I will not be the target '' approaches the topics of the training at the school of the life (“never not to forget the made errors and the learned lessons”), of freedom to begin in hand in order to “rise to leave the mass”, the hostility of people vis-a-vis the difference (“Hostile with the difference face abroad mistrust/Dernier slogan of France where intolerance takes lead”) and solid union of the members of clan NTM vis-a-vis any adversity, with as a refrain of the words to the paces of currency: “Indivisible, incorrigible, incorruptible NTM”.

List titles

1. Test of the microphones - 0:17

2. Authentik (Kool Shen/Joey Starr) - 2:49
3. the Money rots people (Kool Shen/Joey Starr/DJ S/DJ Spank) - 3:19
4. Of anybody I will not be the target (Kool Shen/Fred Versailles) - 3:34
5. Big Flap (Zeedya) - 0:30
6. the Capacity (Kool Shen/Joey Starr/DJ S) - 4:36
7. Freestyle , with Rockin' Squat (Kool Shen/Joey Starr /Rockin' Squat/MR3/Zeedya/DJ S) - 2:56
8. Peace (Kool Shen/Joey Starr/Fred Versailles) - 2:55
9. Le Monde of tomorrow (Kool Shen/Joey Starr/DJ S/Marvin Gaye) - 3:58
10. Dance (Kool Shen/Joey Starr/DJ S) - 3:19
11. Which gratitude? (Joey Starr/Jaeyez/DJ Spank) - 2:59
12. Drunk Drunk person (Kool Shen/DJ S) - 4:32
13. It is clear (Kool Shen/Joey Starr/DJ S) - 3:57
14. Blanc and black (Kool Shen/Joey Starr/DJ S) - 3:31
15. Dédicace (Kool Shen/Joey Starr/DJ S) - 3:40

Individual

• 1990 : Le Monde of tomorrow , maximum 4 titles

• 1991: Authentik , Remix E by Kirk Yano
• 1991: Drunk Drunk person , remixé by Kirk Yano
• 1992: Boogie Man , maximum new containing two titles live recorded with the Zenith at the time of the round of 1991-1992

Clips

• 1990 : '' Le Monde of tomorrow '' and '' the Capacity '', in only one video, carried out by Stephan Sednaoui

• 1991: '' Authentik '', realized by Pascal Venturini
• 1991: '' Soul Drunk person '', realized by Seb Janiak

References