Chaii

Persian-Kiwi rapper CHAII has carved out a corner in the hip hop scene that is fresh, diverse and extremely exciting, drawing from her Iranian heritage as well as the multi-faceted and multi-cultural world of hip hop burgeoning in Australia and New Zealand. A multi-skilled rapper, producer, engineer and director, CHAII's new Lightswitch visual EP is a masterclass in showing us an artist that can do it all. She self-directed and produced all the badass visuals on the EP, filmed guerilla-style between California (where a large portion of her Persian family lives) and Oman. Expanding on the diverse fusion of Western and Persian sounds on Lightswitch, CHAII explains that she was fascinated by the history of Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution, which forced many creatives to immigrate to California. “I am part of the new generation of Iranian immigrants who are creating music outside of Iran. Coming from New Zealand, where there’s a very small Persian community that you barely see or hear from, it was a revelation to experience the perfect blend of Western and Persian influences when I first visited LA to see family.” There's much to know about CHAII, so we had her tell us fascinating facts about herself. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.