Teddy Neguse: "I miss the fire of protest that was in me"
Rapper Teddy Neguse opens up about his life in Lod, his search for identity, his creative projects, and how music helps him navigate his inner world and embrace his true self.
Where are we catching you?
"In Lod, at home, starting the day. The morning started when my sister, who was on her way to reserve duty, lost the car key, so there was an extensive search party here in the house."
How and where do you drink your coffee?
"When I lived in the Shapira neighborhood, I really liked sitting at the 'HaGargar' cafe. I drink a regular cappuccino or sometimes oat milk."
Who would you like to sit down with for a beer?
"I don't drink beer much, so maybe a glass of white wine. With my great-grandfather on my mother's side, Papa Baruch. He was a larger-than-life figure, and there are many stories about him in my family. He left the village where he lived in Ethiopia and went to seclude himself for a period among wild animals and lions. They say that when the lions, or God, signaled to him — he understood that it was time to return home, and then he started the family. He intrigues me. I would like to know more about him, how he left everything and went to live like that."
What are you working on now?
"On new music, and at the same time I am in rehearsals for 'Hip Hop Talpiot' produced by Tamir Muskat and Itamar Ziegler, who produced my last two albums ('It's in My Blood' and 'Point'). It's a show at the Israel Festival with the amazing Jerusalem Street Orchestra, which combines classical music and hip hop with many participants. At the same time, I am participating in the docu-series 'Black Gold: The Story of Israeli Hip Hop' on Kan 11, which has already created a buzz. Kudos to the creators Rom Attic and Amri Dekel Kadosh, talented people with passion and a big heart. They did what many media outlets failed to do: give respect to Israeli hip hop and get into the head of those who created it. This is not taken for granted in the current reality."
What is your quirk?
"Rap. The fact that I am 31 and still writing rhymes, I have beats and I want it, and I want to be the best. Rap is the mother of all my quirks."
How do you like to spend Friday afternoon?
"Lately, making schnitzels. On Friday I was into cooking. I copy secrets from other people online."
What superpower would you like to have?
"Time travel. To go back to ancient times and move to the future."
Who in your eyes is the sexiest person?
"Me. Being an artist and standing on stage made me very connected to what I do, so when I'm on stage, I feel the sexiest in the world."
What do you miss?
"The fire that was in me 5-6 years ago, at the protests of Salomon Teka and Yehuda Biadga and all the drama around them. I appreciate the child I was, who placed himself at the center of the protest, sat in news studios and sang 'Handcuffs on the Hands'. I took on a lot, and today I am in a much healthier version, so maybe 'miss' is not the exact word, but I appreciate that child. Even today there are struggles and protests, for example about the disappearance of Haimnot. It easily turns into an ideological argument, and what is needed is to take horse reins and find this girl."
Where would you most like to live?
"During the war I returned home to Lod, and since then I am here. I have three sisters (30, 27, 25), and we are all at home right now. We are going through a lot together as a family, and a new dynamic has been created between us. I have more space to contain, and it's like getting to know Dad and Mom and the sisters again, from a place that sees them beyond their role. This is new for me and I am really happy. It's not simple, there are complicated days, but it's a necessary thing that does good for everyone. I am very connected to this place, to Israel, so I don't know if I would want to live in another place — but yes, to travel a bit in the world and see other places."
What do you like to spend your money on?
"Food, coffee, clothes. On people I love. To help parents and make it easier for them as much as possible — but they don't take money, so it's more help in the Ethiopian style: driving to a wedding, collecting plastic chairs in a synagogue."
What would you like to change about yourself?
"Nothing. I am at peace with the imperfection. It is a daily job to accept the cards I received: this body, this incarnation, how I speak, who I am. As a child I had a lot of self-criticism, I judged myself. I absorbed a violent and difficult neighborhood, I absorbed a reality of Ethiopians trying to understand their identity in the State of Israel. They didn't talk to me about sexuality or what I want to do in life — things that create a lot of tension, and my mother didn't know how to approach them. I was a child who sweated in the palms and feet excessively, and bit my nails. Today I understand that it is related to my emotional state, and I know how to control it. Music is a tool I chose intuitively and developed myself."
What do you consider your greatest achievement?
"That I am an artist in this country. All the odds were against me, and they still are — whether it's related to the community, the country, the religion or the music industry in Israel. When I wrote 'Handcuffs on the Hands' I described what is happening to us in the Ethiopian community in a language that every Israeli could understand, I felt that I was touching a nerve, and it created traffic. But it also left me stuck in a certain light that is hard to get out of — the Ethiopian, the deprived, the black — and I felt that I had to make a shift. Today I am in a more complete and better place than the child I was, and that is one hell of a sigh of relief."
What scares you?
"Where I can get to. There was potential for self-destruction in me. In my early 20s I celebrated with it and went wild, I also tried drinking and drugs — but I didn't go far, because I can't physically contain too much, and also it didn't work and didn't release me. I understood that I was driving a bit irresponsibly with my soul, and it generates alertness towards myself — to remember that it was out of control, and now it's not. And a person like me really needs this alertness."
What makes you happy?
"Sometimes I am hard on myself, and when I put that aside I see my family in a different, new light. For example, last Friday my sisters opened yoga mats at home and did it together, and it was a calm moment. I left the self-criticism, looked at them and it did me good. These are rare moments to achieve as a family."
What do you miss most in life?
"Money."
What do you consider your most precious asset?
"Silence. The fact that I can take trips of an hour or two and really be just with myself and with the road."
Who are the artists who influenced you?
"Ethiopian rappers: Kafe Shahor Hazak, ADC. The entire Israeli rap scene — Plotnik, Tuna, Peled. American rappers like Kendrick Lamar, Tupac, Drake and J. Cole. I grew up on the Children's Channel, so everything they brought I ate: cartoons, comics, superheroes. When I was little my mom bought me a DVD of Batman in a cartoon movie, and to this day I love it, it's the superhero I love the most."
If you weren't a rapper what would you do?
"Work with dogs. Lately I got heavily into Cesar Millan and he blew my mind, he explains the most basic things that we miss in communication between humans."
