By Walter Dawkins
The (Westchester, N.Y.) Journal News

"Mimian to but the tiri bachin akilar ..."

Does this sound like hip-hop to you?

These lyrics, in Punjabi, the language of Punjab in Northwest India, are actually from one of the hottest rap records on the radio. The song is "Beware of the Boys (Mundian To Bach Ke)," a collaboration between Jay-Z and Indian rapper Panjabi MC. It's the latest in a series of rap records that have incorporated Indian music. Other singles include "Addictive" by Truth Hurts and rap legend Rakim, which samples "Thoda Resham Lagta Hai" by Indian vocalist Lata Mangeshkar; and Erick Sermon's "React," which features a Hindi singer.

Why Indian music and hip-hop? One reason is that hip-hop has always been driven by the sampling of exciting sounds, and Indian songs, with their seductive and mysterious music, stand out.

"It's hot, sexy music," says Yogi, producer of many of Puff Daddy's hits. "The sitar has that sound, and the way they sing, especially if you don't understand it, is real hypnotizing."

In addition, the style of music used by Panjabi MC called Bhangra, a music sung by struggling Sikh farmers in Punjab to celebrate the harvest, has similarities to hip-hop.

"It has so many parallels to rap in rhythm and sound - the bass, the aggressive masculinity. And the men are very flashy," says Nitasha Sharma, a doctoral candidate at the University of California-Santa Barbara who studies Indian culture and hip-hop. "So it's not a hard fit for Jay-Z to rap over a Bhangra beat."

Indian influence is not new

The 1960s were a period of migration from Punjab to the United Kingdom. The people brought their music with them, making Bhangra popular in Europe. And it was while Jay-Z was on tour there that Panjabi MC got his attention. "Every city we went to - Amsterdam, London, Paris - every club we went to, MTV," says Lenny Santiago, an executive at Jay-Z's Rockefeller Records. "Everywhere we went, they were playing this record. So we reached out to their people and asked if Jay could get on the record. From there it has blown up tremendously in the States."

The influence of Indian music and culture is not new, of course. It can be found, for instance, in the Beatles' pursuit of Hinduism and George Harrison's sitar studies with Ravi Shankar.

"With our harried lifestyle in the States, people are looking for things to tone down what makes life so stressful. And when you look toward Eastern culture you find those things," says Aparna Rao, an Indian-American who works with many urban music acts. "With yoga and meditation and people like Deepak Chopra out there showing Americans a different way to live their life, and Madonna pursuing yoga and spreading the word, people start to pay attention. And if it starts getting reflected in your daily lifestyle, you start paying attention to the music."

Also, many first-generation Indians in the United States, like Rao, enjoy combining hip-hop with music from their homeland. "I'm first-generation, along with my peers, who are balancing both cultures. We've taken hip-hop beats and mixed them with Indian music for years."

Yogi believes that the international success of Panjabi MC will further hip-hop's status as a global phenomenon. "I think the Panjabi MC record is going to make the world smaller. If you have a hot record, no matter where you are in the world, we're going to hear about it," he says.

And not only are foreign artists influencing sounds on the radio here, but U.S. bands are exporting their music to India as well. "I was sitting in a hotel in South Bombay, and I saw this Indian remake of the Truth Hurts song. These Indian women were dancing just like the Truth Hurts dancers in the video," says Corey Takahashi, who authored "Musical Masala," a recent story in Vibe magazine about Indian culture. "It shows you that globalization is not one way, and that it's more like this boomerang."

Records offensive to some

Still, some of these records have been offensive to young Indian-Americans who feel that the U.S rappers are not taking the time to understand Indian culture before using the music in their songs. "When it comes to Erick Sermon's record, people are not that happy with it," Sharma says. "The video is kind of offensive, and he has no idea what the Indian singer is saying - which he makes obvious when he says, 'Whatever she says then I'm that.' The Indian hip-hop artists that I study feel that they need to put their time into knowing the history of hip-hop and come at it with respect and know the context of the black struggle."

But Sharma believes that this melding of cultures has the potential to help address racism.

"There is a lot of antiblack racism in the Indian community, so the reason why I am studying hip-hop and Indian hip-hop artists is to put an alliance between groups that are increasingly separate," she explains. "Does someone like Erick Sermon actually lead to a greater understanding of Indians? No. But it does lead to more conversations."