Mogambo Khush Hua!

British-Pakistani actor and rapper extraordinaire dropped his single yesterday titled “Mogambo.”

“We’re living in crazy times, a lot of people feeling unseen, unheard, unwanted, and really — the track is saying, a lot of people might not want us here, but we’re not going anywhere,” with special reference to the recent xenophobic tendencies running amuck abroad. Ahmed, who releases music under the name Riz MC, told Variety magazine, “It’s a bit of a middle finger that you can dance to.” The music was inspired by an impromptu trip Ahmed took last year to Pakistan, the birthplace of his parents. “It’s a message to anyone who feels unwanted right now. It took me a long time to realize that the same reasons you might be excluded are the same things that you should be proud of about yourself. That’s really what it’s about…I hope it connects with people.” The song derives inspiration from the Bollywood classic Mr India. The villain from the film, ‘Mogambo’, is privileged to be forever immortalized through this tribute. Riz detailed the source of the song by stating, “He’s from this classic film called ‘Mr. India’ that was out in 1987, which I was watching when I was like five years old,” he explained on ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live!’

“And he’s got the best catchphrase…it’s really quite simple — it’s ‘Mogambo khush hua.”

Ahmed has been making guest appearances on talk shows for promotions of his upcoming movie Venom by encouraging people to post videos of their best Mogambo impressions. It is famously circulating social media sites under the hashtag #MogamboChallenge. Ahmed also captured the audience’s attention with his upcoming movie Venom by commenting, “It’s funny. It’s dark. It’s action-packed. It might be a little scary for really young kids but other than that I think it strikes a really great balance. The more people that could see this film, the better.” Celebrating the Pakistani roots and the heritage associated with local wrestlers and prostitutes in his new single “Mogambo,” Ahmed gregariously opens the single by spitting this frenetic verse relentless hand drums: “They put their boots in our ground/ I put my roots in their ground/ And I put my truth in this sound/ I spit my truth, and it’s brown,” he raps. “I don’t give a fuck about the cash you stack/ Or the crown on your skull – you ain’t Basquiat/ Or the Prince of Denmark/ Rizzy boy piss on their benchmarks ’til the white kids wanna be Paks/ Brown planet – it’s gonna be that/ The man frown, panic and wanting me out/ But I’m outstanding ’cause I stand out/ And where I was standing there’s gonna be plaques.”

Mogambo Riz Ahmed
The Swet Shop Boys

“Mogambo” then settles into a minimalist beat build from clanging percussion samples and low-rumbling synth. “This is for the mosque and the mosh-pit, We ain’t got shit, but we got this.”

Redinho a lead vocalist in the trio of Swet Shop Boys produced the track. The group issued their debut LP, Cashmere, in 2016, and the Sufi La EP the following year. Ahmed had in his earliest stint in music released his Englistan mixtape in 2016. Bassam Tariq’s raw video ideation features a wrestling match filmed in Pakistan. The essential concept of which was a “glamorized and intentionally composed video that challenged ideas of masculinity. But they changed course after reviewing their footage from Pakistan. We realized that there is a raw energy that we can never recreate. So we decided to make the footage work and embrace the pedestrian nature of it. It’s tough for my ego to put something out that feels rough around the edges but throughout the edit, the footage kept telling me that we are enough to keep viewers interested. We don’t need to be flashy to have people like us. We are perfectly imperfect – shaky compositions and soft focus and all.”

Check out Riz’s rap song ‘Mogambo’ and let us know your thoughts below! 

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