Unique sounds of Hustler Bhai
View(s):In an age where everyone tries to gain fame locally, a young rapper has found fame both locally as well as internationally for his unique raps, in a wide variety of languages.
Known as Hustler Bhai, he considers himself a Sri Lankan rapper, songwriter, video director, actor, and an entrepreneur. He is credited with producing one of the biggest collaborative rap project called a worldwide cyphers featuring 22 artists from 8 different countries, spanning 10 languages – the project is caled “A23 Worldwide Cypher”. He’s also the founder and owner of Media Squad Productions.
Born as Hamdaan Hassan, Hustler Bhai is a product of Kingswood College Kandy. Hassan from a very young age was inspired by rap music and wanted to be a rapper.
While Hassan’s early life started out tough economically, he attributes a lot of his growth and determination to the lessons he learned with handling responsibility as a youth. To this day, he remembers his roots, and even his website has separate pages where he encourages fans to donate to charity.
The name Hustler Bhai was not randomly selected he tells us. It came from his love of wrestling and his icon John Cena’s motto ‘Hustle’. He started off as just Hustler, he says, but eventually rebranded to Hustler Bhai.
One thing about his music stands out: he doesn’t limit himself. Hustler Bhai’s raps span different styles and different languages.
Speaking about the wide variety in his music, Hassan says “I wanted to take Sri Lankan rap to a different level than limiting it to Sinhalese. I wanted my songs to be heard around the world, so I went beyond boundaries to reach fans.”
Being able to connect with people was very important to Hassan, which is why he doesn’t set boundaries on style or language. And it has paid off, because Hustler Bhai now has fans around the globe. Those who are fluent in 10 languages. What’s even more unique is that 33 artists all around the world have played a part in his music.
In Sri Lanka, he says he has a wide range of fans, from all across the country, whether they speak English, Sinhala or Tamil.
He proudly says that his experiments with different styles allows him to reach people of all ages, for where one style fails, another can succeed.
He has already had numerous public appearances, and he says his shows are versatile and are always well received.
Working on his career passionately, Hustler Bhai prides himself in showing off his passion. He records and edits his own videos, and he doesn’t hesitate to feature what he likes in them. In his case, that would be modified bikes and classic cars.
His passion also led to him to organizing one of the biggest worldwide cyphers, sadly, not officially recognized, Hassan stays. Twenty-three artists from 8 countries and 10 languages collaborated for this cypher. This is the first one done in Sri Lanka, he says. The importance of that fact has not escaped him. He goes on to say that for Sri lankans it’s something new, so most of them have not heard about it. But he is certain that if they check it out, they would like it.
Speaking about the people who have influenced and guided him, Hassan fondly remembers Harsha Fernando (known as black Hunter) who took him under his wing and brought him to the industry in 2015, as well as Amila Wickramasingha (Jaya Records) who mastered his first mix tape recordings. Hustler’s first single “Sallalayo” was produced by Ayeshmantha (Month Beats) and every combination the pair made since was a successful record, Hassan says .
As he gained popularity, he met Aki Vish and Nishal Janith Silva (Gloomy Beats) who were great producers, and together they made some indisputable works of music (Year 2017 -2018).
This year he is set to collaborate with Azim Osman (Young Melody Records), the producer who he has been waiting to work with for a long time, he tells us.
Hustler Bhai prefers to keep his future plans shrouded in mystery, but he did share with us that two of his dreams are to start his own Production Company and to enter the Bollywood cinema industry. He also plans to advance his video production, not only through music but through other avenues such as travel videos as well. But at the end of the day, he says, “I want to be Hustler Bhai who touches souls with music.”
(Paramie Jayakody)