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Published 00:10 20 Dec 2016 GMT
I'm sure that 99.9% of people in Ireland reading this have never heard of MC Lynchy. Certainly those over 23.
He's a young MC from Limerick who burst onto the scene with a video, recorded on a smart phone and uploaded to Facebook and Youtube, which you can see below. Despite that video having over seven million views (mostly abroad), I can't find one mention about him in the Irish media (except one small blog post).
He sits at a bus stop free styling, smoking a rolled up cigarette (or possibly something stronger) in his school uniform... and it's fair to say this video is truly mesmeric...
Most of his really early raw stuff is filmed either in cars or on housing estates in Limerick (its all on Youtube and Facebook).
He even has his own feud going on with a Waterford based MC Pat Flynn, and the lyrics in the songs talk about everything from stealing cars to shooting people up and make regular references to both soft and hard drug abuse. Its hard to know how real the lyrics are or if it's just an interpretation of American rap culture, but nothing about the videos feels manufactured so you'd be forgiven for thinking it's all authentic.
The way teens and people in their early twenties discover things is completely changing. Marketers, the media and anybody over the age of about 25 don't seen to have a clue what is going on, and at best throw a few lines out about selfies and Snapchat to cover the gaps in their knowledge.
To hit the big time you used to try to get airplay on the radio, then (in Ireland) get on The Late Late Show and get signed to a label. Given that MC Lynchy talks about "slicing people up" and "banging chicks from Snapchat", it's highly unlikely this would ever get airplay.
The world is different now though, because with a cheap smartphone (notice everything is shot in portrait for Snapchat) and a few social media accounts you bypass all traditional media. While the big guns are off covering U2 botching their latest shitty album launch, a young lad on the streets of Limerick is selling out gigs all over the country without anybody giving him one line of coverage.
I can imagine there will be uproar and public outcry at the lyrics but this is no different to the rap that made Dre Dre, Snoop and Eminem global superstars. Watch this lad explode over the coming months, lets just hope he doesn't accept the inevitable Late Late Show invitation – or sign for a shitty record company and get moulded into something plain and vanilla – because he is so much better than that.
