Kenji by Fort Minor
I just purchased 'Kenji' by Fort Minor on iTunes. It's a rap song written & performed by Mike Shinoda of Linkin Park fame based on his family's WWII experience. The song includes sound clips of his father and aunt talking about what it was like for them. Combined with the lyrics, it's a powerful story about the Japanese American internment and resettlement. On Fort Minor's website (www.fortminor.com), he credits a visit to the Japanese American National Museum as the reminding him about his family's WWII history which led to him writing the song. It'll be interesting to see what the response is to the song - both mainstream and within the JA and larger Nikkei community. Fort Minor is Shinoda's solo project, but he has the built-in recognition from his Grammy Award-winning group Linkin Park. The album so far seems to be received pretty well by critics from what I've seen of reviews online. From what I've seen so far, it looks like people don't really know what to make of it. It's so different from most mainstream songs - particularly for rap. I hope that it is able to bring awareness to younger and diverse audiences. Shinoda has become supportive of the JA community in the past year. Linkin Park donated part of the proceeds from one of the concerts to the Japanese American National Museum and he served as honorary parade marshal for the 2005 Nisei Week Parade. Both the Linkin Park and Fort Minor websites include links to the National Museum's website.  Mike Shinoda's personal freedom
Linkin Park singer uses his roots MUSIC: Mike Shinoda combines hip-hop and Japanese history for his side project, Fort Minor. Sunday, March 12, 2006 By MARIAN LIU / Knight Ridder Newspapers
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MS: I think it was probably in college that I realized that there was a difference between Japanese and Japanese American. That’s important to realize. It’s not the same thing and then eventually with Linkin Park, I toured in Japan. I’ve been there now I think four times. I remember the first time I went, how familiar it seemed, just getting out of the plane, it smelled like my aunt’s house, in the airport, it smelled like Japan. I don’t know if anybody else even noticed it but I walked out of the plane and thought this is definitely familiar to me, didn’t even see anything yet. And then going to Tokyo, Osaka, Kyota, Nagoya, you just recognize things about the way people act, the small things that people do such as how you’ll grab a piece of paper. There are things that are more obvious like taking somebody’s business card with two hands. You don’t do that in the States. When I saw somebody do that I went, "Oh yeah, my uncle always does that," you know. There are little things that culturally come from Japan but they also exist in Japanese American culture and it made me feel like the connection was there and I kind of hadn’t realized how much of it was there.
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Sometimes when the hours get long and the work sometimes frustrating for me at the Museum, things like this song help to keep things in perspective for me. It reminds me why the work we do here is so important...so necessary...so vital. It inspires me to keep going.
It's funny, but on my iPod by sheer coincidence, 'Kenji' is followed by 'Better Days' by the Goo Goo Dolls. I'm finding the combination of the two songs ironic, yet comforting.