B-Tight

Affiliated with the controversial Aggro Berlin hardcore rap collective, B-tight arose from poverty to become one of Germany's most infamous rappers, attaining fame and commercial success via hard-hitting streetwise raps about sex, drugs, riches, race, and other such provocative subjects. Born Robert Edward Davis on December 28, 1979, in Palm Springs, CA, B-tight (aka B!tight, Der Neger, Bobby Dick) grew up in Märkisches Viertel, a poverty-ridden locality in the borough of Reinickendorf in Berlin. Märkisches Viertel is notable for its influence upon B-tight in terms of identity. Planned during the early '60s by GeSoBau (Gesellschaft für Sozialen Wohnungsbau, or in English, Association for Social Apartment Construction) as a satellite city in a rural section of northern Berlin, near the Wall separating West Berlin from the German Democratic Republic (GDR), Märkisches Viertel is defined by its enormous apartment high-rises, which are uniform in design and were intended to remedy social-urban problems. It took approximately a decade (1963-1974) to construct Märkisches Viertel, and many of the high-rises had to be refurbished beginning in the mid-'80s due to deterioration. It was in this environment that B-tight grew up, along with Sido, his Aggro Berlin comrade.