Brazilian rapper Djonga combines aggressive, socially charged rapping with smooth, melodic backing inspired by the samba and funk music he grew up with.
Born Gustavo Pereira Marques in 1994 in the southeastern city of Belo Horizonte, the son of a civil servant, he grew up in the impoverished São Lucas neighborhood, where he hung out with the motorcycle-racing kids after school. He grew up listening to the samba and funk musics that were an important part of the Afro-Brazilian culture from which he came, along with Brazilian rock, and only got into hip-hop later in his teens, ...