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DANakaDAN
Producer & Rap Artist
Dan Matthews, or DANakaDAN, is a producer and alternative rap artist from Los Angeles. He is best known for his work with pioneer digital artists Wong Fu Productions and Far East Movement, acting as a lead producer and personality. As a Korean adoptee, he filmed his journey to meet his biological family, including an identical twin brother he never knew about, in a documentary series called “akaDAN” with ISAtv, and also a sequel called “akaSeoul” with NBC News.
So we know that you started off in the media doing something quite different than what you are doing now. How did you first end up getting involved with music and ISAtv?
I got involved with them back in like 2008 when the movement was first starting up. I think that’s when digital was first becoming a bigger thing, and by pure luck just happened to be living in Southern California. That’s where a majority of the people were, and I was able to meet ISAtv through the community. So I’m very thankful and really just a product of good timing, luck, and location. Were you always interested in music growing up? Yeah, I was definitely interested in music and performance, and for me being able to do music is a way of being able to express myself. It’s super important to me, being able to have that outlet. You said that music is a way of being able to express yourself, so what are the kind of messages that you want to put out there through your music? I talk a lot about identity. I’m adopted and so some of my songs are about being adopted and that whole experience of living in between two worlds. Secondly, I think that I’m a pretty realistic person and I talk a lot about realism; I talk about a lot of things that I think people can hopefully relate to. I think that music can either be a form of escapism or it could be something for you to be able to relate to, and for me it’s hopefully putting out stuff that people can relate to. You’ve been active in sharing your story with reaching out to your biological family, including a twin brother you never knew about, in Korea -- could you share with us a bit of your story and what inspired you to reconnect with your family? Totally. So my story is that I had the opportunity to go back to Korea and I was able to meet my biological family, including an identical twin brother that I never knew about. And it was pretty amazing as you can imagine, and it...it’s something you’re always gonna be living with. So it’s going to be a constant process of how I’m dealing with different emotions. Most importantly I’m excited that it happened, and I’m very excited that the family is doing well, and that they’ve been open to meeting me, and that everybody’s healthy. And that’s really all I could really hope for -- that my family is healthy and happy. That’s very interesting. You met your identical twin brother that you never knew about? Yeah! Wow. Could you tell us a little bit more about that? Well, I guess from the Korean side the main thing to speak on is this idea that when you’re living in Korea and you’re surrounded by Korean media and your Korean existence is all you know, you turn out to be a very specific way. I think that you are more confident, and basically you know what you know. For me, growing up in America as a Korean person, where Koreans are not the dominant majority, I think it just affected my personality and kind of made me into a different person. So it’s been interesting to see and it’s been interesting to reflect on that idea, but I’m super happy and very thankful that he’s in my life. Do you still talk to him sometimes? Yeah, all the time! Yeah, we message each other and send photos. I try to do a call with him every now and then. We know that a lot of the younger Korean-Americans have a hard time finding their identity between the two cultures, was that rift apparent to you as an adoptee, or was it not as apparent? Oh, I think it was even more apparent. For Korean Americans, they’re trying to find that rift in between being Korean and American; I’m finding that difference being Korean, being white, being American -- all of these other things. So for me it was even more apparent. Did you have a Korean community that you could kinda fall into? I didn’t have that growing up. There were a couple Korean people in my city, but not enough to make that kind of impact. And then when I got to college, it was a similar thing where there weren’t a lot of Korean people, and because of that I wasn’t really able to get into it as much as I would have liked to. So how did you start reconnecting with your Korean roots? A lot of that was just living in Southern California. You have the access. I was just an hour away from Koreatown. Once I learned how to drive, I went to Koreatown a couple of times and technology makes it so much easier to connect with people and that kind of experience. So yeah, being able to have YouTube and eventually I met a bunch of other Koreans, so it’s been a good experience. |
"It feels good because I’m able to express something that maybe they’re thinking. I think that’s probably the most important thing, to let people know that they’re not alone with their own existence."
Could you share some of the accomplishments that you’ve made in your life so far?
You know, just talking with you guys is a major accomplishment. I feel very good that you guys care enough to want to talk to me. So, yeah, I say that and it sounds like a joke, but I really do mean that. I’m grateful, and I’m amazed that people still find any encouragement in whatever it is that I’m doing, and if I can impact a couple of people or a greater population or one person or five people, it really doesn’t matter to me. I just think its so cool to still be accepted in the community and for people to think that I have something important to say. We know that you’ve been speaking at a lot of KSA and KASA events at universities, so what is it like being held as a role model to the younger generation? It’s good. I like being around other Korean Americans. It feels good because I’m able to express something that maybe they’re thinking. I think that’s probably the most important thing to let people know that they’re not alone with their own existence. What kind of projects are you working on currently? Do you have anything special coming up? On the personal side, I hope to put out more music in the fall. That’s a big goal of mine. I just want to perform as long as I can. So hopefully more shows, put out more music, and then I’ve got some cool projects -- I can’t talk publicly about it yet -- but some cool projects that I think are hopefully gonna come out in the fall, and then hopefully I’ll start producing some more film work and stuff soon. We know from your song “this song is about mental health” that you released last year, you were speaking about mental health and in your second documentary series “aka Seoul” there were a lot of LGBTQ issues that were highlighted. Are these issues that you’re passionate about within the Korean American community? Totally. I think I’m passionate about them just in general, not necessarily...Because I’m Korean, I just have a natural affinity towards Koreans with those specific areas of interest but for me, yeah I think mental health is super important. I think as adoptees, we just have mental health issues, and there are unspoken things that we just go through so I think the more and more we can make it less of a stigma, such as putting out music like that, I think it’s important. And then with the documentary, not that I was trying to make any specific point, but I think as you watch it you realize the documentary is not necessarily about the LGBTQ community, it just involves the LGBTQ community. And I think that’s actually like when you find more nuanced ways presenting different communities, then it is progress. You’re not watching the documentary to see or learn about that stuff but I you still are seeing and learning about that stuff about that community by watching it as a passive thing. I think that’s awesome because sometimes passive information can get into people’s brains easier than when they’re forced to learn about it. So was that part of your inspiration to shift the narrative from yourself to share the platform with other adoptees in the second documentary series? Yeah, we made sure that the second documentary was always gonna be about other adoptees. I think if I have interesting things to say or things I’m doing, then other adoptees would have amazing things to talk about too, so that was definitely a big part of it. You mentioned that adoptees tend to face mental health issues, so how did you take care of your own mental health when you were going through times of difficulty? I wrote that song! Everyone has their own way of dealing with stuff and for me, writing that song was helpful, and performing that song is helpful. Usually among the Korean American community there is a very one-sided view of success, such as becoming a lawyer, doctor, or an engineer. What’s your own definition of success, and do you think you’re reaching it? If you’re doing doctor, lawyer or engineer, that’s awesome. Do that. That’s great. All of that is success. What I’m doing is hopefully success. I think that I’m very happy with what I’m doing. At the end of the day you just want to live a happy, healthy life. You want to provide happiness and be able to hopefully uplift the people around you. And that’s the definition of success. And if financial stability enables you to be in a place where you can uplift other people, then that’s the definition of success. What’s one major goal or change you’d like to see in the Korean American community in the near future? I don’t have a blanket answer to that. That’s my honest take. It’s not that I don’t have anything-- there’s a lot of things that I’m sure we can collectively want to change within the community, but I guess for our own community to be healthy and happy and do whatever things we can do, socially and politically, to help everybody get there is a good thing to shoot for. Rising boats lift all ships, so if you can improve one element of someone’s life, then it will hopefully then improve other elements. So if it’s getting more funding in our community, that way they can be in a place to help out other people, I think that’s a great thing. |