Ali En

Ali En is the best-known name of a Slovenian rapper, musician, songwriter, producer and illustrator born Ali Džafić on 24 February 1973 in Kranj. Later he called himself Dalaj Eegol and performed as RecycleMan. He is one of the pioneers of Slovenian rap and funk and one of the first Slovenian MCs, and he broke through with his debut album Leva scena.

He began as a DJ in his secondary-school years, mostly in the Ljubljana clubs K4 and Palma, and as a skateboarder he co-presented SkateTV on national television. He joined the Ljubljana group RC Rappers as a guest DJ and soon became its lead vocalist, sang as a guest with the funk rock band Peyotle Crunch and then founded and named the funk band Heavy Les Wanted. In the early 1990s he officially changed his name to Ali En.

Leva scena came out in December 1994 on Mačji disk/Prodok. The songs "Leva scena" and "Stremetzsky" drew a great deal of attention with lyrics that were unusually direct for the time; some radio stations would not play them, yet they became hits, helped by Radio Študent and new stations such as Gama MM and Radio Salomon. Musicians named in the lyrics, among them Tomaž Domicelj and Jan Plestenjak, answered back, and the album is now seen as a turning point for Slovenian rap and hip hop. Its biggest hit was the comic song about burek, "Sirni & mesni".

In spring 1995 he toured with a band of Kristijan Pavlin, Tomaž Zver, Mitja Kavec and a four-piece brass section; Avtomobili opened for them in Nova Gorica, and on 22 February 1995 they opened for the Beastie Boys in Hala Tivoli in Ljubljana. The album sold 5,000 CDs and 1,000 cassettes, a gold edition in Slovenia. He was named debutant of the year and given the Zlata nota award in Bled, which he turned down.

He later appeared as co-writer, guest vocalist or DJ with Heavy Les Wanted and Borghesia. His second Ali En album, Smetana za frende (1999), was more danceable and experimental. That year he took the name Dalaj Eegol, under which he released Red'a'red (2003) and D'Rap (2005). In 2006 he and his wife Miranda moved to Auroville in India, where they founded the Kerubin Art Center. From 2009 he played in Slovenia again as RecycleMan, with the albums RecycleMan (2013) and KWA (2020).