Jack Parow

Thirty years ago, Zander Tyler was born in Parow, Cape Town. Today he is known as Jack Parow, the dangerous romantic Afrikaans rapper. Contrary to popular belief, his wild-fire success did not happen overnight. Jack started out rapping with crews from the Cape Flats and has been at it for nine years.

He studied to be a mechanic, but had to take jobs like packing fish in Cape Town harbour and allocated graves for the Cemetery Division of the Cape Town municipality to support his rap habit. Performing only for a beer and pizza soon changed, when his collaboration with Die Heuwels Fantasties on the track, Die Vraagstuk, put him in the limelight.

It's been almost three years since his breakthrough in 2009 and since Jack Parow has released his first self-titled full length album that struck gold within two weeks of its release and went platinum within a year; headlined at major festivals in South Africa; toured Europe and played before packed out shows there. His music video for the hit Cooler as Ekke has over two million views on YouTube. His songs are hits on national radio stations and he has been on prime TV shows and on covers and centre-folds of publications in South Africa and in Europe.

Jack Parow's second full length album, Eksie Ou, was released in November 2011, under his own label, Parowphernalia. This album reached Gold status in sales within four months of its release. A highlight from Eksie Ou is that the first single, Hosh Tokolosh with Gazelle, is the first Afrikaans song in the station's history to reach Number 1 on 5FM's Top 40. The second single from the album, Hard Partytjie Hou featuring Francois van Coke made is to Number 10 of 5FM's Top 40, making it two Afrikaans singles to enter the Top 10 on this chart. The title-track, Eksie Ou, went on to become Parow's second Number 1 on 5FM's Top 40.