Check out viral hit ‘Mamak Rap’, a song that resonates with all Malaysians

Jiven Sekar in the music video 'Mamak Rap'. Photo: YouTube

In conjunction with Malaysia Day, director Jiven Sekar released a music video on his YouTube channel, TheSaladShow, titled Mamak Rap.

It has quickly become a hit, thanks to its entertaining lyrics and the fact that its subject matter is on one of Malaysians’ most favourite things, Mamak food.

As of today (Sept 30), the video for Mamak Rap has had over 80,000 views.

According to Jiven, he had a notion that the song would be enjoyed by Malaysians as it already got a good response when he put it up as a TikTok video back in April.

The over four-minute music video sees Jiven rapping about all the different food one can get when they go to a Mamak restaurant. He takes on the role of a waiter at a restaurant, rapping the variety dishes on the menu.

“I first had the idea for this song four years ago. But I thought I couldn’t sing it, so I didn’t bother pursuing it.

“About two years ago, I did another song called Stereotypes which was when I met Darren Ashley. When I told him about my idea of a song on Mamak food, he was keen to do it. So, we worked on it together and my friend Vix Chandra also joined in to come up with the lyrics.

“We managed to complete the song last year in September, ” shared Jiven, 28, who confesses he often visits Mamak restaurant and named Maggi Goreng Ayam and Teh O Ais as his go-to order.

The making of the music video – which took place at an actual restaurant after its closing hours, with filming starting from midnight till early morning – began a week before the song's release date. And was completed just before it was uploaded on the YouTube channel on Sept 15. To help populate the music video, Jiven said he gathered a lot of his friends.

He recalled: “It took us two nights to shoot almost everything in the music video, and another day (for the scene) featuring Jinnyboy and Ryan Matjeraie. And we had to go one more night, and shoot from midnight to 5am to film whatever else that were missing in the music video.

“We were working on it, up to the date of release actually,” said Jiven, who also films commercials.

As to why he wanted to include the hashtag #TheMalaysianSong, he said: “I felt like going to the Mamak is such a Malaysian thing to do. It came out on Malaysia Day, and I felt like since we didn’t really have a Malaysia Day song, I wanted to put out a fun Malaysian song for Malaysia Day.”