Keemokazi

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Kareem Hesri (born November 29, 2002), known by his stage name "Keemokazi" is a Syrian-American rapper, songwriter and a social media personality, best known for his comedy and prank videos on TikTok. He has surpassed 15 million followers on TikTok by February 12, 2021, becoming one of the most followed Middle Eastern people on the platform.

Until February 14, 2021, he had surpassed 302k subscribers on YouTube, 2.8M followers on Instagram and 15.2M followers on TikTok.

MilleWorld.com has listed Keemokazi as one of the top five Arab TikTok accounts that you need to follow. ModenEast.com has also introduced him as one of the four hilarious Arab TikTokers.

Personal life

Kareem Hesri was born on November 29, 2002 in California, to Syrian parents. He has 5 sisters, Sara, Sima, Saby, Sophie & Serene, who sometimes appear in his TikTok videos. He started his entertainment career as a singer and an actor. As an actor, he appeared in a couple of episodes of The Last Ship. However, Keemokazi’s main passion was music, and he decided to forgo acting. Then he started sharing his music on SoundCloud and YouTube in 2017.

His family was supportive of his entertainment aspirations but recognized the challenges of breaking into the industry. Hesri’s father set firm but realistic goals for him: By the end of high school he needed to have gotten a solid start as an entertainer or he would need to explore more traditional jobs. Not interested in an office job, Hesri began working on his passion. "I first started out with acting. I was on a show called ‘The Last Ship’ on TNT. I played a Syrian refugee. So, I did acting first. I met a producer at an acting camp and rapped for him. He brought me to the studio,” Hesri said.

He decided to give more focus to TikTok after he saw other content creators gain millions of followers by creating unique content and being consistent. Keemokazi saw TikTok as a means to become more popular and grow his music fan base. He revealed in a recent Q&A video: "I realized TikTok is the way to grow your fan base, get followers, and I had to capitalize on that. I saw a bunch of random people going crazy, growing their followers massively off of TikTok videos. So I said, I got to hop on TikTok, figure out what I am going to do and I did, and I don’t regret it guys.”

He attributes much of his success to his family and their Arab roots. “We hit the Middle East, a very loyal fanbase, because my mom was cursing and yelling in Arabic. People loved it. We have to stay loyal to that because we are Middle Eastern as well as from Syria. So, we connect to them very well. It’s a different kind of connection. I don’t consider them fans or supporters. I consider them family,” he added.

Keemokazi usually does his Tiktok prank videos with his mom Nina Hazem, which has made her popular on social media.

Discography

Keemokazi started sharing music on YouTube and SoundCloud in 2017 with his first song "Foreign". He later released several singles such as "Philosophy", "New Kid", "Feel", "Bad Bish", "Fashion Nova", "Hot Cheetos" and "Broken Heart" that became viral on social media. In 2021 he released "King of My City", which gained over 980k views in only two weeks, becoming his most successful single to date on YouTube. It also became his most popular song on Spotify and SoundCloud. His debut album is scheduled to be released in 2021.

Until February 14, 2021 he had gained over 3.4M streams combined on Spotify, YouTube and SoundCloud.

List of singles

Year	Title
2017	"Foreign"
	"Feel" (feat. Sara)
2018	"Philosophy"
2019	"New Kid"
	"Rather Be Me"
2020	"Fashion Nova"
	"Valentine"
	"Bad Bish"
	"Hot Cheetos"
	"Flexin"
	"I’m Not Black"
	"Return 2 Sender"
	"Special"
	"Broken Heart"
2021	"King of My City"

References

This article "Keemokazi" is from Wikipedia. The list of its authors can be seen in its historical and/or the page Edithistory:Keemokazi. Articles copied from Draft Namespace on Wikipedia could be seen on the Draft Namespace of Wikipedia and not main one.

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