Dengaryū (Tamura Takashi, b. 1982) is one of the breakout Japanese rappers of 2012. Several music journals, including Japan's longest-running popular music magazine, Music Magazine, as well as the web journal Ototoy, have anointed his second album, B kyū eiga no yōni 2, the best hip-hop album of the year. As the music critic Futatsugi Shin wrote in his year-end assessment in Music Magazine, “[Dengaryū] throws himself full-force, dealing with politics, society, the individual, music, hell-raising, and love—all with the same strong attitude and language. An impressive, moving work”; Urata Takeshi added, “Never wavering from his real-life stance, even with political messages, he speaks of the strength and the universal from the point of view of the have-nots, sublimated into highly entertaining hip-hop.” Fans are similarly moved by his “frank revelation and serious treatment of a flawed humankind and twisted society” with “passion and rawness,” making him “more real than American rappers today.” Not only has the rapper garnered accolades but also choice spots in hip-hop showcases by the hip-hop aggregation site Amebreak, club music record store Manhattan Records, and others. What is remarkable about this acclaim is not only the fact that his label, Mary Joy Recordings, is an independent label without ties to the major record companies, but also his origins: Dengaryū is based not in Tokyo or Osaka, but in his hometown in Yamanashi Prefecture, better known for Mt. Fuji than as a cradle of hip-hop culture. He has even fashioned his stage name—田我流—to recall an image of water flowing through a farm field.