Iconic Israeli song gets crowd-sourced rewrite

It was 13 years ago that hip-hop group Hadag Nahash collaborated with writer David Grossman on 2004’s “The Sticker Song,” a clever, catchy song about Israel and its politics using familiar bumper sticker slogans found throughout Israel, and collected by Grossman.

This week, Hadag Nahash did a hasty, impromptu remake of “The Sticker Song” while being hosted by radio station Galgalatz. DJ Hadar Marks gave them words about traffic jams, cobbled together from the “Nation on the Road” WhatsApp group, made up of radio station listeners.

“We’re celebrating 13 years of the ‘Local Material'” album,” said radio host Marks. “And one of the best songs was ‘The Sticker Song,’ with such great lyrics by David Grossman. Now, there’s no more stickers, so we thought we’d let you guys….”

“How can we embarrass them most,” joked Shaanan Streett, the lead singer of Hadag Nachash.

“Song of the Traffic Jams?” suggested Marks.

The original song:

https://youtu.be/sMsxs4FPirI

Marks presented the challenge to the Hebrew rappers, giving them words gathered from Galgalatz listeners about the country’s endless traffic jams, or ‘pkakim,’ the Hebrew word for bottleneck.

It went something like this:
“The coastal road is all backed up.
From HaSira until Netanya,
There are traffic jams in the north as well,
From the Rama junction until Hananya.
There is no movement in Lehavim,
There is a checkpoint at Haruvim.
The Ayalon north and south
Waze for everyone
Moovit for everyone
There are only traffic jams in the world.”

Hadag Nahash is celebrating the bar mitzvah of its 2004 album, “Local Material,” with performances around the country.