You might recognize Yuki Chiba from more than his rapping

When “Mamushi” by Megan Thee Stallion blew up all over social media, its success was due in no small part to Yuki Chiba, the Japanese rapper featured alongside Stallion in her latest single.

Now that Chiba has performed at the 2024 VMA stage, fans are curious about him more than ever. Before his hit with Stallion, Chiba made a name for himself under the stage name KOHH. His album, “MONOCHROME,” broke out in the hip-hop scene of Japan in 2014. He collaborated with the likes of Hikaru Utada and Frank Ocean in 2016 and other notable acts in the following years. Chiba stopped using the stage name KOHH in 2021, but he’s the same guy who worked with Frank Ocean on the song “Nikes.”

If he sounds a little too familiar, it’s because he also voiced a couple of anime characters. Among them are Takaramachi no Minnasan by Tekkonkinkreet and Kenjiro Ota from the Star Blazers 2199 series. He hasn’t voiced anyone from Jujutsu Kaisen, even though some speculate that he’s voiced a character in the series.

Chiba seems to be the type to drop a hit at random with a major artist. “Nikes” used to be on replay on every car radio. The same is practically happening with “Mamushi.” You just can’t avoid these songs even if you tried. Not that you’d want to avoid any of these songs, especially when there’s special context with “Mamushi.”

It already follows Stallion’s love for a snake theme, but the title of the song itself references the venomous Japanese pit viper. The music video also points towards the “Nure onna” (濡女), a Japanese mythological spirit that has the body of a snake and a woman’s head. This spirit was known to eat men. Chiba and Stallion weren’t just being thematic—they were intentional about the mythological references.