KUALA LUMPUR: Award-winning rapper and songwriter Joe Flizzow is set to marry his sweetheart Marini Ramlan early next year.
Joe’s mother, Aishah Ali, a former journalist with the New Straits Times, said that her 40-year-old son was ready to settle down.
“About a month ago, he was appointed as the managing director of Def Jam South East Asia. I personally think that only after this achievement that he is now ready for marriage,” she said in a news report yesterday.
Joe, whose full name is Johan Ishak, had already sent his family for “merisik”, a traditional ceremony during which the family or representative of a man goes to meet the potential bride’s family, to seek permission for marriage.
Aishah added that while no date had been fixed for the solemnisation, it would likely take place some time early next year.
Marini, a visual communications graduate from University of Central England in Birmingham, was a former TV3 assistant producer who went on to become Primeworks Studios’ General Manager for Innovation & Distribution before she left the position to set up her own content design company Serendipity-Asia.
Besides his appointment at Def Jam, Joe also made history by becoming the first artiste from Malaysia to be under the record label which was first established as an indie label in 1984 in New York City. Among the big international names associated with Def Jam include LL Cool J, Slick Rick, The Beastie Boys, Public Enemy, Jay-Z, DMX, Ja Rule, Method Man & Redman, Ludacris, Rihanna, Jeezy, and Kanye West.
Others from the region joining the hip-hop artiste under the label are DABOYWAY (Thailand), Yung Raja (Singapore), Fariz Jabba (Singapore), Alif (Singapura), A.Nayaka (Indonesia) and Young Bong (Thailand).