Classic hip-hop takes centre stage at this year’s jazz fest, as some of the music’s seminal acts are given the spotlight at Metropolis.
Daisy age groundbreakers De La Soul performed last night.
Pioneering political rap group Public Enemy brings the noise tomorrow and Wu-Tang Clan co-founders RZA and GZA play Thursday.
But while the heyday may be turning grey, and his band doesn’t get the same attention it once did, Public Enemy’s outspoken leader Chuck D explains that nobody is slowing down.
“If PE didn’t (continue to) go around the world, I would take being mentioned in North America in the past tense - I would take it more offensively. There’s still a lot of racism in music. We just experienced the passing of Bo Diddley.
He was making music right on up to the end, but he was always talked about in the past tense. But we still talk about Elvis in the present.
“Bonnaroo (the music festival) just took place, and that old group Metallica was getting down. They’re a 20-year-old band, but white journalists talk about them in the present. … Rap really gets treated with this racist segregation as far as where it fits into the realm of music.” Chuck D continues to Fight the Power, as per his band’s 1989 anthem. Public Enemy’s new album, released last year, is called How You Sell Soul to a Soulless People Who Sold Their Soul??? Therein, Chuck D criticizes George Bush, rappers seduced by stardom, and the loss of the revolutionary spirit that his band once made into a movement. Asked how he finds the energy to keep fighting the good fight, he replied: “Well, you gotta do something with your life - seven days a week, 60 minutes an hour, 24 hours a day.” RZA would agree. Last year’s Wu-Tang Clan release 8 Diagrams was dismissed by critics, fans and even some of his fellow band members. While he isn’t happy about the reaction, the group’s founder/producer/mastermind bounced back this week with a solo album, Digi Snacks, under his alias Bobby Digital.
“Some guys thought I was getting too rock ‘n’ roll (on 8 Diagrams),” he said of his bandmates. “I don’t know, brothers were looking for something more aggressive; I came more passive and brotherly. I think the world needs more passiveness now. That’s just what I felt. Maybe I was incorrect in that judgment, but I still stand on it.” What particularly offended RZA was that his crew didn’t get behind him in promoting the album. “I respect (their opinions),” he said. “What hurt me is we didn’t do a campaign - videos, everything you need to do. There’s millions of dollars involved and everyone’s boycotting this record. That pissed me off. You don’t do that. This is our career. We go out and do our job, and settle (the rest) amongst ourselves.” RZA, like Chuck D, is a careerist. He sees the big picture, the long term. In a similar way to how Public Enemy was strategically conceived in the mid-’80s as a cross between the Clash and Run-DMC, Wu-Tang Clan was the early-’90s brainchild of RZA, who promised his bandmates that if they followed him for five years, he would take them to the top of hip-hop.
