Ask where rap music started, and the answer is always the same.
The streets.
Ask where the early rappers are today, and the answer is a little different.
Easy Street.
It all began in the late 1970s as party ”hip hop” music with the jobless or the after-school ”home crews” in the Bronx`s Mitchell Gym and the stairwells of Manhattan`s Colonial Projects. Before Run DMC or the Fat or Beastie Boys, there were the unknowns who led the way-Cool Herc and the Herculoids, Grandmaster Flash, the Trecherous Three and the Fearless Four.
They started with beatboxes and simple, rhyming ”raps” about drugs, crime and bragging about the ”deffest dj” on the block.
This year, more than 10 million rap albums will be sold. Teenagers have become millionaires. Record companies drool. The music grows.
Now what?
”Aside from the money, now there is the message,” says Tyrone Williams, the 30-year-old chairman of the Warner Bros. rap label, Cold Chillin` records. A native of the New York rap scene, Williams is a rap bard. After more than 15 years as a rapper, manager and now record executive, he has become a walking history book.
”Rap was almost like a war. The first rappers gave their lives so that Run DMC could wear gold (chains). Now there are the new breeds who are trying to say something. Everybody has their own message.
”Some are party rappers, and they`ll talk about girls or cars or how great their clothes are or come down on their parents. Others are serious like death. They`re going to make you listen to what they have to say about society, about what is happening to them, their friends or other people, because of what society does. They`re gonna shock you.”
With DJ Jazzy Jeff (Jeff Townes) and the Fresh Prince (Will Smith)
leading the way, party rap has overtaken the raucous mid-town flagellations of Run DMC and the Beastie Boys. They`ve pushed their way onto MTV with a suburban rap that`s tame, sassy and successful.
The duo`s latest release, ”He`s the DJ, I`m the Rapper,” landed in the Top 5 on both the pop and black charts, selling more than 2 million copies-putting them ahead of Elton John, Huey Lewis and Van Halen.
The first single from the Prince and Jeff, ”Parents Just Don`t Understand” is a suburban nightmare about a teen who takes his parents`
Porsche, picks up a 12-year-old girl and ultimately gets caught by the police and his parents.
”That was a hard ride home/I don`t know how I survived it/one would beat me/while the other was driving.
”I can`t believe it/I just made a mistake/Well, parents are the same no matter time nor place/So to you, all the kids across the land/Take it from me/ Parents just don`t understand.”
Williams the rap scholar laughs when he hears these lyrics again.
”That`s what I mean,” he said. ”These guys are fresh, they`re funny and no one gets hurt.
”If you want something that makes you think, then you listen to something else. You listen to Chuck D. and Flavor Flav.”
Williams is talking about Public Enemy, the Black Panthers of rap.
Their logo is a human silhouette framed by a gunsight. According to the group`s leader, Chuck D. (Charles Ridenour), the man in the crosshairs is society`s public enemy.
”That`s us in the gunsight,” he said in a release accompanying the group`s second album ”It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back.”
”The meaning of Public Enemy is the young black man-he`s the Public Enemy. We`re young, we`re black, we`re loud and we`re proud.
”These things ain`t fitting in with America. But I`ll never be quiet, I`ll never be invisible, they`ll have to shoot me first. I`m looking for that. I`m saying, `So what?` ”
Although their first album, ”Yo! Bum Rush the Show,” sold only 300,000 copies, it earned the group a reputation as rap revolutionaries.
When ”It Takes a Nation” was released, it shot up the black charts, going gold within weeks of release. The group is now touring Europe and has racked up a string of sold-out shows.
”We`re out for one thing only, and that`s to bring back the resurgence of black power,” Chuck said. ”But we`re not racist. We`re nationalists, people who have pride and who want to build a sense of unity amongst our people.”
But not all people see it that way. The Village Voice`s Greg Tate, originally a Public Enemy supporter, turned on the group after hearing the latest release, calling the group homophobic, sexist and anti-semitic.
Chuck D. shot back, calling Tate ”the Village Voice`s porch nigger” and a sell-out.
”Chuck believes what he says and doesn`t want to hear anything else,”
said Lindsey Williams of the group`s label, Def Jam records.
”They want kids to wake up and see that its not about wearig the most gold or having the best warm-up suit. The new wave is politics, getting active, being an activist. They`re making it a cultural thing.”
It`s true that there are no gold chains around their necks, no beepers or designer sweats. Chuck D. and Flavor Flav (William Drayton) dress in fatigues when they preach their message of black consciousness and allegiance to the goals of Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakahn.
Joined by their 50-member, plastic-submachine-gun-toting security squad, Public Security of the First World (SW1), Public Enemy is rap`s voice of defiance.
Williams, reflecting on the work of his competition at Def Jam, believes Public Enemy`s single ”Don`t Believe the Hype” tells the story behind the group.
”They actually believe what they are saying,” he said. ”I know they do. They are not trying to create an image. Chuck D. was a radio dj on Long Island and his message was not being heard. So he started rapping.
”He might make another album, he might not. He wants to get on a college circuit to talk about these things. He believes what he teaches and preaches.”
As rap continues to grow and stretch away from its party base, it has become harder for the monolyrical forefathers to return with their stories boasting of crack and crime. It`s old news for the new rap stars, who are looking for the a line on the teenage mind.
”Rap is from the street,” Williams said. ”And the people come straight up from the street. When they get away from what`s happening there, they lose touch. The style that people want to hear comes from the school, not from a mansion.
”So many of the people who got rich first are away from street level that it`s sick. Run DMC is so far away they`re in orbit. Why do you think they`ve fallen out of sight and their movie (”Tougher Than Leather”) closed in less than a week?
”It`s like gymnastics, at 15 these guys are hungy and tough, by 20 they`ve made a couple million and they stop. Then it`s time for a fresh crew. That`s where we are now. Only these guys can be meaner, tougher than the rest.”
