Freedom Moves: Hip Hop Knowledges, Pedagogies, and Futures

PART I

Black, Indigenous, and Diasporic Knowledges

1

Sweat the Technique

THE POLITICS AND POETICS OF HIP HOP

Rakim, Chuck D, and Talib Kweli

ALEXSANDRA MITCHELL: Good evening and welcome to the California African American Museum. My name is Alexsandra Mitchell. I’m the Manager of Education and Public Programs here at CAAM. We are so delighted, thrilled, and honored that you chose to spend your evening with us, for what is sure to be a very special program. I want to begin by thanking our program partners, who helped make this evening possible. The Los Angeles Philharmonic, who’s been partnering with us in a series of programs for the Power to the People! Festival. Julia Ward, Director of Humanities, and Tyree Boyd-Pates, the festival’s humanities curator. I also would like to send a very deep thank you to our partners, friends, and colleagues at UCLA’s Ralph J. Bunche Center for African American Studies, Ms. Tabia Shawel, Assistant Director, and Dr. Gaye Theresa Johnson, who’ve been really integral in making tonight happen. I’d like to send a very special thank you to our staff and our volunteers, who’ve been very hard at work to make tonight possible. Your efforts don’t go unnoticed and we appreciate it.

I now have the privilege of introducing another integral person to tonight’s program, Dr. H. Samy Alim. H. Samy Alim is author of Roc the Mic Right: The Language of Hip Hop Culture, and co-editor of the new book, Neva Again: Hip Hop Art, Activism, and Education in Post-Apartheid South Africa. He has also co-authored, with the great James G. Spady, two oral histories of Hip Hop culture, Street Conscious Rap and Tha Global Cipha: Hip Hop Culture and Consciousness, in which they interviewed many artists, including Grandmaster Flash, Kool Herc, Queen Latifah, Scarface, Trina, Ice Cube, Kurupt, Snoop, Eve, Bahamadia, Common, Mos Def, Pharoahe Monch, Chuck D, and other legendary artists. Currently he’s the co-editor of the groundbreaking Hip Hop Studies Series for University of California Press and teaches at the Department of Anthropology at UCLA, where he holds the David O. Sears Presidential Endowed Chair in the Social Sciences. So please help me in welcoming Samy to the stage.

Figure 1.1 Left to right , Chuck D, Rakim, Talib Kweli, and Tyree Boyd-Pates at the California African American Museum, Los Angeles. Photo by HRDWRKER.

H. SAMYALIM: It’s wonderful to be here tonight and to see all you beautiful people. When Bakari Kitwana first contacted me and he said, Samy, do you think there’d be any interest in Rakim at UCLA or in LA? I said, Bakari, we’re on the phone, but if you could look at my face! [Excited expression] So I turned to Kelly Lytle Hernández at the Bunche Center, and I said, Kelly, you know Rakim, right? And she looked at me with that same look on her face. And then we turned to Tabia Shawel, same look! So this is a very special evening for us tonight, welcoming Rakim.

And I just want to take an extra second to thank Tabia Shawel, Assistant Director of the Bunche Center, who’s put in her time, energy, heart, spirit, mind, creativity, and talent to make this happen. She’s worked very diligently over a long span of time. Those of you who know how long it takes to make things happen, we’re very, very thankful, Tabia. And also of course, to Alexsandra and to Cameron at CAAM, the LA Phil and Power to the People! Festival, big up to everybody.

When Hip Hop scholar and Princeton professor Imani Perry wrote Prophets of the Hood in 2004, one of the most profound pieces of Hip Hop scholarship to date, she focused on both the politics and the poetics of Hip Hop, but she didn’t do this as if the art of Hip Hop was something that could be separated from its politics. The art, the poetics, the aesthetics themselves are political. Those of you who know sister Sonia Sanchez, a brilliant poet of the Black Arts Movement, we just recently attended the funeral of the late great Hip Hop historian, James G. Spady, and she told us that Hip Hop was both the beauty of the music and the message. It was both saying what needed to be said and saying it in a style that was unforgettable. She said that Hip Hop artists understood the connection between words, thoughts, and action.

And this is why we are discussing both the politics and poetics of Hip Hop, what James G. Spady referred to as the most profound, lyrical, linguistic, musical, cultural, political movement of the late twentieth century. We’re discussing both the art and the activism tonight as we celebrate the release of a beautiful new book, Sweat the Technique: Revelations on Creativity from the Lyrical Genius, written by Rakim himself in collaboration with Bakari Kitwana.

We have an incredible lineup tonight. For those of us who grew up on Hip Hop, tonight is what Hip Hop dreams are made of. Let’s get straight to introducing tonight’s all-star panel. We’ll begin, of course, with Rakim. Rakim reigns as one of Hip Hop’s most transformative artists. Along with his partner Eric B, he recorded Paid in Full in 1987, a landmark recording. MTV named it the greatest Hip Hop album of all time. Rakim’s brilliant, inimitable lyrical style, adding layers, depth, complexity, musicality, and soul to elevate the art of emceeing has drawn comparisons to jazz icons, like Thelonious Monk and John Coltrane, and has been cited as an influence on a wide range of top-selling musicians, including Jay-Z, Nas, Eminem, Tupac, 50 Cent, the Notorious B.I.G., and many more. Rakim is the recipient of the 2012 I Am Hip Hop Trophy, the 2013 BET Hip Hop Lifetime Achievement Award, as well as many others. But beyond all these major awards, he’s got the love of the Hip Hop community. I’ve interviewed dozens of Hip Hop artists and I can say without a doubt that Rakim is your favorite emcee’s favorite emcee. The polysyllabic rhymes, the internal rhymes, the bridge rhymes, the true songwriting skill. He has stamped his imprint on Hip Hop globally and across generations. And even though he told us not to, we all sweat the technique. Rakim Allah, the God MC. Here he is, give it up. Rakim! [Applause]

Next, and I can’t even believe I’m saying this, but I’d like to introduce Chuck D. Chuck D, rapper, producer, graphic artist, and political activist, rose to prominence through his groundbreaking, mic shattering, politically conscious Hip Hop recordings and performances. Chuck D assembled DJ Terminator X, Professor Griff, and Flava Flav, along with Hank Shocklee and Bill Stephney, and formed one of the most prominent and powerful Hip Hop groups of all time, Public Enemy, who was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2013. From Yo! Bumrush the Show to It Takes a Nation of Millions to Fear of a Black Planet, Chuck’s booming voice urged us not to believe the hype and always fight the power. He has done remarkable things, both inside and outside the industry, and serves as an inspiration to so many of us. Chuck D! [Applause]

And I’m still pinching myself because next up is Talib Kweli. Talib Kweli earned his stripes as one of the most lyrically gifted, socially aware, and politically insightful Hip Hop artists known around the world for his artistry and his support of activism from his projects against police brutality with 41 Shots about Amadou Diallo in New York to the Ferguson movement in more recent years. After 20 years of releasing mesmerizing music, whether working with Mos Def as one half of Blackstar, partnering with Hi-Tek for Reflection Eternal, his solo work and his impressive Twitter game, Talib Kweli stands as one of the world’s most talented, accomplished artists and one of Hip Hop’s most important voices today. Please, welcome Talib Kweli! [Applause]

Tyree Boyd-Pates is the Humanities Curator for the Power to the People! Festival. The former Curator of History at the California African American Museum, Boyd-Pates now serves as the Associate Curator of Western History at the Autry Museum of the American West. In 2016, Boyd-Pates was named the Herb Carter and Yvonne Brathwaite-Burke distinguished lecturer in African American Studies at CSU Dominguez Hills. He has also been honored by the Empowerment Congress as one of Los Angeles’s 40 Emerging Civic Leaders. He has received the MLK Jr. Unsung Hero Award from the California Legislative Black Caucus among many others. I can’t tell you what a thrill it is to introduce him and this amazing panel, your moderator for the evening, Tyree! [Applause]

TYREE BOYD – PATES: Peace, peace, y’all. This is arguably Hip Hop Mount Rushmore up here. Let’s just get straight into the conversation. So for you, Rakim, and everybody on the panel, when did you fall in love with Hip Hop? When was that moment?

RAKIM: The first rap song that I heard was King Tim III, the Fatback Band. Shortly before that, Hip Hop was buzzing in the neighborhood, I was always into music so, as soon as when any kind of music came through the hood, I was on it, you know what I mean? But when Hip Hop came through, man, it was like we could tell there was something different about it. Every little kid, every teenager in the neighborhood wanted to be a part of it. You could tell by the way people dress, by the way they talk, by the way they dance. The expression was always loud and clear, man. So being a little kid, coming up in the neighborhood, man, getting my first knowledge of Hip Hop, man, I think I was like eight years old, man, seven years old.

CHUCK D: Well, before there was records, and I think Ra could remember back to that. Before there was records when somebody came up to me and said, There’s going to be a Hip Hop record in a couple of years, I was like, How the fuck can that happen? Because I was like, Hip Hop was like this occurring circumstance. You went to an event and it was about five hours, so that’s what rap and Hip Hop was. So when they said it was going to be a Hip Hop record and nobody knew when it was or how it was going to be, it was like, Yo man, how could this happen? We know what rapping is and we know what the party is like. But when the record finally happened with King Tim III, that was the first sign. It was like, Yo, that’s almost it. And then with Rapper’s Delight came out as a record, and that record was about 15 minutes long. But the irony in it, y’all, was not how long that 15 minutes was; it was like, how could they get six hours knocked into 15 minutes. They gave you a whole party in 15 minutes. And I would say my first love of rap records was right there at those two records, because all they had to do back in the day is put that record on and play it twice, and you already had a half an hour of the party going on. And it’d be like all the way to and the chicken tastes like wood! [Laughter] I’m like, Yo, what the fuck?

Figure 1.2 Rakim Allah blesses the mic. Photo by HRDWRKER.

And here’s a short story I want to give you. I was going to college when Rapper’s Delight came out. And I was pretty nice as a 19-year-old. And I grabbed the mic and everybody would get on the microphone and rock songs, like Love Is the Message and Good Times and stuff like that. And I wanted to get my dance on, so there was a lot of wack emcees fucking up my dance because you dancing with somebody and all of a sudden they shaking their heads because the emcee is wack and messing up the record. So I would get on the mic to sit wack emcees down. Like Rakim, he talk about Emcees put them in a line, that was like what I did at my college. And then I’m getting down to Good Times, right, and everybody is, Yeah, go Chuck! And now I’m hearing words come behind me so what do y’all think I did? I let the words happen and I lip-sync’d like a muthafucka. And then when the party was over and everybody giving me props, I went to the DJ, his name was Larry T. It’s 1979, October. And I looked, and it was a red label and I was like, ‘Rapper’s Delight,’ oh, they finally did it. What the fuck? And everybody gave me props. But when the next week we had a DJ named Frankie Crocker and he broke the record. Frankie Crocker said, Ladies and gentlemen, a new record, ‘Rapper’s Delight,’ Sugarhill Gang. And my shit was busted from that point on! I went back, they’re like, Boy, you nice but you’re changing voices and shit like that, you ain’t that nice.