Chuck D talks Public Enemy and the Music Industry | Red Bull Music Academy

please won't you join me in welcoming mr. Chuck D so Chuck yesterday all these participants came in was their first day and you know they introduced themselves and talked a little bit about you know their personal journey to get here I wonder if you might share with us a little bit as far as you know your personal journey just to get to music because it really wasn't a thing that was party a game plan overall originally right No uh number one my personal journey to get here yesterday was kind of up London Heathrow in an Iberia Airlines it just took all damn day and they lost my bags so I couldn't make you a really righteous CD so I just pulled off something what I call a vamp play that I'll show you later but my personal musical journey actually came by accident because I grew up as a big sports fan and then New York where I was born in Queens a big fan of baseball which is the New York Mets and basketball the New York Knicks and football American football the New York Jets and around that particular time I was eight or nine they all wanted championship so that just further threw me into fanaticism about sports and I wanted to become a sports announcer listen the New York City sports talk shows and music was the thing that was always in my household I mean my mother's Motown Stax Atlantic Soul Music in the 60s my father played jazz and some James Brown but I listened to music quite casually and in the 1970s I listened to AM radio is a big AM radio fan WABC was a radio station in um in the New York metropolitan area that played top 40 pop radio but I thought was like what it was exciting was the DJ's the jocks and the way they used to come out WABC Dan Ingram just love the voices man and I love the voices of announcers and so I wanted to become a sports announcer and actually it was one guy that bridged the gap back then it was a guy named George Michael who later on to the George Michael sorts machine what's not seen not to George Michael you might be familiar with Careless Whisper yeah not that George Michael but you know he had a great voice and you know that George Michael was was a DJ so he was one of the DJs on on um on WABC and so when he actually flipped over in the sports I thought that was a cool thing but the music bug bit me around 76 and 77 where I used to just I went and I wanted to play ball all the time and I went to this place called higher ground they named it after the Stevie Wonder record and then half of the place was basketball another half was music with this thing they called a DJ now we always thought DJ this meant disco tech guy you know they would wear in on silk shirts and leave behind this gigantic foundation platform and so we would walk a mile to this place and a winter time to try to get our ball on but knowing that we go to a place they got two rims everybody wanted to go to this one place that was happy to be open to some kids and so you know you're looking at two basketball rims with a hundred brothers waiting to play so who got next is shit's gonna take forever but as you're sitting there and knowing damn well you're not going to play the other side of the gym was this DJ wearing a silk shirt as all of us just had some very good tank tops or whatever so he was playing music so cats is like you know before music and sports were two totally different things so you know we over on one side trying to be hard and but you nod your head to the music and this is when disco just start the easing from a lot of from the over funk period when funk kind of got played out because everybody was trying to do it once David Bowie did Fame this was it was just like okay you know I'm tired of this you know and disco it came in and discos started off kind of funky because it really kind of started off kind of like with The O'Jays I love music and a lot of the gamble and how strings and orchestral arrangements and stylistics and Tom Bell so they had up the tempo and they had changed the beat dududu new new new new and that's how disco became to come in it was very cool and the beginning around 75 76 77 so the DJ actually was playing this record from the group war who had actually said hey we got a UMP up top temple to a lot of the funk bands had up their temples mandrill war more I guess more more known cooling the gang when they did ladies night I guess two years later and so we're watching this DJ as we're waiting to play some ball and he's playing this song called galaxy by war some sitting there and I liked the song how it sounds on it on the radio because it would basically start out you know on top 40 radio on will wwr l was a Seoul station in New York and it said now we're going to and they had the incredible DJ's Hanks pan and even Hassan Gregory in Jerry Bledsoe and England had the best voices in the world welcome to wwr el super 16 because it would be 1600s on the am ames dial he said welcome to wwr el super 16 here's a song by war galaxy in the coming contain can dent attempt and have short intro didn't go in people go in outer space you could google it look it up LimeWire in case if you think i'm trippin this DJ had played the same record but the words never came in and I was like you ain't into gent didn't and then tenten tenten internal intestine tenant didn't and I just could not understand why the words couldn't come in and he extends I mean will you play this 10 cent for about 10 to 12 minutes so this will show you how people didn't understand anything about DZ and I'm telling you some from New York because no you know as many of y'all think that automatic New York just automatically yeah yeah it always was like that no we country as a man especially on Long Island which is only like 15 minutes out so I was like how is he making that record go like that I said in my mind because you couldn't really see two turntables you had no idea what he was doing behind the DJ stand he was just moving like from this side a little bit to that side and had a light in his face and I said that record must be about this big cuz I just say how could it be you know you hasn't stopped so I'm looking from a cause and that was my first fascination to the technical aspect of DJing I totally did not understand how one record could be extended into another and that bit me the technical the technical aspect bit me later on we know tapes were going out because that tapes and people used to make pause tapes off for radio stations and another record that got me off of the tape but really by DJ Hollywood's music alone sells DJ Hollywood some son DJ smalls he had this song called I mean the Jacksons and I mean y'all know Michael Jackson okay all right now i'ma tell you sir how many y'all know that the Jacksons were produced by gamble and Huff in 75 76 77 Vianney oh how many y'all know gamble and hump okay gamble and Huff who would Philadelphia International which was signed by CBS records at that particular time which really they were distributed by them so therefore they were the in-house DJ's they were I mean they did with the in-house producers and so therefore they were hot producers so they were producing everybody that was in the CBS soul rhythm and blues newly acquired tank they had just picked up the Jackson 5 from Motown in 1975 but they couldn't use the 5 because Berry Gordy had sued CBS for the name of the Jackson 5 so the Jacksons without Jermaine just call themselves the Jacksons and we're on the album going places which had all Jaxon's like moving like going forward Michael included because Michael Jax is a badass I don't give a what anybody says they had this song called musics taken over right and musics taking over starts off with this groove like with Michael Jackson say less than what we'll use to break apart let's dance let's dance let's dance let's dance Oh Jenna did it in it Jenna - Jenna - no I heard on this tape once again because the record was really short intro boom into the record this groove was going all forever dunno do them to do do them to them and I was here in Michael Jackson's voice let let let's let and I'm like why is Michael doing that and then let's dance let's dance let's dance let's dance whoa dunno so I went to the store to buy the forty five and it started off like ping ping and then it went into the music and there's a left stand substanceless there whoa gonna zoom and fade it out because it was a 45 and I was like to save the I heard and that's what really bit me to make a long story short the technical aspect of what DJ's were bringing to the music that's really what started hip-hop the curiosity of taking something that was given to you as a recording and flipping it for the listener or for the for the for the audience whether it be at a party whether it be on a tape and cassette tapes were just new at that I mean they they were developing 64 but when they hit the hood they hit the hood with low low expensive arm yeah players what people were able to listen to radio station and make toys tapes that's the beginning of hip-hop and that's why there's no secret that the holy trinity founders of hip-hop or Kool Herc Afrika Bambaataa the master of Records and Grandmaster Flash that's the Holy Trinity it starts right there because they're influenced it's the recording other taking recordings and flipping them in their three different circles went into the other areas like you got to talk about Pete DJ Jones you got to talk about gods like my boy the big sound system DJ's that came with that Jamaican aesthetic of the two turntables but really going into manipulating disco / soul records now a lot of people that you know didn't dig into the funk and dig into the soul after first you know manipulating what they could out of what was considered disco but as this going forward with more computerized people started to dig back and the guys from the streets started to dig back even more you know finding things like James Brown sex machine and all those funky records that were obscure like Apache and and you know five minutes of funk and seven minutes of funk and things like that but um now you being on Long Island well I guess at that point you on Long Island is Long Island is like you know you take the you know the bus to Jamaica you take the enf train here in the sea so the thing about Long Island is is that everybody and from the city had moved to Long Island so Nassau County was the only place in Suffolk County was the only place where you had everybody from every area of New York City before that people in Brooklyn had no reason to go to the Bronx absolutely no reason and you have the person the Bronx you go to Brooklyn it would be like for what Harlem in Manhattan was the center point so a guy from Brooklyn probably would go to Manhattan and that would be the end of that or they would stay in the plan of the Brooklyn same thing on the Bronx the Bronx was staying the Bronx or they would come to Manhattan you wouldn't find a person from the Bronx or come to Queens tact people in Queens kind of would venture into maybe Manhattan and possibly the Bronx and so this migration in the 70s was very important about figuring out you know the gigs the deejay and the music all that's intertwine the radio station that were playing RL was the Seoul station but people still say they can't front and say that that WABC wasn't an influence you ask guys like Biz Markie you ask guys like Bambaataa and they'll tell you yeah hell yeah because that's where they exposure to to like people like Steely Dan era so if all that came from but what about you know when did you get exposed to excuse me like cold crush tapes and things like that with those passed around at school as far as look your exposure to those pioneers from the Bronx no because when I graduated from high school it was 78 so those tapes wasn't running around like that the cold crush tapes were more 78 79 80 I was in college and I was in some other thing you know the thing about it when you got into college you quickly severed yourself from all high school activity so when people talk about the parks yeah yeah I was in the punk yet because you couldn't get in the club's the whole key is to get into clubs and the DJ's that were excelling in the clubs were Andy Chiba and DJ Hollywood they just totally dominated the club scene and I'm 18 years old I make no secret about it I'm trying to get in the club or get into a thing eighteen and over so I could get with a girl you know I'm saying ain't trying to go into high school I'm trying to go to the club in college and I got a whip out as much ID as I can to get up in there and these are the DJ's that were dominating and you had to dress which I didn't like to do and and the parks jumped off in the summertime where you can actually just be casual because it could be outside it can't be outside in January and so my exposure was before cold crush my exposure was to the DJ's and the DJ's actually making tapes the thing the first Street deejays had penetrated to me other than me just following Hank Shockley in spectrum in 76 77 because they would bring Long Island in Queens along with infinity machine and along with King Charles they had a law they had a big terrain I would follow them so these are the mobile sound systems in Long Island they were doing parties not only were they mobile but you had to be mobile to catch them so the thing that was different from the bra folks and Brooklyn is that a lot of people waited for things to come to them we Long Island you had to go and check it out so you know you get in your car you went to you went to the Bronx you went to Brooklyn you went to all aspects of Queens and Long Island you drove there because you wanted to find that jump off where was that money so that was very key and these are some of the things that are underwritten in the formation because you're talking about the New York metropolitan area you know people are surprised at the first official rap record when I going to talk about King Tim the third and fatback man who had a recording contract knocking out things for spring which I thought was incredible though but we talked about people surprised that the first rap record came from guys from Jersey but you got to understand the physical logistic of of Englewood New Jersey it's right across the bridge so it's not like the line makes it anything it's right across the bridge everybody got the same radio station so yeah before the tapes this was before chains because the radio was dominant the clubs were dominant but also the parks and the DJ's were dominant so the first Street cat to cut across that ventured out that really that I was impressed by you talk about Grandmaster Flash and melly-mel those guys blew me the away and then you're talking 1979 now so did you uh when did you assume when did you first encounter them was it was it like Calvin a 70 year live alive and 79 because they were they were able to bleed into the into the what was happening at the club level and also at the college level they had records out at that point no they it's not only not there this recognize a this is the 479 I'll tell you one thing there is nothing in hip-hop and I've been in front of stadiums in front of 75,000 people I can't even explain to you before the the atmosphere of hip-hop and rap music before the first record I'm trying to tell you from October 78 I would say from January 78 to October 1979 when the first rap record came out I can't explain to you the intensity of rap music and hip-hop it was just totally intense because it was heading to a place where nobody even expected it to go nobody knew where was going either if you told me in 1979 that there would be a rap record the answer the IKE it's inconceivable I don't know what the you died it's impossible because it was a whole atmosphere of party type thing so when any cheaper was going around in May 1979 I remember very clearly like it was yesterday you're like I got this new record I'm a break for you I'm gonna break this new song and the place was packed in the name of this song was good times by chic now this was like you know people have been used to like dancing faster because she can actually brought you like you know dance dance dance you know they brought you to all those records you know um then they what you love freak freak out so they consider that slowing of the pace in 78 and so when they did good times it was like way down and I really found a heart it was hard to dance to and cuz I'm like the man but you know got a dance slow to this yeah no problem no but really wet with New York's return into funk which it kind of like escaped from the funk around 73 74 but it's returned into the phone was good times as a popular record and and that was really the turning point because cats were able to rap on that speed and cut to that speed and so I remember very clearly the summer 1979 they would have cats come together man and catch for cutting good times up with his sneakers it was 1979 New York City was wrapped crazy they used to say get that b-boy out of here but but it was like rap crazy and but this is before the rap records and everybody had a feeling something was going to happen but nobody knew exactly what eddie cheever was going around and saying look out y'all you because he broke the records but he was like saying that's why I'm gonna come out with my rap record soon and people were like the are you talking about how you got a rap on the record when King came the third came out in July and I just will get this out for this thirty more seconds because it's very important to my foundation King Tim the third comes out in July 1979 you know and actually is called Kington the third personality jock but the fatback band had already been putting down some hot funky disco tin because it was from Brooklyn so they actually you know would make songs that people would dance to and get down to so when they actually had King Tim the third get down it was like whoa it was like it sparked a clicking a light bulb and saying wow this is almost there yeah Wow and then when rapper's delight' came out in 1970 in October that was the dam that burst because it was good times it was the Firecracker break by mass production film - ternoon turn into noon you know and it was like the two hottest songs that they had made in one record and with straight rap on it and that was just that that was the beginning of the dam breaking and people were like whoa that shit's a rap record and immediately that just like kind of like I don't know what it did to the tapes but it's just kind of like it went into the area of record and the tapes became less of a force but they became big but less of a force it was about that record and the thing about it as I close to you on this note when rappers alike came out it was 15 minutes long you know and a lot of y'all might say well that's a long answer record but the irony is that when it came out it wasn't how long it was how short it was because to me and to others rap was a three-hour thing and so they'd like wow they got it down to 15 minutes you know and this is what's not really talked about because I know this is old headship but I'm giving it to you straight from the from the horse's mouth because I always looked at rap music hip-hop black music urban has a science as well as something to just enjoy because I was a sports fan and anybody knows about sports you can't be a dumb talking about sports if you see I mean y'all know like sports see that's why y'all music guys you know music people you go into sports circle and don't know what the you talkin about they'll tell you get the out here so I like people to think like in music terms the same way as people talk about sports so that's that was my beginnings but then when rap records came out that's when you decided that you had possibly something to devote your life to but it wasn't the music right no I would go to college I got kicked out my freshman year I worked out a job and then I went to some other classes I was I was got into college as a graphic design phenom I turned down the scholarship for architecture in New York Tech and I kinda I was I was really good I was matter of fact I thought I was too good I was really good but I had no direction I was like okay you're good but what the hell are you going to do so um when rap records came out I it just like kind of clicked to me I was like wow rap records that means covers that means graphics I could kind of like use my graphics to work in the art department at a record company as breadth of records get bigger and so that actually made me get back in school and finish out school because I wanted to actually be you know in the art department of a record company making record covers and stuff like that and that that that kind of that pushed me through school and I loved the fact that that you can apply your art to music now I wasn't a big graffiti fan I would be in the city riding the train to work and I would look at half of the graffiti and said less is wax half of the graffiti my effect 90% the graffiti I saw back in the day that they had on subways was just terrible to me because I was I was about really getting graphics to the point so I was a critic and I thought I could do better so I just thought that just because you got a marker and spray can't only make it you know you're right to just be marking up so my thing is like I was a critic I said this dude should have just left that marker in his pocket instead of marking up this train because this is why but there was the 10% some cats that were out there that were really brilliant I just said didn't need to be some kind of zone for them so the idling I saw that I saw the graphic music connection and that's why I went through college and in college I found that there was a radio station WBA you that I wanted to be a part of later on because I was a big rap music fan I got on the microphone only because back in the day I thought that 80% of all MCS were terrible and so they would be on top of a DJ who was terrible and you'd be trying to get your dance on with a girl and you know you get the courage like come on baby let's you know let's dance and all of a sudden the DJ and then she stopped dancing and look at the details I don't think I want to dance number one you mad at the DJ - because he's terrible and the emcee is terrible and I'm like man oh man you know my game up so then I just started to get on the mic to rhyme to sit the wack MCS down because if you're on a long line and you're in the middle and you let the first three MCS and love is the message comes on a good times comes on and ever son just because somebody's from the Bronx they think they want to get on the microphone - because yeah I know what this is and get on is just like terrible I thought it was my turn and then line behind me and disappear like because they would be like I can't do that so that was my main reason to getting on the microphone to sit the wack MCS down so I could enjoy dancing to the music with some chick out there that's well pink Shockley from the bomb squad and before that spectrum city which sound system you just mentioned always says that when you guys were in college there was some sort of jam when like you were saying there was all these emcees on the mic and they were all terrible and then you got on to make some sort of announcement to the hall and that changed his whole he was like that's the guy well you're not going to do it we're back in the day it wasn't about it wasn't about like your rhymes you had to sound good because most systems were inferior so I would just get on there one-to-one to it so somebody on a one two on two and this is you ain't cutting so sit your ass down you know and when I get on the mic I know that nobody's going to be louder and then all I had to do is be clear and you put some words together the somebody's sitting down because they're not loud they not clear and they just not rocking the music like that so you later on when people start talking about flows and stuff like that you talk about enhanced systems studios which kind of balance out the sound everything is mastered coming your way but really when it comes down it's down to it it's like you either got the pipes or you don't people that sing or tell you that people that sing going and they'll go and sing in front of a hall and you say well wow that person is singing with a loud voice that's cutting through and then somebody else comes is like well this person sounded great in the studio but they can't sound lies yet because some people need help and some don't you know guy like melly-mel was the first MC that blew me away cuz you didn't need no mic you him real clear he like damn so he put in the microwave and the next person needing the mic and amps and all that he complained that the sound person you'll turn me up turn me up and then all of a sudden le mouth grab like one two one two in like damn I hear that so so the whole thing about microphone kings of masters of ceremony is that the emcee the it was about the voices you had to cut through cuz systems were whack and if they was scratchy and you already had the DJ in fact in an attempt tent map digital ten one two one two you know that's going to grab your attention so that's why when I talk about up-to-date things you know today we talk about MCS and DJs in a whole different way because we talk about studio enhanced in order to bring all the nuances out but back then you had to have it in here I mean one time the story that somebody told me about the blues harmonica guy Sonny Boy Williamson a miner heard of Sonny Boy Williamson so he's over in the UK and they're asking them all kinds of questions like Sonny Boy I mean what kind of microphone do you use I mean to get that I mean what are you doing in the microphone and what technique and it's checking out engineers and all this technical and Sonny Boy just looked at and then right here it was like wow it's like use something that you got that you develop on your own and some things that you don't have so what finally gave you the confidence to to make music to do records it wasn't a confidence thing it was something I thought that was worth my time I just thought that you know it had to be worth my time to make records I love doing the radio I still love doing radio and said you ain't got to be seen all you got to do is just be heard and to be behind the scenes and radio is very enjoyable then we made our first records like check out the radio so we would be able to sell our radio shows like I was telling you earlier now tell the audience's that I was a big fan of mr. magic Africa Islam the Zulu beats and also our world favorite Supreme Team I mean these are all pioneering all my radios in New York City yeah and I know we're talking about a lot of stuff before yellow born and maybe stuff like way back but it's very important because if you say that you love the music you got to try to at least pick up on on the reasons why some of this in the first place in order to be able to innovate to take it to 2012 and 2010 and you want also a red bull you want to separate yourself from somebody else that just thinks that they're doing what you're doing just because yeah I like it you know and you already separate yourself right now because you're at Red Bull Music Academy where somebody on you know on the outside might just like yeah I do that that y'all do I don't need no school I'll need to know that fact and all of a sudden you you're like wow you know so all this is important I think you know and if I was there and I was able to retain that that that surrounding it's important that I spread it because I say what good is an old head like me if I can't drop some jewels to y'all to pick up and use for yourself now as far as the radio went though to that was also the foundation of you know being a part of a community and not just being you know being something beyond music is that correct that's correct because we talk directly to our community and they was able to see us and I think that was a beautiful thing about radio back in the days of R&B and I think RB means Reagan and Bush you know so we talk directly to the people were able to see them in the laundry mats and the bus stops and that was very important today when people talk about well what do you think about rap music and hip-hop today I think artists do a whole bunch of different things producers do a whole bunch of different things but I think the radio is terrible man the radio has never been worse because they give you nothing they give you no information and they they don't innovate man so they don't give they don't innovate they don't give you the information and give your sense of history and what they think is good they only judge themselves they don't really get judged by a higher order so that's the problem with rap music and pop today is that the people that play it and the people they're supposed to navigate it for the foot for the public they're not good at it man I'm sorry they're just not good not the rappers not the producers even some of the producers got to be able to learn a bit more of course it's not just taking a sound it's about knowing the dynamics behind the mentality of why the sound was created in the first place you know DJ you name again um yeah yeah he was on finding a Mobb Deep's sample on the stylistics album from about 35 years ago you have to get into the dynamics of before you know if you get into say okay mobb deep took this sample you got to try to get into the dynamics of the musicians that made it I mean Tom Bell and it was part of the gamble and Huff team and he would orchestrate the stylistics as well as orchestrate the spinners and so his uses of arrangements and horns and strings were immaculate my fact Tom Bell is a perfectionist so his grooves that he would use from the Philadelphia Orchestra that that gamble and Huff also used you know all this goals in the saying wow this is the science behind why this music was made the way it was in the first place which led to me thinking that it's groove it's funky and it's made to actually extend into a sample or even manipulate because you got to go into the mind of the musician or go into the goal of what people try to do and the stylistics were there to swoon and to also hold you to hold the senses that holders own of like okay this is a love song but this is a groove that's going to get you when you on the floor or whatever with your loved one to sway a certain way or to like you know or to relate a certain way and that sway and that movement is still there and the musicians mind or in that chops and then that groove so that's why all this is important it's not just about I'm a snatcher sound because I'm a stats it's time to make it what I wanted to make it that's that's one half an answer but the other half is like saying why was this sound created in the first damn place and that's why they take all people like Afrika Bambaataa the master of Records guys like gram mix add ext a master of records guys like Questlove from the roots a master of records would be a to understand not just directed but the musicians and the engineers that make the recordings you know you cannot get into the science of some of that hot Atlantic pretty purty Gatson beats without understanding Tom Dowd as an engineer and not whether he engineered that particular record or not his influence on engineers to make that sound the way it is in order to take it all the influence of people like all James Brown Clyde Stubblefield okay what's the engineering technique or what's David Matthews not the Dave Matthews Band but David Matthews Arrangements which kind of led into taking the James Brown folk section and then James David Matthews Arrangements on top of Fred Wesley's Arrangements so you got to understand all this to be able to say we want to make some more incredible music for 2012 or incredible mixtapes or whatever you do and I just don't think the radio stations the jocks the program directors or the music directors have enough in them to take it to the next phase no Osley brother pun intended well you speak about arrangements just now and production I guess what motivated you and Hank and Public Enemy to make the sounds that you guys made you know very distinct and very you know pretty much unprecedented you know we didn't make the sounds we wanted to be able to take and make the new arrangement to the sounds because we had a knowledge of records that we had a respect for the records and we had a respect for the different genres how things was trying to make make it all work and then we didn't like where our B was in the middle of the 80s we just thought that the worst thing that ever happened to R&B is that you start to use synthesizers or synthesizers started to use the musician as opposed to Stevie Wonder would pimp the hell out of a synthesizer but a synthesizer started to use and draw machine started to use the producer so you would just have this corny ass compliment panting type dumb thing you know just like corny ass sounds coming out of the 80s now we wanted to rebelled against so our whole goal was like we're going to destroy the music business concept of music with music that's what kind of thing we wanted to eradicate every bit of smooth R&B that was made in the 80s off the face of the earth and also you know and English pop then we just the music of the 80s republic enemy came about because the music most of the music that we thought in from 1979 to 1986 except for rap records and a lot of organic type of music we just thought was terrible man just whack and so our whole goal was just just a wipe this off the face of the musical map and that was out goal a Public Enemy in the beginning as Sonic Assassins but by the same token you know when Public Enemy came out there was resistance from pockets you know with in popularity as well I mean you know is like maybe this is a myth or beacon refute or confirm it but you guys performed at Latin quarters at other point and there was a you know melly-mel and other people in the audience and repeatedly heckled you guys and gave you what's melly-mel heckled us because he thought we was part of the content contingent that dismissed the magic which really Scott lorac and Kara's one was just like launching in and mr. magic was like you know though you going to respect it so that so our association with dr. Dre I'm talking about dr. Dre Andre Brown from yo MTV not not you know Dre from the west coast because it was to dr. Dre's at the same time that's where melly-mel was a friend of magic so and you know that a melly-mel man could be heard on top of music so you like get off the stage you know and we were performing we got a sound system and you can hear this dude in the back because you know we're from Long Island he didn't know anything about our history so those were kind of like our chops coming through but um that's at Latin Quarter like very very famous hip hop venue in the eighties we had we had songs that would go to Latin Quarter that that you couldn't dance to but I automatically set off some kind of zone inside the average b-boy that they just could not they could not dispute and that was public enemy number one which was a tape that I made for WBA you 84 that automatically like set fire which made Rick Rubin mother saw me in the first place and my out thing was not make music we're gonna make unmusical we knew it was the hot rap rap because we knew Run DMC the Kings you know coming off the Grandmaster Flash and Furious Five so we knew all the records that were out at the time so in order for me to make something I wanted to make something that actually stood out when I made public enemy number one at the end of 1984 as a WBA you promo tape I lived it Roosevelt still to this day next to a busy street so we would try to do monitor Ramana we would monitor the radio show based on how many people wanted to make tapes from the radio show so you know when the car goes by you can usually hear appointment could be anything but we started I started to use noise because I want to be able to even be able to take a real good survey so when I noticed when I did public enemy number one when the car went by and we knew that it was hot that we were doing on the radio a call would go by with a beating and that's the whole key when we knew public enemy number one was hi public enemy number one was high for two years before it became a record and that's what made Rick Rubin said I want to sign this guy and my knee and flavor was driving trucks delivering furniture and I was making this tape and blow your head by the jb's was a record I always liked there's a whole nother story behind getting that blow your head record has something to do with going over some chicks house and then taking the record asking them for the record after I didn't get you know when I came to the house for I liked okay baby when I was conscious record and I took the record it was just blown away by blew your head but it was always a record that was played in the roller rink and it was played in the roller rink and the DJ's did not have enough skill to extend the breakers is really the tough break it's really like this one yeah and I always had in my mind if somebody could keep this going and it wasn't until you had machine like the emulator to that would come out and guys like Molly Moll really made the emulator hot and happening and he laid on the Chi and then we was able to extend that song but the truth of the matter not spending too long talking about this is that I made the first demo off of causing the consent just like we made you know people were used to making cassette paws tapes so I've made it off of going over and over to tape decks and go away and so a couple of glitches or indicas that wasn't perfect timing but the thing about it I was able to rhyme over it so the rhyme actually connected all of the some of the pieces together seamlessly now when we tried to make it in the studio for Def Jam of our first Def Jam release what happened is that when the equipment was they were able to make the the song and we duplicated but Hank and I considered it too clean because it was just clean it didn't have the thing that the brakes in the purple and the pause tape gave it that funkiness of feel and direction that we didn't have so that's what made that a totally different thing when we just decided so what happened we made the record public enemy number one it actually was two-inch tape that was cut by Steve at the engineer and we made that natural loop around a microphone stand going back into the student heads and so we're going in a and so it had that that feel of a band so to speak but with our public enemy number one was made to almost capture the feel of the original demo tape of BAU which had a lot of funky feel and dirt and grime in it and so that make a long story short that was the beginning of us realizing that we're going to make some some noise by bringing the noise and we're going to make different records and we're going to make some abrasive records and the whole goal was then is like make some music that your girlfriend gonna hate it has it was definitely one would be good our girlfriend to tie late with it later became Iowa it was like yo if she don't like this record that means we got some hot here I feel like Luther Vandross and all that other going on and I was like you know I'm making some that you say turn that off and you know and that always worked for him listen you know let's throw on a quick couple seconds of that what's he got there you got the original one oh that was I got this one well you got the professional one you could download the original demo on um on slam jams calm I got it still up there you could take it down it's the original demo from 1984 were you here I could go so like a sugar Ebola which is like Sugar Ray Leonard was the guy that was dominating the the boxing scene and so when I had to make the record it was like I could go so more like a Tyson bolo so I went from Sugar Ray Leonard to Tyson went from welterweight champ to heavyweight champ so that's what's the difference in those particular records but I know I mean the many of y'all say okay you know Chuck is talked about all this and we haven't we haven't got past 1986 because if somebody just said okay you know when people got into making structured rap records you know okay you got eight bars here you count in four bars and and we also felt that that can lead to burnout too from our audience listening to a rap record because it might you might offer different sounds but if every song that you deliver is four minutes long or three and a half minutes long and it kind of like starts out with the same arrangement as far as timing like you know cats talk about hot 16 ok wise how come it can't be a hot 17 how come it can't be a hot 13 and a half because people are afraid to go outside of structure that they know and feel comfortable with but our whole thing is like how can we present something that will make you feel uncomfortable and that was the old meaning of PE you know don't deal with the area of comfort and don't deal with a Mac so close to water Jeff so was that the record that mr. magic smashed on the air yeah magic smashed it on the air because he thought we were were dissing him out with with Dragan Scott lorac so Scott LaRocca and care as one was going directly at magic for some other beef and he had heard the radio station they came out to talk to dray on BAU and he kind of like considered us down with that with the whole posse which we were but we had no time talk about mr. magic like that we got dragged into it and so therefore when he heard that record he thought that Dre had something to do with it which he had but we know we wasn't coming that magic like that but I felt kind of happy to be associated and still be associated with the blastmaster care as one to this day so it was pretty good you know yeah so um takes a nation a million has told us back it's yeah look I'm try to get a power dat is often off inside as the greatest hip-hop album of all time how do you feel about that assessment well when we first made the album it was after a year of touring and I noticed one thing that that rap artists seemed to be victimized by slow tempos worked well on record didn't work good on live performances because when you go into a live setting and a lot of arena people an amped-up anyway to see you so everybody's amped up that's why when you check out bands bands usually play their music at least 5 to 10 beats per minute faster because everybody's all amped up and you know and that's why that's why records actually stood out back in the day more than the van I mean a perfect example is like the Ohio players you know on the record you hear skin-tight 10 tight ping ping tan tan-tan you know so you're hearing that rhythm and then when you go check them out the concert skin tight skin tight I'm dangling your like tan once I smooth ass down or something you know because they act up so bands will be amped up 10 to 15 minutes per minute faster and we realized that even when we came into a performance the crowd is amped up which you can only pitch up a record but so much so we decided to say well let's make faster records so takes a Nation of Millions sonically comes off the heels of us doing rebel without applause at 102 beats per minute somewhere in that range and then and beats per minute meant a lot to us because of DJ's so we always went on bpms and Keith and Hank had digital Panasonic turntables we sew beats per minute always meant something to us bring the noise with 109 beats per minute at the end of 1987 for less than zero soundtrack that was like going into light speed and so the challenge was to be able to perform it and get on it and now we had faster songs like it's like that 125 beats per minute but it was a different double speed so to speak but 109 was like rap on it take the fast speed riding like a saddle and get this crowd throttled up right in the middle of the days of crack so we made a fast record for the days of crack and crack was the type of drug that was used by cats they wouldn't slow them down catherby like this yo-yo playing against uh for real and cats would just be all nervous and fast like that and it just seemed like that was the speed that we took it to which matched the drug of the time by people that was kind of around the hip-hop circle and 112 110 113 beats per minute was a songs when it takes a nation and so that's sonically and what it said is basically said all the things that we grew up with in the 60s and 70s you know taking voices as many voices on there from the 60s and the 70s that were forgotten in the 80s I remember Hank and I were hanging a flyer on a pole in the 80s 1985 and we used Malcolm X looking at the wall outside the window with his car being rifle defending his house which is a famous shot that was used later about carrots one on my philosophy and and people this guy came by said who's this Malcolm the 10th which made me hex a man we need to let these people in the 80s know in the middle of regular bush where we come from because that was just forgotten and that was only 10 to 15 years prior and only only 20 years prior to you know him being killed so that's what really led the vocal or other the meaning of the Public Enemy thing even further and so sonically meaning wise and also rap wise and also performance wise it takes a nation was really the the juggernaut that established us because it was something that we had we definitely said to ourselves this is our thing our thing is a jack up to speed rap fast and strong and come bring some noise and be powerful at it and you know I mean Public Enemy I tell people all the time that's the Rolling Stones of the rap game it's like my time better flows you might find you know individual achievements but that's a powerful thing so it's power and speed you don't find power and speed like what PE presented it's just you know and some people might say well cool I want power I don't know speed I want to groove I want some funky I want you know my to be smooth I want my to be like you know I want the lyrics to be like hitting an aiming tight now this is power and speed it's like Metallica and rock and roll get the out of the way this is going to run you over that's why for years Public Enemy to go head-to-head with thrash metal bands and still hold our own with turntable and then if we throw some good instruments with it it's the only thing you can compare it to diamonds might not be nice might not be pretty it might not be digestible but it's going to definitely wear that place out and that's that's what established us you guys perform the album is in its entirety and concert that's last year a lot of fun lot of fun hell of an album a lot of fun it's one thing one of those things that those records they're not like easy records like somebody just stand in one place and they throw your hands in the air you know you walk along side to side those records are some things if you don't kind of prepare yourself to do the records they will do you and so you do the records or they'll do you I mean loud and the Brahmas no joke so it's going on you got to get you know this stuff seized Wow wait before you treat me like a stepchild so and at the same time Public Enemy was never one of those things like okay I'm gonna stand here the phone and I'm going to just be here looking at you and you can't do that on the 912 beats per minute you got to get it moving and it's like it's like punk you know and so that was the devil's out I was on things we separated us from the rest of the pack you know and you know power speed is very important it's only really been one MC in my book power and speed and could do it all and because he develops himself at that time and his music jacked up to and speed and was able to do things although he danced into you know Big Daddy Kane power and speed the voice comes like this he was able to do it fast and he's able to keep moving and you know I tell people all the time this is you know this is something like if you smoking weed and you want to sit and lounge back in front of a crowd this ain't your thing you know later on when Dre did the chronic and stoop dog-eat-dog he developed you know a whole nother thing with a whole different beat per minute and slowed it down and became like you know because we then was the drug of choice in 92 93 therefore the music and rap music seemed to represent that speed he play anything 112 beats per minute in 94 and 93 people would be like oh my god get that out of here and so we understood that I just didn't I just didn't like it as much as far as me to do it I mean do you feel it I need such a fan of hip-hop so you know maybe you won't concur but do you feel it's the greatest album hip hop album of all time if that's you know different panels about it as in visitations or in about etc I believe if you sort performed you come away from saying damn when I first set out to make it understand wasn't that many rap albums out maybe you have to put got 20 albums in your hand so and we had some great I mean to me the greatest rap album that signified everything as a album Marketplace's rap music is on album format excuse me as on run DMC is raising hell that's dignified to me power is this power and that was his power and Run DMC they're yelling over in able to handle or stadium or arena but when we made takes a nation it was like we knew what we were not going to make and we knew what to make something based off of whatever so I was set out to make what's going on of rap music then so it had a lot of things going it had its sonic changes it's the first outlet that said we're not going to go out record track the track you know before De La Soul put skits in that we show that you can break an album up from the monotony of track the track first often that did that the meaning the voices the arrangement of samples the arrangement of the album to itself the juxtapositioning that plays like a radio show we didn't we wanted to make it exactly 60 minutes or an hour of introduction into the world of 1988 so it's calling it the greatest rap album of all time I mean I mean it's like I don't know to some somebody else was cold but I know that if somebody seen it performed and heard the records and seen us perform the records they'll come away from it like damn okay I understand now so they would have to see it feel it take it in and they would come away and say all right watch somebody else do an album and I think that you know that was a that was a thing I was kind of critical about when I first heard about it don't look back concert series which the promoters in the UK with tell a rapper do your album we don't want you to do anything else and so first I was like ah it sounds like a fans dream it doesn't really sound like an artist's dream but when we did it and we actually play along with the bomb squad Han could keep Shockley it was a it was a treat because it was a challenge and we stepped up to the challenge it was a treat and so coincidentally we'll be playing it all year long we got another tour in Germany Greece we did some small shows in the UK and capital of the year in Australia then it'd be to a number 63 and 64 for Public Enemy so it takes a nation it's fun to do because what we do is we do the album and then we say okay we'll do our other cynnwys hacks actually if another hour of show of show time so it's fun I mean what wouldn't be fun getting down next to Flavor Flav's I mean really may is that he's the greatest hype man wherever could be invented the road he's bought so much to the game that people kind of just think that you know young cats think they always a TV show what does he do they asked what the Flavor Flav did from the minute one I introduced him with me and Hank introduced him the Rickerson we gotta sign him to like what does he do we don't know what he does but you got his you gotta take them and then he's had many imitators never duplicator and nothing like flea was like nothing so he's the one that makes it enjoyable and is what Griff was brought to the table were terminated and now d-day Lord Bramha Taylor so it's a fun thing to get down with it's like if I getting down with a with a would you to of somebody like that so it's fun I'm just curious as a side note when you said that you and flavor used to move furniture for your dad's business and where did you you had imagined like you and Flav would do a TV show together were you just driving driving around the problem is that would be fun but back then you were imagining it being before no that was his work we had to do he had he had to work I had to work you know so that was it I know people look back on anything would you do a TV show like I don't like to be photographed all the type of person that says get that damn camera away from my house you got five seconds to get around three two and get that camera away from my crib so I don't like to be photographed so I don't like to be televised I never liked doing videos so I'm different when it comes down to that but flavors made for camera you can't take your eyes or he is awful so no matter what he does on TV he's going to discipline anything else whether he I don't care what he could talk about science or he could just talk about foolishness which he'll talk a blend of both and you can't take you can't change the dial because he's just like what the is going on with this guy you know so that's that is it um I'm curious you know I mean one of your famous quotes is you know hip-hop serving as CNN for black communities now today what is centering that purpose if it's not hip-hop or is it still hip-hop is a worldwide cultural religion simple that it's everywhere it's in more than 150 countries and I think the biggest misnomer that has happened about hip-hop is that people still talk about hip-hop like it has to have a New York state of mind and that that was best been over since the 80s what takes a nation also did its signify that it was already a global scene when people started asking whoa is it a global scene and they started asking that question in 1999 the first statement it takes a nation is like good evening London so as we was telling the United States at that time like what this is already happening in London and you're hearing like going on so if you ain't up on hip-hop and this is what's happening in London then New York Philly all y'all better get up on it because we already got it going on and we let you know this is how much we got going on this is no and so it was like sort of like introducing the first concert live concert element to hip-hop and it takes a nation because the people could say all right you guys are making up your own world you're doing whatever you know the beats per minute all that crazy noises doing you're making up your own you're believing your own height nope this is London I like that from the people up top check this out in here on that crime so really also with fans of music we understand when Earth Wind & Fire came out with gratitude we understand when you know when emotion came out and you hear like you know earth went in fire live it helped boost the Earth Wind & Fire concerts because you had this you had to become part of what the is going on and the Earth Wind & Fire live as far as a band in the 70s they just dominated over the over the escape so that's what we wanted to kind of prove like okay say what you want but this crowd is bananas and you're not used to hearing a recorded bananas crowd and hip-hop at all you may be here club oh between here no stadium arena or gigantic building yeah I guess you know I asked you about this yesterday but you know he was always the biggest champions of hip-hop always you know fighting for acceptance and recognition for hip-hop because it was such an underdog genre for so long you know I remember seeing interviews with you back in the day where it's like you know be very proudly saying you know hip-hop has its own section in the record store I never had that before now obviously hip-hop has become you know mainstream popular music and while hip-hop is bigger than the record store now right but I wonder do you feel as though you know hip-hop has won that war and that you know what at what cost at this point hip-hop hasn't won any war because if you talk about hip-hop from the United States a state of mind people fail to realize that in the United States that they fell off a bit and the United States and I'm talking politically and also going to talk musically in a quick second the United States is like if Michael Jordan in the 20th century it's like y'all shield oh my god you won world wars you cook you you moved into other parts you know your post Teddy Roosevelt you know beat everybody with your big-ass dick and you might show your swinging it like why what cool it's the 21st century the United States has to realize that it has to really work hard to be one of the top 20 not that you dominate over the whole space and that hasn't that has trickled down into culture basket basketball you know started by Canadian who people for people forget started by Canadian and the University of Massachusetts system to teach this sport to Americans which was dominated by you know Jewish Americans and white Americans or whatever and then black Americans dominated and at his time just like boxing that's why the boxes you find all coming out of Lithuania and Ukraine because I come from nothing I kill you you know you know I knock you the out you know I come from nothing well so boxing has a different zone now because it comes from a different hunger standpoint the United States has been full for so long even in hip-hop it's been full and it's even full of his own hype if you took the four elements of hip-hop and say where does it rank if it was a so-called Olympics and hip-hop it wouldn't rank it wouldn't get the gold the silver or the bronze in graffiti it wouldn't get the gold to silver all the bronze and break dancing although it's coming up a little bit I don't think it still would get one of those three medals turntablism not winning the gold silver LeBron the turntablism for the last 20 years we have exceptions here and there but really come on man worldwide so that's three of the four elements then you got MC n now MC n is all subjective because this mcs now super mcs I go to explain the people in the United States when they just say well they want to watch bt you know the basement on formerly rap city or go and watch hip-hop from the united states and my state of mind and I tell people hip-hop and rap one of rap music is all over the planet and this Catholic is spit three languages maybe in the same song or same verse and go back and forth that's super rapid now you tell the average American who only knows one language that this exists and they think they choose to say well that doesn't count because it don't mean cuz I'm an American and I'm great because I am and I'm like that thing which is just like they did in basketball Oh with a NBA we're great because we're wood we got marketing and contracts and we're rich you know you know you got to work at that and that's how that is able to get the gold again cuz they figured this out we better play like this we better get to the fundamentals we better love this we better throw all their ego aside and we could possibly win hip-hop in the United States has been in a lazy zone for so long and thinks they could win because the record company says you win or because you deal with a large demographic that says oh yeah you poppin off you from New York you could talk about like this you can swing it like that you can show off what you got and automatically you're going to win yes you could have won in the 20th century 21st century is a different way to win if you wanted to say it's winning or losing as far as hip-hop in this century you have to figure out what's the global atmosphere on music and hip-hop what's the global condition and concern of people saying we have to live here to get we have to share the hip-hop state of mind is to unite embrace you know cultures the thing that brings human beings the one race human race together for our similarities and knocks aside the differences this what makes culture diametrically opposed from governments governments like to categorize they like the fragment they like to actually group people in the grouping so they can take advantage of it that's why when a government says is that they're in charge of culture you got to watch out for that culture and government are diametrically opposed governments are the cancers of civilization all governments government now what are you what are you going to do Chuck you need government to keep people in check well that's government business but I'll tell you the one thing that's derogatory to human beings is the fact that you need a passport to travel to the place that God gave everybody and if we don't take care of the planet and fall in line like the species you know birds they fly animals actually the animals are talking crazy right about now the animals if they had a language they would be like you know and maybe that's the underdog animals are like you human beings a is planted up the is going on with y'all right because the animals are talking some real going on anybody recently heard the story about the Penguins they actually had to get help to go right back south because they came too far north because the atmospheric planet climatic conditions have been altered by the greed of human beings and by the audacity of our stupidity and so hip-hop is is it has this organic sense of trying to culturally bring people together the figure this plays out to figure out sells out and I think you know beyond hip-hop as a term it's the beauty of culture and the beauty of music and art and Expressionism is to say we got to share this thing and I think Americans who have watched hip-hop through the portal of corporations have actually accepted the the cycle of greed so to speak so when you actually see hip-hop and United States and it's not about the ability of an MC but it's it's the size of their watch that makes people go oh look at that watch oh my god did you see that per helicopter oh you know so it's bringing the or out of the audience in a whole different manner they've got nothing to do with cultural expression which the rest of the world realized that it has to at least be able to exude some of those qualities of like it's got to come from within me it can't come from the outside of me you go to Brazil and you can't be saying I'm coming out of the favelas you know like laced with all the diamonds and like that cats to be like yo man we robbed in this man that so you got to represent the people and that's what the global aspect of hip-hop has stuck to that fundamental over the last 30 years they've kind of like stuck to the fundamental I'm not saying that it's been a solid connection of course it's been shaken sometimes because somebody coming from from Spain and somebody come from Italy might look look on a video screening like oh man look at this cat man he's riding around and he's got this big house he's got like all the women you know like the women never MC the women always just they're like there's no women involved in hip-hop which is also hurt hip hop to the underdog of hip-hop is also women in a problem I say that the biggest biggest vacancy of hip-hop is the lack of women cohesiveness women crews teams groups use the name at least five to six of them in 80s if I asked you to name women crews I mean meaning the producers the engineers the remixes the DJs emcees the record company owners you know women in a collective it's far and few because you know I mean even as males the males are not groups no more that's been one of the biggest problems I think I think we talked about this yesterday the the absence of collectives the absence of groups and when you have a group it's going to make any individual look at you like saying well I could take this solo individual but I can't do what this group is doing and I just think that I have a all women autonomous unit hip hop unit on my label called Kruger Order and I'm trying to actually get behind them big time without trying to be that male on top of them because they got it mapped out for themselves I'm just trying to also fight through all the testosterone to make it a little bit easier for them to spread their wings and to make their statements and to do their music and the come in a hip-hop state of mind so this this long story short these are some of the things that are missing as far as hip hop from American state of mind America has been taught to be arrogant to the rest of the world arrogantly stick their heads above the rest of the world so we're always better because we're American which comes from that British state of mind anyway and I think the last eight years of son of a bush you know has really signified the Ugly American and so now once upon a time black people used to be able to have that debt that ghetto card from the United States because we signify the people going through struggle and the civil rights to fight against the system that people like oh yeah black from America you're the underdog you fight against your slaves there so we accept you you know because we understand where you come from but they have co-opted their imagery into a way of the black american almost seeming like he's the arrogant american as well so that whole ghetto card has disappeared into being like you can't just say I'm black I'm from America because they said oh yeah you show off you throw money in the camera like like the like those old videos in the 90s when he was throwing money at the camera which ain't worth the paper it's printed on right about now so we're seeing all of this come down to a collapse and when it collapses it comes down to people inside instead of outside monopoly but it just to play devil's advocate for a quick second like you know is there something wrong with aspirational motivation you know and yet is there's nothing wrong with aspirational motivational motivation as long as you have reality glued into it and as long as you get you're able to spread it and and and if you spread a fantasy without answers for the reality then you're bound to have side effects and the side effects that we witness right about now in the United States of America you know there's not enough therapists for their guilt but you know what there's not a therapist for but there's a growing prison industrial system which houses more people than any other country on the planet now America they don't brag about that and when they talk about the percentage of people in the prison industrial industry complex and black men and black people make up 12.5 of the population and you see 50 percent in the prisons when why isn't this a story that that ok in the middle of all the Human Rights Crusades and American claims that they they're at the forefront explain your own human right maladies and you know so it's about in ok we want to bring you to aspiration but do we want to inspire people to greed as opposed to just being able to figure out how to handle yourself I don't know I mean maybe maybe that maybe that's hip hop's maybe that's hip hop some I don't know a Joe adjoining motives maybe it should be but you just asked me like well once upon a time hip hop was on the door because everything everybody woke in and during Reagan and the Bush era because there for hip hop was on the dog is underdog but then you you know you look at Eric D and Rakim you know album cover and they're very proud of their money yo in the real real thick gold a really real fake in light so they were aspiring but when we look at it were they really paid in full no it was nice thought nice thoughts you know it's like you know everybody could wish that they could get to that mean when they say that jay-z is worth 300 million dollars I don't know what that means and number one I don't know where it comes from and I don't know if it's a whippin it maybe it's a weapon of mass distraction you know I don't know because when what does that do with somebody is trying to learn their craft like wow I'm going to become an MC because jamesy got 300 million dollars and Beyonce he does okay if you don't get 300 million dollars he'll have Beyonce are you going to still do the craft and are you still going to try to you know make that feed your soul and if a person says nah I think I can accept that okay then you got to do something either you awake or you sleep the beautiful thing about art is that it enhances you and that it fills your time if everybody in this room says okay you know music all that you know what do you want fill your time with you I fill it with something I mean II you know create all your consumer see how many young have friends who just cannot get away from a Playstation and just are lost in the video game instead of designing one well that's that's a reality too you could get lost into your own zone and and and you don't have to you know you don't have to be a productive person you could just get lost to his own and that's cool too I guess but I think in the hip-hop and in music I think the beauty comes in the area area of looking inside yourself looking at the terrain and coming up with something that you might think is brilliant and trying to push that into the forefront of entertaining people or informing people bottom line people at the end of the week if they work hard and then this place used to be a textile plant y'all know this right now do you actually take your mind maybe 20 years back and in sighs these same walls people working a for 40 years punching the clock if there was a clock to go through eight hours of work busting their ass up in here you know okay that was then but what I'm saying is that you at the end of those weeks people still flock to something that made them feel better that was entertainment that was music that was art and I think there was all there will always be room for people to say you know what I want to release myself from my everyday work and I want to enjoy myself and I think everybody in this room has the ability or has the love to create something that gives somebody a breath of fresh air in their life and that's the beauty that's the beauty of the communication of what you do as music it's like it's the release it's like yo man I just want to get away from that everyday thing because you know when you're grown really seriously I mean pull out all the stops yeah I mean your kid days are over you're not 14 years old which is dumb in your mouth for a lollipop like a little way you know it's seriously it's time to be grown which means that was it me okay you got an apartment God pay somebody rent oh you still live with your mom's okay how long you gonna do that oh you got a girlfriend you got a boyfriend okay yup I have a baby we're gonna take care of the baby oh all right I was out there skateboarding I broke my leg you got a shirt oh my mom my mom's our pasta passed away who's gonna bury them you know we get an introduction into adult life that might not be you know adhering to your comfortable tastes but somebody's got to do it and welcome to adulthood so you're able to actually be in adulthood but you're also able to give people a release and a break and so this is their badges that you have that's music makers as DJs MC produces engineers because there's a lot of people that don't have your ability and there's a lot of people that don't have your flexibilities and there's a lot of people that don't have your insight so always keep the music with you always don't never let it ever leave you because people need they will need it more than ever this year next year and then the years to come it will need people like everybody in this room this is not a thing to like I give up because I can't make a living at it you still gotta make a living a matter what figure out how to parlay the tools like okay I gotta work in a textile place but I still want to do my music and the minute that your music gives you answers that you got to decide where you spend the time it will give you oh it will give you the answer whether you can make a living off of it it will give you the answer oh wow I happen to be doing this club and I could get a chance to actually pay some of my bills but I can take this you'll see it instead of always saying well I'll just not work and I'll wait for the music to actually pay me you know you got to be able to see it make a long story short on myself that April 1st 1987 my first day of touring with the Beastie Boys our tour first tour I worked at a job to that Friday I was not leaving my job until I seen that there was a clear answer that I can make a living and support my family doing rap and I already made a record and when I made the record I wrote your brothers to show driving while working I mean you know waiting for the music to pay me I'm like I better see it work so when I was able to see a little bit I said you know what I'm going to go from work I put in my resignation on that Monday work to that Friday so I could get that check and I was on tour Monday so I only had two days from going from my job to my own business and once you go into your own business you know you out there to try to figure out and work it out because it really is only three options you have a job you have a business or you ain't got no job ain't no other option other than death so I wasn't you know me I was a grown person when I made my first record and it had to be serious to me it'd be like you know what ya know order for me to do music full-time I better see it so I like I said Friday was my last day at work March 1987 my first day of my business April 1st 1987 I ain't making no kid ass moves ain't no child 12 years old with thumbing my mother like what I do next not that you know so I look at this I looked at this had a very realistic approach of yeah okay in order for me to do it full it's got to be able to give me answers I was going to do music anyway but I was going to do it in my time around what I had to do as an adult person I don't know if y'all could relate to that but that's my story so I mean and I'm pretty sure I ain't talking to anybody in this room who's actually under 16 years old everybody 16 anyway over 18 so I need not to tell you where you are in your life as adults all right I know I've been running my mouth and it's like I know y'all like okay you know 95 degrees up in here so maybe we might want to take a couple questions yeah yeah question is always better than folks out here please wait for the microphone and then say your name and tell me where you're from because you know I think the Red Bull Music Academy is one of the wonders of the musical world and y'all should also realize that okay um hi my name is Michael I'm from Tel Aviv Israel all right I'm a hip-hop producer an MC and I wanted to ask you how do you think if Obama is elected in November how do you think it's going to if so how do you think it's going to change or affect the world of hip-hop or black culture in total Oh immediately I mean just him running it changes the whole scape of how do we think but that's how we think how do we live and how do we act let's break this down in the United States me as a black man who's been almost in the United States almost 50 years right I've never seen anything like this what does the United States history tell me that even if a Barack Obama gets in day to have myself prepared be ready to work and be ready to understand that the good and the bad is going to happen with people kind of looking at it the wrong way although I vote for Barack Obama I have to understand that there's going to be ways that there's going to be things that he's going to do as a president in the United States that I know I definitely ain't going to agree with and I know that all only as a collective if people say well he's a black president so what is going to do for black people no he's the president United States so black people have to be a collective since we judged by our characteristics rather than our character to be able to influence a decision that will help us as a people who are at the bottom of the pit in America as far as a lot of different things education economics health all those things that go along with it to come up as a collective because we still live collectively in our neighborhoods Barack Obama to the planet is is what it is opportunity number one y'all know it's the biggest reality show in the world everybody is looking at the United States right now saying coming from George Bush to the possibilities how do we as the rest of the world says how do we operate knowing what's going to come out of the big bear and I can't tell you what's going to happen the next 24 days if John McCain gets in as the president States you could rest assure that the rest of the plan is going to be like oh because he talks foreign conflict instead of foreign policy number two I don't think he'll be doing the job for long I think first of all he's going to just be trying to like his first day at work is going to be April and then I think in June he's gonna be like yo mam seventy-three this is a whole crazy job I ain't reduced the world to the next president the United States Miss Sarah Palin that's a reality and she's like yo that you know power you know so Barack Obama is an opportunity to adjust America's image to the rest of the planet of saying we got trying to find ways to fit in instead of dominate you and put you under out i wing and try to beat your ass and opportunity can I speak for for what's going to happen hell I don't know what the hell's going on I always consider myself a citizen of the planet instead of saying well I'm a United States citizen and this one right now you know I'm a citizen of the planet and I think that this global this global picture is is has to be looked at for the existence of the planet they will they're talking about there won't be any Arctic ice next summer what does that tell you what that tell y'all if y'all really give a damn well you know what that means it means if there was wars in the Middle East over what whole bunch of resources right you know underneath that Arctic ice is the is the oil of the future in the oil of now the oil of now is oil right already they call the g8 they call it the g7 why because they say Putin and Russia is renegade they say I go and they're up in the Arctic as well as Canada with the United States like on Canada's back like get the out of way right already putting Mike wells offshore drilling into the play going into the Arctic and getting that oil then the oil of the future is Warner Canada is right up in there and you know the United States relationship with Canada will change so all this for green and you've got the economic system just kind of shutting down all over the place yo there's a lot of that's going on right now sometimes when people said well damn man artists speak to this yeah they should I think a lot of artists aren't speaking to this and we're in the days of MySpace pages I like in facebook all the social networks going on that you could present your music YouTube is a fantastic medium because I never understood if we're in the audiovisual age right and cats like I mean y'all actually make music put your hands there now how many I'll shoot your own video see see making music has become easy shooting and cutting videos of let me tell you but you know what in order to put yourself head and shoulders above anybody else how could you actually say you're in the music business when you're denying the audiovisual dominance of music music is seen as much as it's heard today and for the last is for the last ten years especially so you better get into well I did this track so okay what's with the visual or we don't shoot videos you know what I do I pull this is this thing right now it's my little man what y'all say what's up Chuck it's my little arm this flip flip cam you know and this is real simple the USB right goes right into a Mac or PC or whatever first of all you'll say what's up Chuck well y'all say like y'all mean it what's up Chuck I'm at Red Bull Music Academy I'm the key uh one of the keynotes you know and and this is this is the future of the music world and they are definitely doing it right now on to arrives and light which a man Chuck D all right cool yeah another thing about is right is you you better be multimedia instead of your own station your own networks making beats and making music I mean cats been doing that for 20 years you better I tell some some especially MC how many MCS we have out there okay we got one two three if you make in eight tracks for your album you got to kind of like get out of the old old idea just like you're making an album okay I'm making an album what does that mean but you're making an album right how many tracks would you put on an album so you're making an album for 1992 first of all you got to ask wise was why was there seventeen tracks on an album back in the day in the first place because there was an appetite and before that can only sustain a certain amount right the format can only sustain a certain amount but also you you know you were being released maybe once out of every two years but then you would get everything out because their appetite for rap music was like well yeah it's it's a lotta and what's more appetite than material that's why we released 16 tracks on on it takes a nation because Yoga appetite was there for it but who said that the album had to have twelve or thirteen fourteen tracks anyway it was a major contract that said that you had to deliver 12 sides to a record all right usually say they said twelve stars meanings twelve tracks and this was in the 80s and especially when the CD came into the 90s that's wise people put all their songs on an album but if you know your musical history and the 60s you had albums right they have sometimes how many cuts on it Isaac a is hot brothers so how many tracks on it what track the doors name some of the doors album they have six seven songs on it now now sometimes artists of the 60s released three albums in a year right because that was the marketplace coming into the the birth of albums and the album oriented marketplace that started to accept that we're in a different marketplace in the 90s so 17 tracks might mean that you in one seventeen track album in the digital world you got maybe three albums because who says that one of the album's can't be you know five tracks the other one seven and the other one for you put your artwork you put your concept behind it and you actually able to make a digital release of it now of course if you're making a CD you might have to put 17 tracks all on the CD if you believe that the CD is the format of the future the CD is a format of now but blank CDs are the ones that sell the most so get yourself out of the 90s way of the musical thinking and develop your own thinking now here here's another thing if you do a four track album five track album you should do a video for every single album now what's your standard of video doesn't have to be what you see on music television just I mean even if you're like it could be you know in the stills and you got a bunch of stills going on and Mac has a program that allows you to do that but in all the areas of music out there in trying to get your music out there you got to present your music visually as well as audibly and they got to see your music you know the difference between when I was growing up you heard music first and he was able to see it on television the Soul Train American Bandstand you saw perform maybe on Ed Sullivan or whatever so seeing it reminded you of the audio presentation because people use their imaginations more you know or maybe you heard in a club and your experience goes back to going and get that record because you had a great time in a club I remember boom oh wow yeah yeah so warm imagination kicks in but in a visual audio age now people see music first so whenever they hear music on the radio it reminds them of what they saw first so the imagination is working in a whole different way wouldn't say better or worse it's just different so when you comes down to you know making your music you have to also think from a visual state of mind and start getting into cutting vision as well as cutting audio and that's just I think you got to be kind of equally skilled or find a partner because it's how it works if you can't do it all yourself you either got to pay for that service well fine or collaborate with somebody that can do what you can't do and that's what you have a team so that's why you know the combination of where we came from as the bomb squad we had four to five individuals that all were skilled in different areas that we came together as a team because one person cannot do it alone sometimes one person could be great but this in the going into audio-visual age you should become a person that can do it all but you're not going to do it all the best all the time but I think that's a good way to look at making your music for the future and being a step above what separates you all that Red Bull Academy from somebody out there is just happens to be making beats and they critics out need no school you know this is your collective study of this while you're going to try to make a really kind of like a calculated move in the future with your music in which your idea of where you should be in the music field so I was just like saying that's a skill and I say how many people make music a lot of hands went up how many people shoot video only a couple of hands go up you know why because that's the hard ass thing but you got it you know if it ain't hard then it should be hard masturbate figure it out and learn how to go to cut edit pro take simple take simple devices even if you know this is a simple device goes 100 US dollars so you know it's only about 3 euros and yeah it's so understanding it's not how much you have it's what you willing to take on up here and it's not going to be easy I got my degree in design and graphics in 1984 by 1990 everything I learned was obsolete because everything I was doing by hand cut and paste you know you did it all by hand 1990s was the beginning of computer graphics I had to learn Photoshop and an adobe illustrator in the late 90s and it bled my brains man it's yo man matter of fact one of my co buddies and the producer Kyle Jason I remember he was in the studio we have a compound on Long Island and he's in the studio trying to learn Cubase and I was learning to Photoshop so we come and take a lunch break it did the kitchen man to be like yelling she was killing you there but when I finally got over the hump I was like yes I don't have to wait for a person and I can try to guide the person on how to do it I know it and you just got to got to go to the process the thing that the advantages you guys have is that you're in a studied collective so you can learn under the system but you also can can buddy up with somebody to teach you the ropes so that's that's why a collective is very important when it comes down especially in music where music is still renegade and unorganized all right who else has a question you have to choose I was someone else Reggie I'm from Perth Australia all right oh yeah the most remote city in the world isolated City yeah I'm a kid five eight and I just had a few questions I just wanted to know because it's mostly everyone's favorite video clip I the power what was that other night what was that day like and what was it like working with Spike Lee because it's a hot video I just wanted to know I can't take any credit for that oh I don't usually take credit cards Spike Lee is was innovative renegade filmmaker who dared to do in film like we dared to do in music and he actually took bed-stuy Brooklyn brought ahold of what the movie industry there had the momentum of making a statement in a very politically charged New York City at that time made the statement worldwide and do the right thing and he made fight the time for what it is so Spike Lee and Spike Lee first shot fight the power as a trailer with all the film clips and then followed up with the Public Enemy version that he extended so it was you know it was signifying that even at that time that music and hip hop was visual as well as audible if it was just a song it would just been like you know and especially at that time it really didn't fit in to be you know a song that actually was head and shoulders even above the stuff that we did but as far as fight the power its meaning the film Spike Lee that started Brooklyn New York City at that particular time making a political statement you know its meaning is well beyond the Sonics and it when people see it sauce performing lives we always stepped up to the plate to say yeah well you know but half of a song other than the Sonics and the lyrics are the spiritual meanings of it you know you can have lyrics that say one thing but the meaning of it say something else and that's why I've always asked rappers and emcees I say well sometimes you know you want to don't stay locked in to what you think something is is kind of like gravity into some other spaces because that record is going to be there for the test of time and when people come back to it even when you come back to it you got to feel that at least it came from you you can't say it didn't come from you and we know we all can make excuses always make excuses I mean in some songs I made it I'll be like saying yeah that's how I thought at that particular time yeah do you feel great about it nah but this is the meaning about it you know but you want to kind of like make most of the songs in your career represent where you're going to be in your life because it's an extension of you and your soul and um that's fight the power you know like I said fight the power was a collaborative effort it had a lot of help you know so I can't take any crime at fact I can't take credit for credit or any songs up there every single song I've done everything I've done in this music industry has been a collaborative effort even this conversation with our Chairman mouth so all right we're going to pass the mic along to next person hello I'm Sarah from London okay and I just wanted to know like you were saying about the current state of American hip-hop and how its kind of alright really showing off and stuff like that so is there any new hip-hop that you actually feel in at the moment well here's another thing that just doesn't line up with with new questions or I should say old questions about new ways that we take on music iPod comes out be able to put 10,000 songs on the iPod somebody says what are you listening to at the moment and he like what is 10,000 song about if I give you a top 20 do I give you a top 20 for the last five minutes or do I give you a top 20 for the last year or whatever a month because you have a lot of selections you could carry the soundtrack of your life along with you to answer your question I think there's all kinds of accidental or don't get natural good you know great exposure and I think myspace has been a great vehicle and I think moving into I like that great vehicles for people who don't have the traditional record company situations I like NY oil because at my age and stage he's saying things that I'm familiar with I think you know I think the roots to me are the epitome and we talked about them last night said I think what the roots are doing right now they're kicking into their second phase of their career which speaks to me even more because just that question Questlove is just gone into that second zone of confidence as as a band leader with hip-hop sensibilities and futuristic thoughts with a passion for the past and legacy he's going to a place there few people are ventured into I think on the group with my label crew girl order being one is a few female rap autonomous situations I'm getting behind them full-time this year because they some they speak the unspoken or they speak to the to the to the voiceless because if you say women in hip-hop you know I mean that to me that's the underdog another cactus coming out here I got it rough today you know I'm 18 years old I can't figure out where is that understand but I think there's a problem that most MCS don't listen to each other so when they come along and say yo I got this that you never heard about son for real it's the reason why sometimes you might have 650 5346 MCS saying exactly the same thing with exactly the same type of beats in exactly the same beats per minute with exactly the same beginning and ending with with eight eight bars or sixteen bars or four Horace's in one break and you know so not to say that it's bad it's just that a lot of similarity there so when I'm listening to different things a whole female group is going to spark me a cat like NY oil who reinventing himself is going to spark me you know a certain thing the roots who take it from abandon aesthetic into a hip hop aesthetic with black thought riding you know these different waves it's going to spark me but then again Big Joe Turner's turning me out right now to for some reason because he's saying you know music from the past is just as enough unknown as music in the future and now that you can have it on a device and be able to say okay let me let me hear some you know some James Moody and let me hear some something like the let me think something is really really kind of like the flow box so the fact that you could go from James Moody to the flow box and still kind of you know make it fit into your day it is is a good thing I think it was as wide as it terrain you know there's a lot I would tell people in London there's a lot of emcees that's coming out of London because that need to relate to their surroundings whether it be you know like sway and now Dizzee Rascals is getting you know he's doing American tours now and I would tell them for the longest time just like I'm telling like Canadian emcees don't get strung onto New York try to speak from a global standpoint and you'll swing into New York or you'll swing it to the United States but one way or another one thing we have to also understand the United States I've been telling people for like 25 years is not New York in LA all people like home I go to Atlanta for the first time well you know the United States is 2,000 by 3,000 square miles on the lower 48 which most Americans don't understand Americans are poor in history and geography one of the biggest things that that shocked Americans where the amount of black people they were televised in New Orleans during Katrina which shocked the Wisconsin white folks like I didn't know so many black people in New Orleans because you don't know nothing about geography and history history to tell you it's a slave point geography to tell you that support that came through and channeled people and goods up the Mississippi which goes from New Orleans up to Minneapolis where a bridge collapsed last year but you got to kind of like keep dumbass off' occation at an all-time high by whippings of mass distraction in order to pimp the people out to get them to vote for John McCain so they're availing you got to keep the masses dumb you know what they say take the masses and just move the em over and consider that the crowd so you can pimp them out and control them so we hope that music and culture kind of goes opposite to that and that's what we hope for from MCS so so those are MCS that's walking me can you fully see you know the public enemy attention a million's era you know ki respond it's it's such a very unique time in place you foresee anything like that happening again thank our that's happy to go things like that are happening now we're where the time we've never ever experienced things that happened at all like that now but is there time and is there K and concern for people to to navigate and Corral that into a popular understand is it too big to actually to actually take it and actually project it as as as it did back then so don't know that doesn't exist now but as a dominant sort of you know cultural force that it was then at that time for us I think technology is dominant as opposed to the software I think the hardware is dominant cerrado is the revolution iPods have been a revolution before that Napster was the digital revolution that everybody engaged in the software that actually rides it is just it's widespread now it's bad so I think the revolution will come and what happens to properly explain all these big bang effects that are happening all around the skate that's that's the information to the masses about what's happening has to be better I think we have all kinds of artistic explosions in all kinds of vocal forward that's being done but I just think that navigation look like if you have to agree with me come on radio tells you nothing and and although there's been kind of like small steps in national satellite radio and then there's aspect on digital radio even what you is doing and what you do as a writer and what you've done an ego trip and The Book of Lists you don't you don't see a parallel component to that and explaining to the masses what this is about that's a big problem it's like watching sports with no broadcaster and no statistic keeping sports is all about dates history where's that now in the future stats everyday abilities weighed balanced judgment comparative analysis and and non-stop Broadcasting also called sports cam is non-stop in the United States they have SportsCenter anybody familiar with SportsCenter ok are you able to catch it you do do whatever ways you catch it if you from the states or whatever Sports Center shows the same our show six times in the morning before they get into the news of the day that means they ain't even trying to give they giving you a chance not to be stupid on the statistic meaning you can't make up we have nothing like that explaining music to the detail for where y'all actually studying it or taking it in at Red Bull so that's a big thing that's missing right about now is this like more advanced that y'all getting the music you find yourself more alone go to somebody and you actually make it in music and in somebody's mother like oh my son's a DJ he does what you do he does what you do right and what do you do you you DJ you make beats it makes beats and he's 12 you know yes ma'am in the back Harry how are you Chuck I'm good I'm my name is Benny's and I'm from Brooklyn New York and I am a producer so I'm representing that underrepresented section in hip hop first I want to say kudos for Public Enemy for adding such a political twist which is very important and it's something that we're definitely missing right now I grew up on hip hop so I was able to see the fun part and the political part and really understand how important it was its life as a culture in terms of when I do my live show up and trying to incorporate more political aspects because I do realize how important and how strong music is as a culture even though right now like you said especially in hip-hop in the states it has become something that's laughable extremely so my question is because I do believe it has become a big corporate entity as with everything else that we do in the States and in the world but especially in the states where ego and greed is a huge huge problem do you there was definitely a time period where there were a number of hip-hop groups they were very political and then all of a sudden you didn't hear much about them or many other groups for that matter that were political with their music do you think it was a matter of taste in terms of the audience and what they wanted or what they yearn for or was it a move strategically in terms of the music industry to try to take away something that could have had a very powerful voice and like you said in terms of keeping the people stupid or was it just a matter of focusing on whatever was making money like you know is it something that just happen or you know what it was it a strategic move because I do believe that just like our mass media our education system everything in the States regardless of how great they make it appear to be it's made to make us you know as I say sheeple what do you think about that well although all of the above what you said was actually kind of like accurate to to the point and it becomes harder to discuss to the masses because it's very detailed intricate you know it's very easy because I might put up a red flag all conspiracy theories so who says you know you know what's going on make those secret about it's like corporations are in business so they can actually make money so therefore they're not talking about equality of anything as opposed to quantity quantity is always ruling the roost especially if the major corporations at that time when you do they actually had musical chairs as far as the executive branches of the people holding those positions so it wasn't so much favorable to worry about something long-term because they don't even know their term being in a position being the president of Sony or being the president of this record company underneath one of the majors so their whole job is to be there and do numbers and oh wow the music and the hip hip hop in the 80s was this thing where you got $10,000 you can make a million of the $10,000 but if you don't actually understand that it's a it's a business where you got to kind of like watch out for that line going into the area of diminishing returns then you can also fall into a situation of not catching not paying attention to the quality that got people attracted in the first place and I think that's what kind of happened to hip-hop to the point where okay more of its going to come knowing that you can put ten thousand dollars in and make a million there's a story of ruthless records then eventually it becomes this thing where you put a million in to make ten thousand records where it's that now it's totally like reversed so it's no longer a business model that's based on the quantity anymore I've always had a belief that if the community doesn't support you then they can't place you in more situations that a corporation is going to displace you in the record store and sell you and that's why I think that selling as a music artist as opposed to being able to engage your art with people you know once you're in a position of selling then you fall victim to all those capitalistic rules and corporation you know motives that actually put you in the same position as muffler's probably got to try to move these mufflers we got to try to move these loaves of bread oh we got to move these CDs we got to move this music and once you're under that model you know then then what it is and the quality and the spiritual aspect that's all out the window it's like yo you you're with this company you sell the units you don't sell the units you out of there but what happens if people can support it if they don't if it doesn't exist or if they don't know it exists dollars then like you say if you're a few communities and if your audience isn't there in terms of this whatever it is music that you're delivering if if they're not putting it out there it's different now just because the business models are dependent because it's never it hasn't been ever it's never been supported by our education education is a system that supports books you you know being in Brooklyn did you read books in the seventh and eighth and ninth grade and say well I'm reading this book like why am I reading Huck Finn and I quit what's why did the school system buy three hundred and thirty six thousand books for witnesses money go to and why is this part of the school budget and why hasn't black music than a part of the curriculum and school study ever you know I mean as far as a general national level because you know black kids it's just part of the American system and so therefore American culture will be subsidized wherever that money might go so you can read Ethan Frome or even Charles Dickens you know great expectations well you know they got to buy the books for you to read you know so therefore all the music that we've had as far as it's not sleep on its black music black people being involved in music because our expression had to come through the music because all those other poems were shut to us so we expressed our history our story in our music so all you got to do to get black history it's just study the music you go back to the first recording Thomas Edison 1877 Mary hello Lam and not far from there are black people singing spirituals or whatever and music that it will tell you about that time you know going in the ragtime going in the into to blues jazz or whatever and you get the history by default which teaches you all the appendages on how to actually learn what you got to learn but if you don't include it in the education system you as a person that's bringing across something that ok I'm bringing across something that's good for people well it's not included in education so it ain't in the community so the only way that you can get outlet is what you got to go sell yourself next to a bottle of vodka it's so bottle vodkas like yo from 9 o'clock to 3 o'clock in the morning this is our time and you got to sell your orange juice in the bottle of vodka time and you know and really seriously at a party the orange juice is only going to be used as a mixture you know and so therefore the problem in the art is not supported by the community it's not supported by the educational system so therefore its levied into the economic system of companies on how they deliver art and that's an unfair comparison it's like taking a kid and saying okay mary had a little lamb or playboy hmm you know it's the lowest hanging fruit and the lowest hanging fruit in the music industry as far as black people you know it's easy to sell you know in America because America is built on the treatment of black people as so it's more familiar than the upward understanding of where we are in the country and in the world because it's been saturated inside Americana and whenever you come up with something to speak for black education women human beings is going against the grain because it's being sold or better yet it has to be sold really it should be given away what should happen to your music if it's positive for the community and just up with upwardly favorable whatever I don't know if I to the right term for it is that a school system should buy you know 1 million CDs in the Brooklyn area and subsidize it around the school system if they can learn from it and at the same time you're not positioned to have to sell in HMV you know oh I gotta you know I got to get this airplay in order for me to actually inform the community of something good so therefore why is the community going to get something bad because I know the airwaves it's going to be like this is what moves the one that's moved the most familiar that's what's going to actually you know be picked up I mean just not even going further but just give you a point of view other people like oh man why do you got like the chicks in the video and why they got you know just going on and want to be a derogatory why why did showing this i mean who can't sell sex to a 12 year old kid who can't sell primp a promise of a club to 11 year old 11 year old can't get in the club but ask them if they know anything about the club they'll tell you he'll yeah I know about the club hell yeah I know 50 Cent's bracket they'll say pity I know 50 Cent's record in the club but you can't get in the club you six seven years from getting in the club but you know all about it you ask the kids now explain the strip club and they'll tell you what a strip club is about and never been in one and can't wait till they 18 to 19 to probably get getting one and they three to seven years off but they'll tell you exactly what it's like so these are the images that are being sold because it's the lowest hanging fruit because it's where young people kind of like want to have that vice side and it's kind of like want to think it oh this is finding my own identity but they aren't they aren't given the other hand side the other side has to kind of be given to them as the other side is sold to them you can't ask them like okay do you want vegetables you want ice cream which one you want to buy ask a kid day oh no that's right now no no no I don't want the ice cube I'll take the asparagus I take the broccoli yes and that's the same thing that's happening in music and culture the culture if it's positive forward it has to be supported by what the community is already spending its money on in education so culture but but the structured America don't consider culture or black people's culture and music even being part of an education system because they say it's not enough there and it doesn't speak to everybody so what that's crazy because black music has spoken to everybody across the world that's why you find out musicians will tell you for the longest period of time I go to other places in the world and they know everything I'm doing and I come back to United States on the same block they'll know who the hell I am by the old man's man you know so how did getting it how did getting it you know the reason that works and worked in Europe and and other places in the world because of the contrast the curiosity also the the fact that nightlife was triggered on being like okay a little bit more broad than than just saying okay you know in Germany we're just going to have German musicians bring German music all night and no okay this comes from the black musicians who actually started coming over after World War one playing and bringing some music that people like oh this is a that's what you call it jazz or bit systems which people started coming together with because culture is that thing that brings human beings together automatically there's something about the bite that you cannot fight you know so yeah you have to get supported by a system that just has that magic doors open universally as far as being there for the masses you know corporations are there to sell you stuff so that stage they've treated music like like rims or hubcaps or sandwiches and then right now people feel that they could get their sandwiches somewhere else that's why they'll realize like no they before they were the only place that made the hardware to play the software now you already got your hardware from computer companies and now computer companies and telephone companies are now dominating the software that's why the music business screaming they're like the phone company and Apple and pcs you know where the record company listen us you still want a sign we still on the side with us don't you and more people like sign with you out yeah if you give me some money but you know and that's why people want to get signed to major record company money and exposure but I tell you this is that welcome to the terrordome because you signed with a major record now on urban music can you wait for 24 months and then I'm telling you what to do with it that little event and they ain't given big advances like they didn't know what the 80s and I they give you like okay here's his ten thousand patents to hold you off for maybe 24 months until we figure out a way to position you in the marketplace okay can I can I actually do no release my mp3s on my own like get my setup at 9:00 now we don't want to you know what you know we we want to exclude exclusive rights to have you with us so even if it's ten thousand pounds oh there's 100,000 pounds if you got a group of five people and strong co songwriters is that going to last for 24 months split amongst five people and the making of the record and all those things that go along with it yeah you might have made it made to your music for nothing shot your videos and all but you got a split with five people or three people and then all these other things that figure into it oh yeah you know like a lot of young people like I won't buy my mom's on Flint how crude you know and then that's 40,000 pounds and all the things like on 60,000 left so becomes a mathematical you know avalanche after a while but long story short that's why it's been an obstacle for women great art to actually influence because those areas are still closed all right who's got the next question and you've been talking about the when hey Barcelona I was born here and my name is David I'm always I'm always trying to be nosey to find out where people were from before I can always take a story back home like yeah they were from Barcelona Poland Brooklyn you know wow this is you know because the story that extends for me because your voice is going port yam from us Ilona and and I I get my hands in there with an IRA Public Enemy record when I I was 15 I didn't understand any English at all but you talk about the power on the music and I want to ask you about the power on the visual to on the art and design also the information you got from a public Public Enemy record when you to gather the sheet and you rate all the information you write a lot of different bands as much likelihood good I think the logo too is a powerful level one of the best lowers in the music history for me and and also the concept of organization you you give with with the the way Public Enemy was you know all the and in the shows and stuff like this I want I want to know who came with the concept of the logo and their art in the in the album's yeah we all came with the concept of trying to present yourself visual and also putting as much information on the onto our album as possible it's all important because we didn't have much time this is before they made videos so we had to be able to explain ourselves just like when you we called it the cereal box theory it was like you go into a store you see the cereal box and the most you could do is read the box and then when you eat the food you want to read the Box still and just turn it around and see the ingredients to see all the stuff on the back so we wanted to be able to get everything out into the artwork and the presentation the imagery I designed the logo I'm from a designer aspect I always like to see the rock and roll guys they had logos and stuff like that so why couldn't it be the same in rap because I liked art and design as far as making the music legitimate as much as the other genres and then you know like being a fan of history you take involved from all the things that you see to make a visual presentation we didn't make up anything we just kind of like took involved from the from the area of visual I guess here visual aspects that we that we've seen all our lives any participants and questions yeah and by the way shows a I'm from hydrogen here to Brazil alright and I I like to know like you said you you started to scene because we went to parties and you pisses off because the guys were whack like how how come you you became so political after that you know how how your entertainment thing got into Politico and how you feel about this this other the represent now are just entertainment no no politics at all um we were fortunate to come at it another time I was born in 1960 so when I was born I had Negro on my birth certificate in civil rights is 1965 I was five years old Malcolm X was killed in 1965 I remember that dr. Martin Luther King was killed in 1968 I was eight years old Vietnam wars and from 1963 all the way to 1971 I remember that very clearly I wrote black steel in our chaos after my uncle actually had an officer come to the house hand them a letter and said he had to be drafted into the Vietnam War he opened the letter and just dropped it on the table and it just graduated high school so these are things is already inside me as well as the music say it loud I'm black and I'm proud by James Brown that said that we black we not colors we not need what we black we speak to the world because it's how we looked Curtis Mayfield you know always spoke inspiration these are already music in the house so is already inside me so when rap music came out later on you speak a lot of words you speak where you come from and what you know so I mean if you're going to say a lot say what you know so that's how that whole yeah people like well your political but know this is where I come from because this is what's inside me and I think a lot of times when rappers tried to copy a political stance that wasn't inside them the same way it might have been born in like in 75 or 1982 different thing going on you can read back but you can't actually talk from your personal experiences that can help out to you know by reading back and talking to people to help build your experiences huh yeah it's not like leaving the that like I said live it through the war to the but but you live it but it's watching and reacting to people who are actually living it and talking to you that's like when when when I'm an ad when Reagan and Bush came along they knocked down a plenty of opportunity so people were responding to - all of a sudden a lot of guns in the community from nowhere drugs and the communities from nowhere all of a sudden is like it goes from wheat the cocaine in three years like who why what so you have conversations with people but you also have people in your own family who are wiped out for from these things so you comment on it games in the 90s and then the Millennium young-sam Bill Clinton came along in the United States and it was it seemed like people partied for eight years but so P Diddy comes along and and he might party in 96 or 97 because Bill Clinton is going around saying he's a black president so people you know kind of went to sleep a little bit and say well you don't have to be aggressively important and also Bill Clinton cut off the rest of the world so he kind of like made America a focal point and so it was a party time but around the rest of the world policies were enacted on the rest of the planet there was still very American liked but it just wasn't reflected in the rap music at the time which was celebrate the good times that's why one of the reasons that you know just briefly speaking why I think that America didn't go for Hillary Clinton versus Barack Obama because I think America was just tired of you know Reagan Bush Clinton Bush Clinton a loud noise like enough of that we don't want no dynasty going on so I think that has something to do with that why you know people would say no we kid was stop it start with some something a new sort of so that's what's were that right now so it was a good point that you brought up I mean yeah it's already was inside of me so I could not actually ask for somebody who's 10 years younger than me to try to share that point of view because I remember seeing these things I think we got to one last question we're going to take before we break for lunch hi I am Natalia from Mexico um hi I was wondering about mm once you realized that you have to deal with so many things around what you do which is like music in the beginning and then how can you deal with your inspiration like once you have to do so many things and you have to manage like I guess it must be like I love to do on music business and then what happens when you are on a stage and you will have something to say I enjoy inspiration like have you ever being have you ever felt away from it like I don't know you know the thing that probably will to make you always get a perspective where yet just studied musicians and other musics and how they went through it and what they had to go through that sometimes make you look at Europe you know your surroundings with some kind of understanding a little bit better I mean sometimes you know like when you're making a record and I said I've made about fifteen or sixteen albums and then somebody might say well wow that's a lot and then you find out that someone like Duke Ellington has done on seventy-six albums or you write a song it Duke Ellington wrote when he was 76 in the deathbed wrote on matchsticks and so you get a perspective or this just this artist came through and had to serve on a plantation and then finally was able to record and then had to go in jail like you know you get the Lead Belly story through I think study other musicians and what they've gone through in the past even in the present and well even you know artists around you and you'll find out that you'll find out where you're at you'll get inspiration from other artists and you'll find that this is a bunch of artists that look at you that there's trying to get to where you're at right now so you can always look at another artist and always ask questions I would say that it's key for artists to always ask other artists questions like how do you do what you're doing and then and then how do you make it from A to B and how do you work at the same time yet play a club yet got some kids yet you know find out this time that you be able to sell you know abuse your mother and father or whatever to eat dinner with them wherever they might live and still you travel somewhere there's some people in this room that's that you know you get the most out of 24 hours I mean for example I got in here late yesterday and after a long day at the problem at Heathrow and I was knocked out but then I'm old of them but I still amazed at how y'all go and hang out to four o'clock in the morning and be up at 9:00 and is crazy man you know I mean I did dad for years back when my kids you know like youngest one who's grown and my oldest one was growing in my youngest was in high school and I did that in my life and I look back on saying how the hell did I do it you just do it and I remember when it was single digits and I would go on the tour and get back and then take them to school with you know finish coming out of studio at 5:00 in the morning take them to school at 7:00 you sleep for an hour and the calls do interviews pick them up at school at 3:00 feed them be go somewhere and then 9:00 be back in the studio again and do it over and over any okay yeah it got to go to UK for three days you know you go to California you got to speak here and then still do all this thing I mean you look back on it and says oh yeah it's 24 hours in a day but here's a hit of a good way to look at time you know you can't master time you only can manage it and sometimes you can't share time because time is different to people to different people sometimes it's easy to look at 24 hours like it is and break your hours down into minutes because instead of saying well I did it for our break your hour into 60 minutes and dedicate minutes to something well in 60 minutes break those down to seconds that's why I've always been a person to tell artists be very fair to your fans be very fair to your fans like family Fanta not fans but fans because if you have these bodyguards keeping you away five people come to you you keep them away you can spend two minutes and give quality time in two minutes to five people to make them feel it for a lifetime you spend ten minutes trying to keep them away you can spend two minutes to see them hey how you doing oh wow what are you doing Bobo Bobo mobile home and in two minutes you shook everybody's hand which only takes what it only takes six seconds does take five people's hands it only takes ten seconds let's shake five people's hands look them in the eye as they alone you know so a lot of these things that this industry tries to do like Oh bodyguards in the VIP section and stay away they spend more time and energy fighting people instead of engaging them to come in and in exchanging and communicating and that's what this business has to work on it has to work on better public relations and when public relations comes in with you with the audience and then the performer actually become as one then you have something that's around for a long time which for some true respect so you know I look at these places they they got all the security and any you know these big bodyguards and I'm like saying man ain't nobody trying to like beat up on this office you know and the artists got five bodyguards I what the hell did people want to do to this one blue person you know I mean I won't even name some names I've seen from people that got all just you know these bodyguards around to protect them from what saying hello so so that's how you guys want to also treat it to you your public is your relations that's why I say public relations is very important you know so I don't think I think you just got to look at situations carefully and look at time carefully - that's my my only thing I could say to that thank you for the opportunity to speak in front of you and I would say keep on doing the music keep on realizing how fun it is and keep that youthful spirit of knowing that your cultural ambassadors and so whenever you go home to you to your countries understand that the music and the culture is the thing that ties us all together as human beings on this very important planet thank you you [Applause]

Channel: Red Bull Music Academy

Views: 23,734

Rating: 4.887588 out of 5

Keywords: “red bull music academy”, Red Bull Lecture with Chuck D, Chuck D Lecture, Chuck D, Chuck D Interview, Chuck D Discussion, Chuck D Public Enemy, Chuck D talks Hip Hop, Chuck D talks Music, Chuck D on Fight the Power, Public Enemy Rapper, Public Enemy Fight the Power, Chuck D lead, Chuck D on Making music, Chuck D talks Rap, Fred Wesley-sampling, Chuck D Live, Chuck D talks Politics, Chuck D Art, Chuck D talks to Red Bull

Id: dYuBnBzEJSc

Length: 149min 14sec (8954 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 21 2018