When Chuck D dubbed himself "the incredible, the rhyme animal" on It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, nobody challenged him. And even though Public Enemy's influence has dimmed, he's kept busy. He has goaded the music industry to embrace technology and runs several Web ventures, among them Rapstation.com, a mix of hiphop news and downloadable music. He publishes regular columns for a number of online and print magazines. His first book, Fight the Power: Rap, Race, and Reality, was published in 1997. He has been an outspoken advocate for Mumia Abu-Jamal and Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin (the former H. Rap Brown).
Before speaking to college students recently at Wesleyan University in Middletown, CT?he says he's done about 40 such talks a year for the past 12 years?Chuck talked about music, politics, New York since Sept. 11, the much-hyped feud between hiphoppers Jay-Z and Nas, and his age. Sort of.
How old are you?
How old is not important.
Born in '61, is that right?
Born in '60.
'60, okay. And you haven't had a birthday yet in 2002? You're 41 years old then, right?
See, you answered your own question. You know, to me, I always tell journalists, figure it out and then ask the real questions.
Fair enough. So will there be another Public Enemy record anytime soon?
After 2000 I don't believe in album concepts like they were in the 80s and the 90s. It's just the fact that today's audience wants records, singles. But the industry wants to still be able to sell albums at a high rate. So we just say we'll come up with some different things and look at an album differently... Like, a certain portion of it will be live cuts, a certain portion will be remixes of classics and a certain portion will be some new studio cuts. And that's how I will do albums, as far as myself is concerned. We're playing with [a new album that would be out] in April or May, but I mean, it's gonna be what it is?not trying to prove anything other than just creative expression.
And it will be a Public Enemy record?
Yeah, yeah. We'll put three albums out within a span of maybe two years, two and a half years, that have that combination.
What do you think of the climate in the culture now with the so-called war on terrorism and all the flag-waving that's going on?
It's scary that people don't think on their own terms and when they have to have propaganda feed the fire. You know, yes, we had an unfortunate incident in the United States on Sept. 11, but it was part of the whole back-and-forth program that this country was part of. And America got slapped this time, and all of a sudden people think it came out of nowhere. Things don't come out of nowhere, not when you're dealing with that level of world policies and world governments and stuff like that... You want Americans to become more worldly, you want them to become more aware that there's other places and people and things outside of the 2000-by-3000-mile box that we call the United States. When a person raises their child, do they raise them to be an American or do they raise them to be a human being that deals with the world? I mean, there's not a Mars and Venus foreign policy?you're dealing with earthlings?so to me that's the bottom line.
What's it like visiting and living in cities and spending time in cities since Sept. 11?
A lot of cars riding around with flags in the window. That's new shit, you know. I think people initially after the Trade Center incident in New York, they were humane and open to each other and embracing. Now things are kind of like getting back to normal, back to New York's old way of seeing somebody walk down the street and somebody says hello to you and, you know, you're like, "What the fuck you sayin' hello to me for?" ...In other cities the impact I think looms larger because a lot of people in other cities haven't been to New York yet, so it's almost like a movie in a way.
You think the city will miss Giuliani?
As a mayor you're supposed to do your goddamned job, you know. He did his job, I guess. He said, "Fuck it, I don't care what you think about me." Maybe you gotta have that type be the mayor of New York. But it's really scary having a billionaire being the mayor like Michael Bloomberg. I think Michael Bloomberg is a tin man.
What's good in hiphop now?
I think the talent level is definitely high. What's bad?corporate overload for the sake of consumers, the McDonaldization of hiphop to the point where you got a lot of artists who are not looking at it as art. They're looking at it just solely as a business, and therefore, instead of actually expounding upon art, they're trying to become more similar as opposed to being different. And that's very important to push any art form forward. But then you've got a lot of people who've never studied art. So if you don't study art you look at music and art just as something that you buy or something that you gulp down like a burger. And it suddenly becomes something else. And that's not healthy for anything that you want to be around for a long time.
What about the Jay-Z/Nas thing, the feud? You have any thoughts on it?
Nas has to perform onstage. How can you be a performer if you don't perform? Have you ever seen Nas perform? Case closed. Have you seen Jay-Z Unplugged? Case closed. I think Nas really has to prove his art?why are you a performer? Hiphop hasn't created the performer. I tell a lot of artists all the time, I say, you know, the stage has been here for hundreds of years... I like Nas, I just think he's gotta work harder. It's almost like basketball?you gotta have a handle, you gotta have defense, you gotta be able to shoot the ball and you gotta be able to box out?all those things. I think in rhymes Jay-Z does that and Nas has to really take it to the stage. And you know it's beyond lyrics because you know, shit, Sarah McLachlan, Ani DiFranco write great lyrics. We're not just talking about lyrics. There's thousands of great lyricists. You're talkin' about rapper, rhymer?in hiphop you gotta take it to the stage as an end result. You can't just let videos, records do all the work.
Will there be another solo record, after Autobiography of Mistachuck (1996)?
If I go in and cut something and release it the next week [on a website], what's the big deal about me releasing an album? That's dinosaur thinking: "When you coming out with an album?" Well, I just released eight MP3s. You know what I'm sayin'? Well, what the fuck man, what are you waitin' for? Go ahead and get it. That's the immediacy of technology. But you have a lot of people with their foot in the future and their ass in the past, so they wait around: "Yo, you comin' out with your album?" To young people it's such a ridiculous statement right now. People who are 25 and over are waiting like dinosaurs and sluggishly walking to Tower Records: "You got that album out?" The album's been out amongst the people that really want it. Some people say, "Well, I just want to support you." Oh, that's cool. Send the check here, then.