There is so much to say about Public Enemy's magnum opus—and only about 25% of it I'd be personally qualified to speak on, due to my being brand new to a lot of this—but the most important thing I can say is that this shit is fucking awesome. I first became aware of It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back's existence on that Rolling Stone list from so many years ago (the best best rap album of all time, according to that list), but I waited. I waited until I was ready. Fifteen years later, I finally am.
I am ready because I am mature enough to acknowledge the poignancy of the subject matter in the lyrics, and how the themes expressed by Chuck D et al. have not changed even after all this time. Do the Right Thing made the same point, and the movie primed me for Public Enemy in more ways than one.
I am ready because enough time has passed that Flavor Flav has receded from the national spotlight, and does not serve as a distraction here. On ITaNoMtHUB, he is not a distraction, he is an asset. I can't blame him for grabbing the bag in the '00s by becoming a living cartoon on national television, but I'm glad that I didn't think about him in that way while listening. There's a fine line between hype man and albatross, but Flavor Flav does a great job staying on the right side of that line.
I am ready because I rightfully grapple with the fact that I am a man who is very white and who still feels so cool listening to this shit, especially with the windows down on a warm spring day in Philadelphia. I turned the volume down when I was stopped at a red light at 42nd and Girard because I don't want to be disrespectful, but that in turn makes me feel a little naughty listening to it. It's such a fucking cliché for some fucking white boy to be enthralled with classic hip hop, and I don't want to fall into such a cliché. But at the same time, this also makes this album feel kind of like a secret I'm keeping. One of the greatest rap albums of all time, and it still feels like a personal experience.
I am ready because it took me a long time but I'm finally at the point that I understand the nuts and bolts of rap music. I can listen to Public Enemy and I can break it down into parts. Here's the James Brown breakbeat, here's the sampledelica bridge, here's the record scratches at the exact right time, here's Chuck D using his lyrics to both paint a picture and to function as rhythm.
That last point is the most important part for me this week. I heard patterns in the lyrical rhythm that I would have never heard if I listened at age seventeen. Like, for example, how in "Caught, Can We Get a Witness?", bars are grouped into fours, with the percussion hitting a heavy kick drum on the one of each bar.
And in each group, Chuck D skips the downbeat for the first and third bars, hitting the up beat after one for each, and then for the second bar hits the up beat before the one, and then on the fourth bar starts the lyrics on the downbeat. I am absolute dogshit trying to explain this in words. Point being that Chuck D is so goddamn talented, and I don't know if I would've been able to appreciate the extent of his rhythmical prowess prior to this point in my life.
There was a lot to take in (this is one of those albums that can't possibly be consumed in just one week). Still, every minute I spent with Public Enemy this week was a delight. I was ready.
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