Let’s Connect Politic, Ditto feat. Marc Lamont Hill

This week on The What?! author, activist Marc Lamont Hill talks to Nyla and Mouse about pressing politic issues and how to affect change on the local level. We also get into hip hop, politics and what music inspires him.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
He said, everybody, this is Mark Lamont Hill, and you're
listening to the What hip Hop Questions Legends and lists.
Make sure you checking out every week. But some guys
and welcome to the What hip Hop Questions? But I
and I am the man of Puson Juxton Juxtapositions, Mouse
Jones and this week we have a very special guest,
Arthur Professor and activists. Mark Lamont Hill, Welcome to the What.

(00:22):
Thank you for having me. I'm looking forward to this. Yes, welcome, welcome, welcome,
Congratulations on everything, Congratulations on all you've been doing, all
the success and all the work you've been doing, and
thank you. I think it's very important that we, you know,
in these moments that we get you know, uh thought
thought leaders and activism people actually moving the needle forward.

(00:44):
It's important to acknowledge that. I appreciate that, my brother
always good to see you now, that's good to meet
you and to build with y'all. It's gonna be dope, man.
I love what you're doing with this show. I love
the idea, I love all of it. Thank you, Thank you.
Hopefully you feel like that after the show. I wish
I wish we were in person. Because you know, whenever

(01:05):
Mouth starts to make his crazy, terrible opinions, you throw
tomatoes at him. It was like on deck. So you know, sorry,
it has to be through soon, but I'm so happy
to have you as well. Oh. Now, Mark, From abortion
rights to climate change to gun control, there's a whole
bunch of issues that's currently impact in the country. Is

(01:26):
there an issue that you care about? I wouldn't say
most about, because I think all those things connect the same. Um.
The thing that is, in my face, the most right now, um,
thing that has me the most um or the least
optimistic at the moment is this issue around reproductive rights.
You know, when I look at the Supreme Court, when

(01:47):
I look at the layout of the Supreme Court, and
when I look at how carefully the right wing has
crafted this project, um, it's actually stunning. You know, year
after year. There was a time we put like this.
There was a time when people throw abortion rights couldn't
go anywhere. There was a time when people say, you
know what, we don't even have to to put this
into law in a certain kind of way, because the

(02:08):
Court has decided it is the law of land. That's it.
It would be like it would be like reversing voting rights.
It will be like reversing you know, for black folks.
You will be like, it would be like something like that. Um.
And they just kept chipping away, chipping away, chipping away,
chipping away at the state level, chipping away getting the
right judges, and chipping away a public opinion, chipping away,
buying this politician and that by a politician. Um. And

(02:30):
then by the end they get to a point where
you get Donald Trump. They get to a point where
they get to elect Supreme Court or select Supreme Court justices. Uh.
And they get to a point where suddenly they overturned
what was a solemn and sacred right for women for
for decades. And I think that the scary part of

(02:52):
it for me is not just that it happened, is
that we didn't see it coming when we should have
When I guess when when we had because obviously it's
not right when it happened, Like when when can you
identify can you point out a time where you where
we should have took more that the eighties? In the
the eighties, you know, they never didn't say what they

(03:16):
were doing. You know, it would be like a of
the biggest wall between here in Mexico, popped up right
told you that's what he's gonna do. We just thought
it was so un realistic and so impossible that it
wasn't anything to worry about. But the differences, this was
a realistic goal because so many Americans, uh take that

(03:36):
position really, you know, people who are on on a
religious right. Also slowly, carefully Republicans since the nineteen eighties
have been appointing judges. This is this is the part
that people keep missing. They appoint judges at the not
just at the Supreme Court level. That's you know, that's
every you get one appointment, maybe if you're lucky as
a president in your whole term, um, but at the

(03:58):
at the federal level, and then you look locally, state levels,
you see more and more courts moving to the right.
So the groundwork has been set since the nineteen eighties,
and we watched it happen and it's like we just
didn't focus. And I think one of the challenges we
have often as a community and I mean black people,
I mean just as Americans, is we think about the
presidential election is like the super Bowl, and that's the

(04:20):
only thing we get up for. It. You know, people
only watch the Super Bowl, right, they don't watch no
other game. They don't care, but not not but they'll
watch the super Bowl. A lot of us treat the
presidential election that way. So when elections are happening on
the state level, when when we're deciding who the mayor
is going to be, we're deciding who the house or
the state house is gonna be. We just said, who
are all the men are going to be in the city,

(04:40):
like like Chicago. You know, we're not there, and so
the outcomes are different than we want, and the policies
are different than we want. And so we look at
this finally, like if you think about, like um so,
an issue like gender neutral bathrooms, you know, the fight
against gener at your bathrooms. Is it being waged at

(05:02):
the federal level. It's been waging at the state level.
And so when you look at all these states, they
keep winning the battle because they've been fighting for the
state house. We all want to worry about who the
president is gonna be. Where the whole state houses is
Republican mhm. I feel like a lot of people in
our community don't necessarily really understand how it works, like

(05:24):
from state level to winning different seats and stuff like that.
So how do you think. I guess we as activists
in our own rights, Um, we can like reach the
masses and inform people and let people know because like
you said, it's kind of similar, like they're not hiding
it from us. And you even mentioned like it's kind
of like repressing voting rights, which they are doing currently.

(05:48):
So it's kind of like, Okay, we know these things
are happening, but what can we do? Education? Political education
has to take place everywhere. If imagine if I wanted
to be a pop star or a rap star, right,
and I thought all I could do was just be
able to wrap right, Like for its face, it seems right, right, Like,

(06:12):
you know, if if I could rap and I make
good music enough people somebody don't like it, so I
don't listen to it, and because I'll become famous for
this song. But it doesn't work that way, right. There's
a million things you gotta do to be a star
that got nothing to do with being able to wrap. Conversely,
there are people who are stars who can't wrap right
because you know those other things. Right. That's how politics is.

(06:33):
It's not just about the most popular idea. There are
a lots the most Americans wanted universal health care for decades.
You know, most Americans um didn't give a ship whether
gay people got married or not at some point, right,
I mean, there's lots of stuff that most Americans want, Right,
most Americans. I get a better example, Most Americans want

(06:54):
reasonable gun control. Most Americans don't want the right to
walk through walk through cities with a K forty sevens
if rename launches, right, like, most of the think is
reasonable that if that if you're gonna get a gun,
you should get a background check, and that you should
have a certain kind of criminal record criminal record clearance,
and but that you should have a history of violence,
that you shouldn't have a particular I don't want stake

(07:15):
in times of mental illness, but a particular time of
mental illness that that doesn't go well. And having access
to guns. Right, these are reasonable things. But a very
small slice of people is able to stop us from
getting those reasonable things. Not because their vote counts for
for more votes in in in technical terms, right, one
vote is one vote, but because they know how to
organize politicians so that the senators listen to those ten

(07:37):
people more than they listen to these five hundred people. Right,
there's a system of play. You gotta figure out how
to do that. You gotta figure out to get DJ
to play your music, you gotta get you gotta figure
out how to how to get a buzz. You gotta
figure out how to do this and this and this
and this and this and similarly, in politics, people think
that if they just have an idea, or that if
enough people want this thing to happen, is going to happen.

(07:58):
But what we need is not just public sentiment. We
need organized power. We need money, We need to allocate resources,
and we need to teach people what's at state when
we make one decision versus another. And so that's political
education now, and then we actually have to sway public opinion.

(08:18):
That's the other thing. We actually got to teach people
why you might not want why you might value the
Second Amendment as I do, right, but why that doesn't
mean that you shouldn't have reasonable legislation. Right, go ahead,
go go please. Do you think it's possible to have
like an organized power? Yeah, we have it all the time.
We have organized people is the only thing that defeats

(08:41):
organized power, right, Organized power is always in place and
all the things we see is organized powers is the
question who has the power? Right, Organized power is why
we don't have gun control. Organized power is why women,
women or birthing people in general are losing reproductive freedoms. Right.
The question is is um, can we rest that power

(09:03):
away from the powerful and give it to us? And
your question is the perfect one, Right, can that happen?
Can we do that? Yes? Because we've always done it.
There was if I were if any of us were
to take a poll in nineteen sixty five, right, the
year of Voting Rights Act, if and say should black

(09:25):
people get the right to vote without restriction? Right, we
lose we right? Like, I mean, this is the year
to voting rights at right, this this is a this
is a congressional act. But if we if it ain't
going to the polls, if they're going to vote, but
we would have lost. Right If in eighteen sixty three

(09:46):
we had a poll, should slavery end? We would have lost? Right?
So how do we keep winning? Well? Because we organized,
we fight, right, we fight against power. Slave masters didn't retire. Right,
We decided that we were going to organize and fight

(10:07):
to the point that they would lose. So I always
have faith in the people. I always believe in the people.
It's an uphill battle, is not guaranteed, but we keep
winning unwinnable battles. HM. The only reason why I asked
if you think it's currently possible is because I guess
in a sense of like our community I'm from to

(10:28):
like you know, like the Panther Movement, and then like
the Nation of Islam, and just like it seems like
every time we try to build something that is ours
and for us to empower us and enlighten us um
on what to do instead of being swayed by propaganda
and only caring about the super Bowl quote unquote, you know,
like you become a martyr, you know what I mean?

(10:50):
And that's why I applied you. It's like, you know,
you always represent without that problems. Yeah, so far, so good, yo.
Not not gonna let me knock on some woodingrass. You
ain't coote one yet. No. It is the thing. I

(11:13):
think you're right, and I think that what makes this
movement in this moment a little bit different and a
little bit even more brimming with hope for me is
that we're not a single person, right, We are not
a leader less movement. We are a leader full movement.
Yeahs of them like nobody if no one's gonna say

(11:34):
who If you say who's the leader of black people
in two thousand and twenty two, j not a bad answer.
That ain't a bad answer. Right. There's a whole bunch
of people who want to have brunch with them right there,
like a five hundred thousand that I have. Nah, gonna
see whole boy right exactly? Oh my god, a Ted

(11:56):
talk while we're here. I would love a Ted talk,
jay z I would I would take that? Would they?
I would pay the five hundred thousand dollars I was
supposed to get to the touch hole. We're like black.
You make a good point, right, So we have leaders
in culture that people look to for for for legitimate leadership, right.

(12:19):
We got leaders in an industry who people look too.
We got actual elected officials. We don't mean the president
of black people to just be self appointed. We had
an actual black president, right, whatever you think of that
black president. We have black people in all these off
We have black people in all kinds of spaces right right.
And and we have the activists, We have the people
on the ground organizing trying to trying to get us

(12:40):
free through through those means. All of those people are leaders.
So if if in in nineteen sixty three, if I
said who will lead to black people, people might say
Dr King, Right, they might have said a decade before
a Philip Randolph. And then late sixties or sixty five
Malcolm Passes the man said Malcolm was I'll lead. After that,
they might have you know, it might have looked a hue,
but it was a very small slice of people, right,

(13:03):
And no one would have said Harry Delafonte or UM
or City Party, although they were incredible powerful people, right,
who who were instrumental in moving our agenda for But
now we got all these people. And so you can't
just shoot one person. You can't just co and tell
pro down the organization, right, You can't just frame somebody.
You can't just assassinate somebody's character and and and and

(13:26):
eliminate them. You can do all these things, but it
doesn't in the movement. And so I think the best
example of that is what happened when George Floyd is killed.
And I talked about this in my new book Seen
and Unseen. You know, George Floyd gets killed and we
take to the streets. Everybody thought when Trey Viron was

(13:48):
killed that that was the moment, and in some ways
it was. Then we went down to ferguson in after
Mike Brown was killed, and never said, so this is
the moment that ship gonna change black lives, that all
the stuff has happen, that this is the moment. And
then George Floyd is killed and people said, oh, this

(14:08):
is the moment from my estimation. In some ways, that
is the moment. But when I say the moment, I
mean the moment that that that moment like in mat
Till in nine, Rodney King in ninety one, where where
after this incident happens, the world shaped shifts, policy changes,
people hit the ground and do something different. We keep
having those moments because we've got so many people on

(14:29):
the ground doing different things. And in the age of
George Floyd, we took to the ground and we didn't
just march and tears shit up, although sometimes you gotta
do that. Laws have changed, and in the age of
Brianna Brianna Taylor, no knock warrants have have been eliminated
in the state of Kentucky because we organized people are
defunding police departments around the country because we organized. You

(14:51):
can't run for mayor of a major city, for example,
and not have a position on on on who your
police department, how your police department's gonna run, who your
police chief is going to be, whether you're gonna have
body cameras or not, what your position is on bail reform, etcetera.
These are questions that nobody asked the mayor ten years ago,
except in a few cities, like maybe in New York,
But in general, we didn't do that. But now we

(15:13):
do it. Not because this this the state, the government,
the powerful change their minds, but because we forced them
to so. So right now, despite all the stuff they
do to our leaders, historically, I feel more confident than
ever that we could win. Now how now I'm with
that right, but with with this power and with this organization,

(15:37):
it's like, what do we do in instances where it's like,
all right, well, they're committed to you know what I mean,
Like nobody is more committed to racism and oppression and
racist and oppressives right like you you look in North
Carolina where that entire police unit, all police that whatever
the proper terment, that that entire police officer moment they

(16:00):
quit when when the new mayor came in or the
new power. So you know, in that moment, what are
we doing? Like what what? What is our response? Then
right when they're when their response to change is so drastic,
one you, White people being upset can't be the measure

(16:23):
of our success. Racist being angry shouldn't be the measure
of our success. But to the extent that it is,
I'm happy when they're mad. I'm happy when they all quit.
That's a good day. I think that. Um. One of
the things that I always hold on to is the
fact that change isn't made by the majority. It's just

(16:46):
not right. It's it's just like when I talk about
taking a vote on our rights, you know, fifty years ago,
ship maybe even now in some states, we wouldn't win.
But we don't need that. We need a small group
of dedicated, organized people. White people are gonna be dragged
to racial justice. Men are gonna be dragged to gender justice.

(17:06):
People don't operate against their interests, intuitively, not most people.
So a small group of people will fight and organized
and dragged them to freedom. So you currently listen to
the what hip hop questions legends and list will be
right back after this break. Um, you mentioned your book.
I want to get into it seeing unseen it. Uh,

(17:29):
your book, it speaks about the way, Um, you're so smart.
I say this every time we talk. It's like the
things you highlight and the things you put a spotlight
on are not always these like um hidden gyms. They're
like right in front of our face, and somebody should
have been breaking it down a very long time ago,

(17:53):
but they don't until you come along. So so in
your new book, you discussed how media affects, uh, the
way people view race. So what what even invoked you know,
the thought process behind creating this book and what are
what are some hopes behind you know, what is actionable
success points you're looking for from from this book? That's

(18:14):
a that's a good question, man. I think the thing
that that shook me to my core was watching George
Floyd be executed. Um. You know, I'm old enough to
remember the Rodney King beating. I was. I was a
kid then those teenager and uh, I remember I remember

(18:36):
watching them beat Rodney King, and I remember hearing black
people say finally we got proof. Right. Um, I ain't
met a black person that was surprised that Rodney King
got beat by the police. I ain't met one yet,
maybe a few, but but but um, there's a special

(18:56):
kind of black people that you know that we all
know some of them, but in general that black people
weren't surprised that he got killed. I mean that he
got beaten the right and King was beaten. The difference
was back then we didn't have the ability to say, um,
look at what they did to me. Right. This guy

(19:17):
was on his balcony taking he bought a video camera
and big cam quarter that we had back in the day,
and he was a plumber who was just experiment with
video and he happened to turn the camera and see
the police whipping his black man's behind and videotaped it
and submitted it. But other than that, no one would
have seen this. And when black people saw the video,

(19:38):
when when America saw the video, they were shocked and
they were able to say, oh my god, this isn't
the country I know, Oh my god, this isn't how
I understand how the world works. And then we had
a tribe and as a teenager, I remember thinking we're
getting justice today and didn't even question it. Didn't even
question it, because how could you know you could see

(20:00):
it the camera. Was our ability to tell our truth
in the world that doesn't believe that black people have
the capacity to tell the truth. Right, black witness, black
testimony doesn't count. Black people saying we're getting beaten was
never enough. Black people saying the police are sucking us

(20:20):
up every day was never enough, even when we don't
get killed, right, just walking through the hood, just our
relationship to police growing up, No one ever, everybody was
the oh, they're exaggerating. Try explaining to somebody who even
in the two thousand's right before pre uber like what
it's like to get a cab in New York. People
always told me I was exaggerating about about trying to
get a cab in New York. I couldn't get a

(20:41):
cab in New York easily, not at night. And if
I did, I had to tell him I was going
to a different place and then get in the car
and then then be like, actually, you know what, I'm
actually going to East New York. You know what I mean? Oh,
actually you know what I mean. For the record, I
would not drop you over East New York, just saying,
but you wouldn't be a gab river right like I'm

(21:02):
with you, I wouldn't. I wouldn't either, I don't quss
every time they did. But I wouldn't take a job.
This is like I wouldn't run into a burning building.
But if I'm a firefighter, that's kind of a job.
You know, I can't be firefighter like at your right.
You can't have it both ways. And so there's a
way that the media, media technology allow us to tell

(21:28):
those truths and expose those those realities in a different way. Um.
The difference is Randy King, it was a one off.
We all couldn't walk around big as camcorders. And now
in the age of George Floyd, we don't have to
walk on camcorders. We got cell phones, we can record
all these It's not that suddenly all these black people

(21:49):
started getting beat It's that all of a sudden we
had evidence of it. And when I watched George Floyd,
I kept thinking to myself, as then my my co
author tied, why now we've seen lots of these beatings,
What was it about this beating? What was it about
this murder that was different than for me? Part of

(22:10):
what how long to beat it was not. It was
not miss twenty seconds. Watching somebody put a knee in
somebody's neck. For now, missing twenty nine seconds is gruesome.
It was like watching a photograph of still photographed because
because it was because how gruesomely steady he was right.
It was like watching m mat till or lynching photo
from I. T. B. Wells. But it also was a video.

(22:32):
And we watched him scream out for his mom. We
watched him beg for mercy. We watched him say just
like aer Garner did that he couldn't breathe. We call
all of that, and America reacted. You couldn't say he
was fighting back. You couldn't say he shouldn't have ran.
You couldn't say he should have pu should have pulled
his pants up. You couldn't all the ship they say
to justify murdering black people. They couldn't say. And so

(22:55):
that video circulated and changed the world. It changed is
the world. And I wanted to figure out, well, how
does that happen, Why does that happen? And when else
has it happened? And so when you look through our history,
you see these different moments with black folk and whiteful
have used technology media to tell the truth. We think.

(23:17):
We tend to think about social media as new and
the Internet is new, but social media is old. You know,
a flyer to a party with social media. It was
just as much slower form of social media. You know
what I mean? Um, a telephone, old school telephone is technology.
A microwaves technology, It's just different as older technology. So
I'll give you one example. Just people get what I'm saying.

(23:40):
Black people have always use these tools to help expose
out you. And Mattill was killed August. He was dragged
and beating and thrown in the Tallahatchie River. Boy from
Chicago killed in Mississippi. His mom had an open casket
funeral so that the world, Yeah, mammy tells said, I

(24:01):
want the world to see what they did to my baby,
what they did to my boy. So when you look
at the cover Jet magazine that week, who's on the cover,
But this boy would have had three full times as
normal size of this figure in an open casket. What
did she do? She used technology, the camera, she used
social media, Jet magazine, think about it. And I grew

(24:23):
up in Jet magazine. Man, when you go to my
going to my uncle Bobby times, Jet magazine. Jet Magazine
had the news every black person that got a job,
It had a right anybody who got a big promotion.
They had the top music artist, they had the beauty
of the week. You know what I'm saying. It had
everything you needed to know in Jet Magazine. That was
our social media. You knew you made it big when

(24:44):
you hit Everydy or Jet Magazine or Essence right. She
used to dr Kingyon. We got beat on the Edmund
Pettis Bridge in sixty five. He knew that the news
cameras would watch our beating. He's like, we're not gonna
beat us in secret, no more. You're not gonna beat
us in the dark, no more. You and beat us
on national TV. He used the technology of the day,

(25:05):
the evening news cameras, and he used the social media
of the day, the news itself to leverage. Right, that's
what we're doing every day with this. It ain't perfect,
Ranny King. He still didn't get justice right. Trademar Martin
still didn't get justice right. You know, Brian Sailor still
didn't get justice right. Whether whether we got tools, technology, whatever,

(25:28):
but it's a weapon, and it's a weapon that helps
us get what we need to be and I want
to tell that story from the eighteen hundreds too. Right now,
I do want to ask you this quick question because
every time you speak, I always want to ask you
this questions, but we always just get o contanged. So
I don't want to ask you this question. Um, only
if the answer is it's quick enough for us to
to to move on. I don't want to be a

(25:49):
quick answer. I'll be better, I'll be shorter. No, it's
not true. It's the it's the it's the question is
it's outloaded. I feel the question is sometimes. But um,
when you were talking about just a few seconds ago,
you said, um, you know they still didn't get justice,
and um, you know, uh they they that we don't
want to be up. That's what it was when you said,
uh when when Martin Luther King uh knew the news

(26:11):
cameras gonna beat us? Why is it always at least
map to the masses. Why is it always non violence?
Why a black people always chosen non violence as the response,
especially when if you look at history, no revolution has
come without bloodshed? So why are we why have we
always been I hate the word tamed or trained or room,

(26:35):
but why has it always been passed down from all
of the thought leaders that non violence is the is
the best way to go. Well, first, I'd say that
there's all wide range um of diverse thought, yeah, um
on this, and that many black leaders in history have
not advocated non violence. They've advocated armed insurrection, revolution, et

(26:59):
CETERA more interesting question might be, and this might be
bigger than the show, but it's something that you think about,
is why are all the leaders that become our top leaders.
Why are all the leaders who make it to the
to the pinnacle of of of being seen and understood
and legitimized as leaders the ones who advocate not violence?
That might be the question, right, you know, man, you're smart.

(27:24):
It's it's it's an interesting It's like the hip hop question,
right would be like, why do all the rappers only
rap about this? Is not it's not the only rappers
only wrap about this. It's just the rappers that make
it on this radio station and the rappers that make
it on this late they're the ones who wrapped like
people wrap it all kinds of ship, right, Um. And
I think that's an interesting moment. But I mean, if

(27:45):
you think about from the moment we got here um.
There were slave rebellions, organized slave rebellions people. There were
people on the ship who said I'd rather jump off
or kill myself than nake it right. There are people
who fought to turn ships back, they killed their masters.
There are people who every single day these the other thing.

(28:08):
There's something called everyday forms of resistance. There are people
on plantations and slaved Africans on plantations who are poisoning
their master. They were people who would wait for the
moment they couldn't wait to make make masters some tea
and was master didn't wake up. I don't know what happened.
Balls right, this is this is this is reality, right,

(28:28):
And by the time you get to the king era,
right then I'm skipping ahold of a wide ranging stuff.
But there were there were other moments. I mean, even
if you look at the the U and I a
United Negro Improvement Association Marcus Garby, they weren't fighting for
armed rebellion against us, but they were saying we gotta leave.
They were saying, we don't want to integrate into this,
we don't want to be part of this. If you
think about some of the Black Heaprew movements of the

(28:50):
Night of the of the mid twenty century, they were like,
we gotta, we gotta go. Right, when you think about
the Nation of Islam, they weren't advocating armed indirect but
they certainly weren't advocating non violence. Right. They were arguing
self defense. Black in the black panther party, who it's
it's ten point platform. What the panther? Uh? You know
the panther ten point platform comes to nations Islams. What

(29:12):
the Muslims want the Nation of islams ten point? But
and and then no point? Is there an argument that
this thing ends in peace? Right? Um? It was. It
was self defense, but against the violence sate self defense
is gonna lead the violence. Right. If you think about
people like George Jackson, you go and you'll go out
there and read solo dad brother, and read blood in
my eye. But read solo dad brother. First. You know

(29:33):
there are people who were talking about military tactics and
strategy to get out of this thing. If you think
about our our beloved sister aside of Shakoor, and you
think about all these people, they were part of movements
and organizations that understood to your point about and you
know a thousand percent right, that you don't have revolutionary
freedom without revolutionary action. The point though, is there are

(29:54):
lots of leader who don't believe in revolution. They're not
beginning from place of revolution. They're saying, we don't want
a revolution. We we want to weave into this thing.
We want evolution, we want integration, We we we we
want something different, we want something different. Now, King, finally,
might you might argue with King understood that you don't
get freedom without bloodshed. But in his non violent strategy,

(30:16):
we were the ones bleeding right like like we're gonna
get out, We're gonna We're going to bleed and be
beaten and harmed in such a way that it pricks
at the sensibilities of white liberals and it forces the
state to be accountable before they've done to us. And
therefore we advance. And you can make an argument that
some of the most powerful UM policy advances we've seen

(30:39):
came from that approach. I'm not a non boy. I
don't believe in non violence as a philosophy, UM I
believe it as a strategy. Right now, violence is always
a straight now violences and a look no violence of
strategy right right, or dude, surround you or you're the
club with somebody bumping you by yourself and it's five
of them. You got it? Now, If I was a strategy,

(31:02):
sometimes they got done and you ain't got one. You run. Now,
violence is a strategy right now? If I was always
okay as a strategy, but it can't be your overall
philosophy from my perspective, and that's where I differed from Kingdom. Alright,
So let's get into the music, because this is the
what hip hop questions about this? So we want to

(31:23):
know do you feel like hip hop should play a
stronger role when it comes to politics? Stronger is an
interesting question. I the older I get, this might be
just some old old man ship I'm on now. Um,
the older I get, the more I wish hip hop

(31:45):
talked about more stuff, you know. I I'm just I
don't need hip hop to be talking about electroc politics, right.
I don't need some rappers spitting bars about the new
i'm Nibus bill coming out of Congress, Like that's not
for me what needs to happen. Um, But I would
think somebody would have something to say about abortion, right,

(32:07):
just like and I don't want to be on nostalgic,
but I mean, there was a moment where people like
Diggable Planets had songs like the film Fatile or where
Common had Retrospect for Life, which was a different take
on abortion was actually a more anti abortion song, or
at least uh in terms of his own individual choice
at that moment, but it was a song that at

(32:27):
least engaged the conversation. Right, you had mainstream artists talking
about this stuff in very particular ways that I think
we're useful. Um, I'm tired of hearing people talk about
how much drugs they take. I'm tired to hear people
talking about um, which I find a lot less interesting
than talking about how much drugs yourself. But and that
might just be my own generational thing, right, Like, I

(32:49):
can at least wrap my mind around how much drugs
you said, I can, I can. You know what I'm saying.
I'm not saying it's okay, I'm not I'm not saying
to sell drugs in the community. Right. But however, if
you're gonna do something like you know, I mean, I
can at least wrap my mind around that ship you know,
I mean, you could be I love a push your

(33:11):
tea out. You're kidding me? Mark you marm be enterprising, right,
That's all I'm saying. Right, at least we push your
tea like you can wrap you know what you're thinking
about this ship you drive our street listen to push
your tea, thinking about pretending I was pretending to self
drugs And I'm not an anthropologist, you know what I I mean?
Like I can I can do that, You know what

(33:32):
I mean? I can't. I can't, like I can't get
hype on like um on just being high all the time.
You know that that that's not that's not cool to me.
That's not it's not that we didn't get high. It's
just that like that wasn't the thing that it wasn't thieves,
we wasn't fiends. And this right, this ain't even like
on some like Snoop ship or something Death and the

(33:52):
Dude ship or you know, or some messing red depend
on what region you front. It's it's to another level
that I don't think it's interesting or productive for our community. Now,
we had a whole bunch of ship in our area
that wasn't productive to the community. I'm not trying to
romanticize it. I'm just gonna I don't find this interesting.
And I think that the stuff in hip hop that
people got mad about with us, a lot of it,

(34:13):
not all of it, but a lot of it um
was still political. It wasn't conscious, it wasn't explicitly political
in the ways that people might want. But when Niggas
for Life comes out, right, I didn't see you going there,
you know. And that's the point, right, we tend to
think about political hip hop. We go to public enemy,

(34:35):
we go to you know, the kind of cultural nationalist groups,
the native tongue stuff. We go you know, to Paris,
we go to assist the soldier. We go to all
this stuff, which is cool. All that matters, right, and
I love all I love most of it. I love
most of it. But politics has never been about just that.

(34:58):
The thing that hip hop has been able to do
is push against the grain to tell the truth about
the powerful. It was the weapon of the week. It
was the voice of the power, of the of the
of the ostensibly voiceless people who we thought didn't have voices,
but always find a way to say they voice. Right.
These are kids who didn't have records or didn't have
instruments and use the turn table as an instrument. These

(35:19):
are people who made them way out of nowhere. So
when I think about the possibilities of black folk getting free,
I'm going back to people we've some about earlier mouths
and people who somewhere earlier now in terms of the
in terms of saying, everyday people make change, organized people
defeat the organized power. When the Black Panthers were envisioning freedom,

(35:40):
it wasn't getting the bourgeois on board. It was getting
the lumping we called the lumping, the lumping proletariat. It
was about getting the gangsters and the dope boys, and
the pushes and the pimps, getting them to organize and
be radical for freedom the people their prayers talking about
when they say revolutionary but gangster, right. So when I
hear to me the most one of the most political
songs in hip hop history is not before I Get

(36:04):
to Arizona, which was an important call to for for
king day, um it. It wasn't stopped the violence, right,
which was an important call for black people as the
community to come together right across crews across the coast
to just to stop gang bounce and stop bounces in
the street. I'm with that. It was fuck the police.

(36:25):
It was fun the pole. That's the political song, because
that's the ship that's gonna change our material reality. That's
the thing that hip hop can do that nobody else
could do. Right, Nobody was gonna get on a guitar
and playing country music for the police, right. Celine Dion
wasn't going to get on or glory Estifan was's gonna
get on the microphone in the in the eighties and
sing fuck and crewing suck the police. Luther wasn't gonna

(36:47):
do a run you know, fun the police. Right. But
when n w A doesn't want ice Cube stands up
there right right and talks about how you got it
on these streets right as you brown right, they think
they got the authority to kill a minority. They're rallying

(37:07):
people around their organ around their experience. They're saying, look,
our everyday life is one of oppression, and the oppressor
is the person who the world thinks is supposed to
be protecting us and serving us, but they're not and
developing a disposition towards there. Now, there's a whole bunch
of misogyny. There was a whole bunch of patriarchy in

(37:28):
in a whole bunch of homophobia. And I'm not saying
that they were perfect, but they had a political critique
of the police that to me had the ability to
take everyday black people who weren't thinking about politics and
organize them. That's the answering your question. Now that that
that's that's the that's how we win. While they destroyed

(37:48):
our movements, they ain't gonna destroy they constroy all of us.
But if I can give bloods and cryps to be
like something that's wrong on these streets, I love that.
I want to say, well, I just want to throw
out one of my favorite records, even though it doesn't
really apply to the masses, is carrass one black cop. Yes,
we can't really have you on the other side when

(38:10):
we need you on this side. Yes, Yes, it's an
analysis and yeah, and I think too. I guess back
to the point of is it possible for us to
have that unification, It's like we're not united, you know,
if you're gonna be a black cop. And I'm not
saying it in Today's since I'm saying it in since
I am, I'm saying I'm saying both the police and

(38:33):
black cop, you know what I mean, is a problem. Right,
But but but but think what Carress is doing, right,
He's not just saying your sellout, he's breaking down system
system systemically. What the problem is, right, how they're using you?
Thirty years ago you couldn't ride around the block, right, right?
So now then you take people who are exploited and marginalized. Right,

(38:53):
recently police trained black cops to stand up on the
corner and what take gunshots? Talking about the way that
the most vulnerable people will be weaponized against their own people,
the same way we get put in the front lines
and wars overseas to fight other poor black and brown people.
Something how might at least say't know to it's the
same principle, right that that that suddenly black these black

(39:14):
people are gonna be putting positions of power. Eric Adams
right to oversee overseas officers, officer officers, officers right oversee right,
That's that's that's that's the linguistic shift that cares one
does from officers the overseas, showing the kind of etymological connection,
right would say, black people, the freedom dream isn't for

(39:36):
black people to be ruled by other black people. We
didn't march to get beaten by black cops and to
get locked up by black police commissioners, right, but instead
to have a different freedom. That's what cares one at
his best is doing. That's what at the best are doing.
And I mean black cops are good as choice. But
I was when he did the verses man. That was
one of the ones. I was that in criminal minded,
But that's one of the joints that like is underappreciated.

(39:59):
I thinking hip hop. I can yeah, we all tho
agree on that one. Um. I mean mine is uh
mine is Minority report by jay Z. I think at
that time when I think, um, when people we're having,
you know, all the critiques about mainstream hip hop and
all that, but hope to come back from his retirement,

(40:21):
do um do the King Tom come album? And then
like by name, call out FEMA, the government George Bush
used those use the I always have a thing in records,
especially like politicized the records or like political driven records.
It's one thing to hear our words and wrapping here
our feelings. But I love it, and it might be

(40:43):
because I love documentaries. I love when you take the
real sound of what's going on, like don't just take
my um, don't just take what I'm saying, don't just
take my thoughts here. This is what I'm going off with.
And so to open it up and here you know
the people in the warrants telling them like you know,
y'all forgot us. We're dying here. Um. So yeah, Minority

(41:05):
part it is pretty. That's a that's a good one
and in a gym, because that's not an album that
most people would with point to Kingdom come with that.
It doesn't make the top of his uber right, like
like I was if I was making You're now listening

(41:30):
to the what if I questions legend and listen will
be right back after the break. Uh. Let let me
say this right because I feel like sometimes um, in
these conversations it's necessary, it's not necessary to say, but
sometimes people are like purposely go over so we're let's acknowledge,

(41:52):
we ask there are there are many ways to get music.
There are there's a ton of music out there. But
why do you feel if you agree, why do you
feel that the shift in in putting the eyes on
the political rap um has changed over the years or
is there is there's something media wise going on or

(42:13):
do you just feel like the music and the artists
are less radical. I don't think the artists are less
radical or more radical. I think there's so much interesting
stuff happening. I think in some ways. I mean again,
there was a small slice of rappers that we're doing that, um,
but it became the thing to do. And then suddenly
the industry was like, wait, we're gonna shift from this

(42:34):
not not not enough of this ship, not of this
public enemy ship. I need more, I need more killing niggas, right, Untildenly,
you go from political hip hop the gangster rap as
the centerpiece, right, it's the gangster rap becomes the centerpiece
of mainstream hip hop. Um. And that kind of a
shift is it's not coincidental. Um. What the industry would

(42:58):
say is, well, you know, we we were here to
make money and whatever sales will put out. But we
create appetites for things. We create desire, right. People don't
just wake up wanting certain things. Um. We create an
energy around it. And and so that now people want
more of this and want less of that. I remember, Um,

(43:20):
even in the nineties, when you think about our consumerst aspirations,
right that the the ship we wrapped about you could
still get you know, um, I pushed a Q FO
five and finning right or who draw millennia right? Cards
that I couldn't afford. But like if I, if I worked,
I could, you know, you know what I mean? Like

(43:41):
like now we with the spoiler, right, we knew that
people with benes, We knew people asked. We know people
with Q forty five. People are a driving around the hood,
whether they so drugs, just work at the post office
double time to get some of them cards. Like like
our aspirations lexus, right, aspirations were we're within the realm

(44:01):
of possibility, so we can still connect to this. Now
the ship is so astronomically far that it's disconnected from
hood realities, right, Um, it's it's the artists aren't in
conversation with with with vulnerable in the same way in
my estimation, And so there's something about that I think

(44:22):
that has shifted over time. I love I love that
UM artists today have more reaching, more access. But I
remember even when Obama was elected and people you know,
like my president is black. I'm with that, right. I
get the idea of the pride and the investment, but
there was a time when hip hop's job was to
hold the White House accountable not to celebrate. I know

(44:43):
the president is black, so that's a little bit different.
But I'm saying, even post where's the Biden critiques? Where's
where's more Trump critiques? And you know, you know we
need more of that, we need more language of critique,
we need more powerful Um then Donald Trump feel like that? Yeah?
Yeah for us? For me, it did because I'm not

(45:06):
I'm not you know, political minded. You know, I'm able
to have rational thinking, I have critical thinking skills, but
I'm not. I'm not an activist or I'm not in
any spaces um leading thoughts to you know, political change
as you are. So did did funk Donald Trump? By? By? Nip? And? Um?
You know reston of these nip by? Um? Whych and
Nip did that? In that moment you heard that? Did

(45:27):
that feel like that? They just feel like a cheap
cheap like didn't feel cheap to me? It felt like, um,
you know what, it felt like. It felt like an
opportunity to enter the conversation, right. Um. Think about Nip
and I didn't know him well at all, but I
know that he read. Yeah, he read deeply and widely,

(45:49):
and he had the ability to not just say, funk
Donald Trump, but break down why these systems are are problematic? Right,
And he was growing and that was a growth area
for him. But he was growing and learning and study
like we all do. Um. I love the spectacle, right,
the spectacle is then Donald Trump, but it's what's underneath that,
It's the layers. Right. But you gotta get an audience

(46:10):
hooked first. You get them hooked with the funk Donald Trump, right,
like like jay Z can't come out with four four
four first mm. Right, He's got the world hooked on
his genius and on his braggadocious lips, although from reasonable
doubt four he's always sprinkled the analysis in right. But
my point is once he gets you into a point

(46:34):
where you'll listen to what he has to say, he
can talk to you about how housing projects right, Right,
A project is just that, a project, project, project, because
it's a project exactly. I wrote a book. Nobody I wrote.
I wrote, I wrote a whole chapter on the history
of Black American projects. But no one wants to hear
me talk about Taylor Holmes or or Cabrini, Greed or

(46:57):
any of that stuff. And until they get to us
space to think that this is important information and jay
Z gets us there. That's what a great artist can
do right. And it can be subtle, it can be smooth, right.
It doesn't always have to be diactic. It doesn't always
if we have to teaching you the facts and dates, right,
it can be that, but then they have to be that.
There are artists that do that well. Their press doesn't
brilliantly right because they can actually wrap right. You know,

(47:18):
they're great m c s. And they've got great information
and great politics. Some people got great politics, but they
can't wrap right. Because that's the other thing. When we
talk about political hip hop, we gotta be mindful that
it's not enough. Just like it's just like, I'm not
into this at all. But like gospel rap is the
thing people like, but a lot of gospel rappers can't
wrap think it just they can just preach over the music. Yeah.

(47:41):
So so if the message is right but you don't
have talent, it doesn't help, right. And if you have
a lot of talent but don't have a message, then
it's not that political. So when the when we're at
our best, it's when somebody like Hendrick makes albums for me.
Kendrick makes two People, Butterfly Cool. There's a lot of
messaging on that and he again he's going through his
own sort of learning processes around around information, around faith,

(48:03):
around all that stuff. But for me, the interesting political
album for him is actually good kid Mad City. I'm
super interested here. So so for me again, think about
my my n w A position. Right, for me, the
best thing he could do is give us a window

(48:24):
window into the lived realities of what it means to
be an urban America at that juncture in history, in
the same way that n w A did, in the
same way that right. So so now you're coming in
here and your songs are about your experiences, right, about
what it means to lose homies, about what it means
to to to be a black girl, same black girl

(48:45):
from section eight, right, to to be a black girl
undergoing objectification, street harassment, uh, human traffic, all the stuff. Right,
What does it mean to struggle with suicide? What does
it mean? What? What are young black men? Alcoholism? Alcohol
is right if you actually live so to me, that's
that's that's that's just his entry point. Now, once you

(49:07):
funk with him, you can listen to Complexion, right, which
is a great so although I think rap raps versus better,
but like it's a beautiful song rap cities versus better,
but but on both called the body Yeah, rape of body, yes,
but like when you but to appreciate it, and I

(49:31):
can appreciate complexion from the gate. But if I've already
gotten hooked in with good kids man City, that's something else.
And some people will say, well, he's just rapping abous
like yeah, but life people, why does that? And I
love why why albums? Right, but why she's not doing
political rap? There is a distinction I would question. I
would I would say, maybe revisit My Crazy Life his

(49:53):
first album Okay with the same eye you're looking at
Kendrick's city and you would see that right, like because
the way he used because of how intricate, And I
think Kendrick did it as well. Um, I think a
lot of West Coast artists like do it well. Um
when I'm talking about them, the way they uh interweed

(50:14):
the skits, it's not always being so uh this disconnected
from the last song, right like where Okay, this song
is done, then we're gonna do a skit to transit. No,
they're weaving from the song, right into the skit right
in to the next song. So now you have this
one cohes of story. So for me, my crazy life,
it's just as political in that sense. It's just as

(50:37):
political as you hear Kendrick's Good Kid Mass City. It's
just done in a more I don't have the I
don't have the triple and tendres and uh and and
I don't have the automatic people, but I have this
right here. I am. I am a bomb that I
am a tree top blood and this is the day
in the life. And if you take that with that

(51:00):
same man, you'll be like, Okay, this day in the
life is because of this systemic issue. Okay, I'm gonna
revisit that I know the album, Um I don't know, well,
I don't, so I revisited and listen to it with
those ears. That's helpful. That's actually helpful for me. Thank
you for that, brother, not just music though, like art,
black art as a whole, right, I feel like then

(51:21):
maybe you can help me. I feel like some of
the are we doing too much looking for these artists
to be these thought leaders? Are we doing too much
and we're putting too much pressure are to to eventually
end up disappointed when we try and make politicians out

(51:43):
of our artists. Yeah, you know, that's a good question.
There's something, Um. If we want to get free, we
need all kinds of things right um, and we need
the cultural stuff to be right. But I think at
our best, the artists are a reflection of our movement

(52:06):
in our politics. They will help us move, they help
us organize, they help us do again. I think about
Harry belafontat right. Harry Belafonte in nineteen sixty three when
we have the March on Washington was not only the
most famous black artists in America, he may have been
the biggest celebrity in America, certainly the biggest musician. I mean,

(52:30):
Harry BELAFONTI at his height is there's nobody bigger. Okay,
I want people get that because now people think him
as that. You know ninety year old elder statement that
time he was the was our jay Z. He was
our jay Z. And Harry Belafonte sat with the great
Paul Robeson, He studied with UM leaders, He met with

(52:54):
activists and organizers. He was friends with Martin Luther King.
He was and speaking at the March on Washington. He
gave Martin the King money to help March of Washington happened.
So what did he do? He used his influence, he
used his resources, he used his power to help us
get free. And in his own world he created, he

(53:17):
created things, he built things. I think that's what artists
to do with their best. Um. Now, there was nothing
in Harry Belafonte's music they like come we Want to
Go Home, Right, wasn't a freedom song. But every dollar
from that freedom song, from that song helped us get free,
way more than some of the freedom songs that got made,

(53:40):
you know. So I think that I think that that's
one slice up. Then there are artists like like our
black art poets, the great Sonya Sanchez, the great Hockey
Bout of Booty, and the great Gwendolin Brooks right, who
made art explicit that we get looked at the last poets,
you know, and other artists right who used their music
I'm assuming, who used their art beyond this music right too,

(54:04):
to explicitly educate us and organize us and help us
get free. That's a that's a lane too, right. I
think though, where we go wrong is not whether artists
play an activist role or you know, anything like that.
I think where we go wrong is when we expect
and you alluded to this, when we expect the artists
to lead the movement, when we suddenly say we're not

(54:26):
free and it's jay Z's fault. We're not as at
you know, or oh, coach Conscious coming up? Who I love,
by the way, Coach Conscious coming up. Let's lost, that's
what's up. That's up. We're you know, that's that's the
new leader of the movement. You know, it's like, na
that brilliant artists who are doing dope shit. Let's appreciate
that and let them figure out who they are and

(54:48):
to who that music is inspiring. Right, That's a good
that's a good way to think of Right. So so
that's the right question to ask, right, who is this
music inspiring? And how can this how can that information
help us educate them, organize them, to help them get free.
My job isn't to go to coach Countra and Fit

(55:09):
and start feeding them talking points. So the next album
has you know, excerpts from my book in it, right,
because you know that's what some people want to do, right.
They want to take these artists and feed them information
and hope that they'll that, you know that they'll suddenly
become parents for their their line, and their probably went
that ain't it? That? Ain't it for me? Like I
think that question of who is this art inspiring is

(55:31):
the right place to start. And also the other question
I would ask is why why is this? Why does
this move people? Why does this art inspire them? What
is it about this text, this, this image, this this
sound that that stirs something? And people when we hear
Kindrick lamar all right m hm as the anthem of

(55:52):
ferguson summer, what is it about hearing? Right? I'm funked up?
I mean, you funked up. But if God got us
think weak, gonna be all right? What is it about
that blind that bar that resonates with a whole generation
of people? And there's something in it? It's not just catchy.
We got a lot of catching ship. Yeah, there's something

(56:15):
in it that speaks to our revolutionary sold stern and
I feel like long as that he did something that
I haven't really at least to my I know, everybody
gets caught up in a moment like this was a
great but that was one of the most revolutionary songs
that I had heard and I grew up with you
met my father before I went with UH five percenter inspired,

(56:37):
you know, somebody who did time before. So I grew
up around a lot of revolutionary but hearing that in
my different age, it was like every bar you know
what I mean when he said um, and when I
wake up, I know they recond on me for the
paid cut for the faith damn Stephen. It was like, Yo,
he's he's talking to us, like he's really talking to

(56:58):
us in a in a in a volutionary way, in
a way that you know, I felt when I heard UH.
And I know people gonna be like, oh, you're dragging it,
But the same way I felt when I first heard um,
Malcolm X is when the roosters come on, UM, I
spelt the same way when I first heard or right.

(57:18):
It was like, Okay, what what am I hearing? And
you know why? You know why, because there's a there's
a there's a thread that cuts across that from Malcolm
and the rest of the nation UM to to this
song you're talking about all right, and that is there's
an analysis of the world. There's an acknowledgement that we're
not perfect, that we're broken. Yeah, right, but we don't

(57:41):
have to be perfect to be useful. We don't have
to be perfect to struggle for freedom. We don't be
perfect to win, right, and it's undergraded by faith, whether
it's warranted or not. We can debate that that we
will be victorious, that I struggle will be rewarded. We're
gonna be all right, man. That's the message that that is.

(58:05):
That is the message of the wounded healer, right, that
is the message of the freedom fighter. That is the
message of our ancestors. We're gonna be all right. And
you know, I can talk to you for as days. Um,
So if I get you know, if I let you
get any like said, this is the what hip I
questioned legend and listened was so all about hip hop there, um,

(58:26):
and you already kind of touched upon it earlier. So
I just want to, like, you know, dive a bit deeper.
And if I let you go, what are what are
like two songs that like what is the song that
is like that that that when you grew up? What
was the most like rat not rach? What's do I
look for? What's the most like rambunctiontion song that you
know got you in the hip hop and then what

(58:48):
was the one that politicized you almost you know what? Like,
so we get that juxtaposition. Hip hop fan. So I
grew up sharing a bed room with my brother who
was a couple of years older. So um, he bought everything.
He bought all the cassette tapes. And honestly it was um,
it was carriss One. And I didn't think about carriss

(59:11):
One as if it's funny because when I heard criminal minded,
I didn't think I was thinking about carress One as
the teacher. I wouldn't think about carress One as the
scholarly m c. You know what I mean. I heard
boogie down productions. Ducts will always get paid, right, we
take the whacking song and h and A remember to

(59:37):
let us into your skin. So when I'm hearing that,
I'm like, oh, this dude got swaggy talk shit, he
could rome right. There was something, um, there was something
about it that just felt right to me. And that
was my interne. I mean, I'm thinking we like I was, did,

(59:58):
but like you hadn't. It was it was different, was
new to hip hop the way he was attacking that
verse minded you blinded looking for Stott like Mike you
can't find like that was very much nuanced then. Yeah,
he had he had a modernist he had he had
a modern flow, right and he was him g rat

(01:00:19):
of course rock him right. It was it was a
very small group of people that were now going with
the track as opposed to you know what I'm saying,
the kind of caricatures that we hear, you know what
I mean? Uh so so so that was part of it.
So for me it was that it was um, it
was it was him. It was slick Rick, It slick Rick.

(01:00:41):
You know. I I still re hearing Children's Story and
being like, oh ship like and it's interesting because I
didn't Again, you can you can argue Children's Story has
a social message. I didn't think about it like that.
I thought about it as it just was hip hop.
To me, it was just like I was gonna ask
you that, like get you because now I think about
Yester the song that like all the white people who
like they grew up on hip hop they know it
or it's like a song that like you like a

(01:01:03):
bar or a happy hour and everyone. But when you
think about it, it's a social you know what I mean.
He's coming poverty, he's covering homelessness. He's covering uh. I
mean that that cop was a little aggressive. Was a
little aggressive. I was a little aggressive. And for me
it was like the voice. I never heard a voice

(01:01:25):
like that before. Right, I'm sitting in North Philly here
in this this this British has voice right, just the
smooth as flow like. I dont understand none of that.
I just knew that he could wrap um. And then
I'm gonna throw one more. I'm gonna throw a couple
morening I know I'm cheating, right. That was still my
brother's like stuff, and that got me into hip hop.
You know what really put me on was um was

(01:01:46):
black sheet Okay, okay, okay, my pops love black sheet. Man.
When I heard the choice is yours middle school man,
I was I was hooked man because and again just
just you know, dress could just rap, you know what
I mean. And by then it was on my own term.
So I was hearing that and that, and Mama said,
knock you out, l L. You know, I mean, who
does not get enough credit? Right, you know? L L

(01:02:07):
coo J. I heard her older L stuff, but Mama
said not it was my ship. I was on the
school bus wrapping that ship, and I remember, like I
remember just again, like it was the energy, it was
the power. And I wasn't I want to think about
number of politics. I wasn't thinking nothing about being organized
scholar rap. I wasnt thinking about that. I just they were.
I just love how they sounded. I loved I love
their their vibe, I love their energy. Um it's it

(01:02:31):
spoke to my it spoke to my soul man. And Um,
as I got older, you know what I mean, I
started to get more into like battle rap, I started
to go you know, I mean, I got you know,
I knew about all the bridge wars and stuff, but
I was you know, I was too young to really
appreciate it at the time. But I went back and
was like, oh ship, And I was like, oh wait,
and Rock saying shot, Oh she's the ball Okay. You know,

(01:02:52):
I go back and listening to money Love, like, oh wow,
old Latifa, Oh Ship. Right then I was in the
contextualize that stuff. And then, um, I think the era
of hip hop, um that I resonate with the most
isn't even those errors, um errors. I resonate more is
like the cultural nationals stuff, the stuff where they weren't

(01:03:12):
wrapping my politics per se. But they were just so
proud to be black. And the images were black, the
sounds were black, the hair was black, the colors were blacker,
you know. So so when Diggible Plants album comes out,
um in early nineties, I want to say ninety two,
but I might be wrong. They uh reputation, time and
space like cool like that is when everybody knows. But
for me, it was where I'm from. It was the

(01:03:34):
film Fatile you know, it's Jimmy diggon CAATs. It was
that kind of stuff. A trial for me was everything,
you know what I mean? The roots later would become
everything um and and and and that stuff resonated with
me because it made even even uh arrested development, right,
you know people every day or tennessee. Right. It was
like there was a way that these artists when I

(01:03:56):
saw them, I wanted to look different. I wanted to
sound different. I want to that's different. Blackness was was
becoming more and more central to my identity, you know,
common after not not on um the first album, right,
um Canna braw Dollar. But but from from Resurrection forward
was like a It was like a drink of water
in the desert for me because I got to watch

(01:04:16):
a black man developed culturally and politically at the same
time that I was doing that ship. Right, So when
when he goes from from resurrection to um one day
to all make sense to uh to um like water
for chocolate, He shifting his faith, He shifting how he

(01:04:38):
talks about things. He shifting how he dresses, He shifting,
you know all this stuff. And I followed the vibe
all the way up through electric circuits all the way
to find it forever or to be even finding everyone
like I get this, So I had so hip hop
also gave me models of black manhood that were different.
But then I can understand he still talked about what

(01:05:00):
He's still talking about the hood ship. You still talking
aboutnigger ship. He still talking about ship that I thought
was cool now that I would look back on now,
but that wasn't. But I could resonate with it. It
helped me be a freer, more more articulate, more thoughtful,
more reflective person. Um flawed as hell, but it helped
me be somebody and I And that's with him, that's
with nas, that's with Hole, That's what Lauren, that's with

(01:05:22):
Jane gray. That's with uh quality the most deaf. I
just I grew through hip hop and it wasn't the
people always holding the picket sign. It was the people who, um,
who are willing to be open and honest and transparent
and black. And there's nothing more political than that. M
hm m hmm. Wait wait to send it home. Wait

(01:05:46):
to send it home. The consummate professional words smith and
thought thoughter. Uh, it's it's always a pleasure when it's
when you know, when we have an opportunity chopped up
what you was in person, uh on mikes whatever, so
on one. Like I said earlier, thank you so much.
But if it makes me time to come over and um,

(01:06:08):
please let them let the people know how they can
support the book and anything else you got coming out. Yeah, man,
I got I got a lot of projects coming out,
a lot of stuff out, man. The kids just following
on all social media. Mark Lamron Hill just my whole name.
The book is called Seen an Unseen uh in bookstores
everywhere anywhere you get books, get it. I prefer if
you've got it from my own bookstores. Support a black bookstore.

(01:06:28):
Uncle Bobby's his uncle b O b B I E. S.
Dot com Uncle Bobby's Coffee and Books. That's my bookstore
in Philadelphia, really one of the largest black bookstores in America.
You can get everything on line from us. So support
Uncle Bobby, support the books, uh, and just keep struggling
for freedom. I thank you so much more, dude fum
until they please keep speaking too, power keeping keeping your

(01:06:50):
foot on eating. I think I talked to you soon.
And as for you guys listening at home, make sure
you tune into What If I was watching Legends each
of every Monday, we'll be here on You can get
it on I Heart Radio, on the I Heart h
on the I Heart app, or you can listen anyway

(01:07:10):
you stream podcast until then. We'll see y'all or talk
to y'all for next week. Readies, don't miss an episode
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(01:07:32):
Darren Byrne and produced by A King