#559 - Chuck D

Yo, Chuck, do you right here?

You could check me out of Public Enemy on the Bootleg CAV podcast.

Hey, before we start the episode, we're gonna remind everybody, man, we got one of the biggest radio shows in the country, syndicated in almost one hundred cities all over. Shout out to iHeartRadio. All right, some of the latest cities that we've been able to add. Man, I want to give a shout out to ninety three point nine to beat in Honolulu. That's right, Hawaii, We over there going crazy. I also want to give a shout out Hot ninety eight three and Tucson. Shout out to Tucson going crazy.

Welcome.

Well, I'm grateful to be invited in your palace.

Look at this man.

Yes, I don't know if it's it's a palace. It's just you know, it's just a hang you know. No, it'sace.

I'm you know, and these are thrones, man, So I'm glad to be invited on it.

You know, we met in the lobby outside. I was like, I actually met you when I was a kid.

You know.

I grew up with Raka Iris Science is a little brother from Dilated. So every time Dilated would come to Arizona, I would go hang out with Rock and Evidence and Baboo and those guys. And they opened up for you on tour Lack Delicious.

Man, it was a nice tour. And really and you said you met me at fourteen.

Yeah, I don't know if I was fourteen.

I was.

It was in that somewhere arranged and I remember Raka introduced me to you, and I was just like, yo, this is because I read your book probably the year prior to that, you know, you used to get dropped off at the library as a kid, and then you just find ship and then it was like yo, Chuck D's got a book.

Yeah yeah, I've had ten cents. So it's been this incredible full circle. Got a project with Death Jam and here I Am and you know keV spot Man.

Yeah, the new album is it's dope because it's like it's got a real theme and uh, you know, you got people kind of like I like I was listening, I ran through it last night. You got some legends checking in, like King T's got a quick like what up on there?

And then and jag Fu Front and uh, you know Damage and you got Daddy Oh and we got Miranda Rights and also people like phielmost Chill and drops from King like you said, King T and school e D and school d Man. So you know, you know what it is radio radio I'm again. It is almost like it's like a radio station full of Paul's Boutigue meets DJ Shadow with Woo Tang hanging outside getting ready to

It is like there is like a now that you say the DiPT in acid part, like if I was tripping a little, I feel like the album would have been a lot, like really intense.

Yeah, it's it's like it had no beginning, no end to it, like if you took it and got to a stream of ice.

I'm saying it's the last interview I did.

If you took it and put it in a shuffle, it would make no difference, right, It's like it could pick up and lead it has. Yeah, it has no beginning to end and you know, like you know, like when they had the Lamb and they shave it off for Jiro's Yes, that's why these are not singles that come off with they like like like slices, right, So you know, I mean the whole thing about Radio arm Again. I got to give props number one too, my guy, my partner, my record label. We were all super independent

M sees no more because you have clearance issues, yes, the clearance so your.

Creations and your whole way you pull it from what you create, and all that has to be a different and he's figured I'm telling you in twenty twenty five, he's a Brian eno a hip hop and rap music right now because his toolbox is something I think other people are gonna mimic.

Can you Because I've been saying this, I've said this in a bunch of interviews, but I feel like, first of all, the timing for an album right now, just where the world is from Chuck d I feel like the timing is amazing. I feel like we But what I always say is, I don't know. You know, when I was growing up, we had you know, the Mortal technique, and the generation before was public Enemy and and you know there was such thing as conscious hip hop, you knows,

Well, they listen with their eyes. They listened with their eyes first. You know, you're probably the last part of the generation that listen with your ears. And that's why Enemy Radio which is the which is the particular act that has done radio armageddon. It's like the mc DJ component of Public Enemy. So my my MC style on it is not really conventional. It's almost like the MC that introduces the rapper. Yeah yeah, so I might come off with an orthodox wild you know, Warpe style, but

It's kind of like your interpolation, would you say of like.

Don cornelis on acid.

Right, like doing the like the radio DJ in the Chuck D Way, I mean.

Yeah yeah, and in public Enemy, if that something comes up out of it, it's going to be Chuck d Plavor flame like it.

You know. Like that is so you know, to come on Enemy Radio.

The first and foremost is the mcs, the rappers, and also the DJs, because there's a few DJs on it, like m Rock Our Chicago. He's just like just nasty DJs and sometimes you know, and I'm in right here, you know, in Los Angeles, Los Angeles, and like Bootleg cavn on you guys are more DJ centric anyway. Yeah, we are a big DJ town.

The beat junkies, mixed Master Mike and you know, the scratch Pickles. I feel like West Coast in general, California. We love, we love, we love our turntable lists.

Yes, yes, and and this is like a homage to that.

And also you know, like we've always had great turntable lists and DJs always in our sight.

But we come from radio, you know.

So people that that peeled off of us from Terminator X, well, I was able to be with def Jam and do the first compilation albums with the Terminate I produced the first two Terminator X albums and then we had DJ Lord with us for twenty years.

Was now the DJ Cypress Hill the greatest group in the world. Shout out to Cypress Hill. Yeah you be real and Tom. You guys had a cool that's a good four year run.

He be real, Tom Morello, you know, Brad Wilt, Timmy c and also DJ Lord.

So yeah, I mean that was that had to be profits of rage, man, that was that was something that was a ball. Yeah, No, that that was sick. I just remember like hearing about it and when it first got announced, I was like, wait a minute. So it's like Rage against the Machine, but with Chuck d and b Real.

Like and DJ Lord too, it's like the Lord is the one that really capped up because those musicians did not know how to put a turntables into their conversation. You know, Brad on drums, Tom on guitar making DJ sounds and also Timmy on bass, the funkiest bass player ever in rock. But DJ Lord is a monster and he can make a turntable sound like a guitar as

Can you take me back to when you guys first get with def Jam. You guys are are doing something that nobody had really done before on that level in terms of the subject matter and the and the content that was.

We was Kevin's just because we were older, that's all.

But I'm saying like was there because these days it feels like if you talk about certain shit, there's an uphill challenge in terms of whether or not, like maybe the label will be like, hey, maybe shit tone this down.

Maybe.

Did you guys deal with any of that?

No, not at all.

We never dealt with racism coming at us. We never dealt with somebody telling us what to do. Rick Rubin begged me kind of and asked me to do records for two years. So once I agreed, it's a different understanding, right, you know what I'm saying. I mean I would turn down calls from Rick Rubin to my house, like I don't want to do records. We wanted to do radio. So I'm automatically My first day is not a jubilation. It was surrender.

Right.

We couldn't do the radio dreams.

But you know, fast forward, I have rap Station, which is twelve station app and it apps are hard to make.

They are.

That cheap thing and now and not easy to make because you had the world of glitches and you got the realm of security. So we built rap Station, which is twelve station channels all with rap. These of hip hop dedicated for sixteen years now, but the app has been built for five and then to bring the Noise app, which is really the really the trend set of there.

Dude. I always wonder like when you have, like like you have a couple of the greatest hip hop albums of all time and under your belt, like when you guys are getting ready to release it takes a nation of millions to.

Hold this back.

Do you guys understand like how fucking good it is and like how it might change everything?

Yeah, I have interviews that said I'm making the what's going on in rap music months before we put it right, so you got you know, but you know what it is, Kevin, you know it was already a leaning tree. I'm ten years older. I didn't studied everything in it. I knew what was coming out. We were really the beginning of the album oriented, you know, rap artists, where it was still a singles media.

Yeah, there were still singles vinyls getting released.

Yeah, and you know, and we knew everything from Iron Maiden to Marvin Gangs, so we knew how to make an album. So when I trust me, I'm coming off my first tour year in eighty seven, So by the time we get back in the lamp, I know exactly what to make. Number one, make it faster because on stage, you know when you're going to no matter what you're doing, you're gonna be amped up to do a song faster than what that recording would be. Right, So I knew,

Yeah.

The average person doesn't go by like, oh, this needs to be five beasts for a minute faster and amp.

Up like this.

You guys were conscient, just like, hey, we're gonna speed our shit up like everybody else is here.

We're here, yeah, because the difference is is like, how do you, how do you make your stuff different from the next person, faster, louder. Well, if everybody could reach up and be louder at the same time, you know, more than one vocalist, you know. So our whole thing was to stand out because you ain't had radio, you ain't have a lot of people like yah, yeah, we're going to make sure we financed this thing forward.

No, it had to stand on its own two feet.

You guys also were very instrumental in lending an olive branch to Cube once he left NWA.

Yeah, nineteen ninety America's most wanted. We toured together eighty eighty seven, eighty eight, and eighty nine, and you know, so that's where the friendship started.

Yeah, and then obviously he comes, I mean, the Bomb Squad takes the realm of his first solo album, which was a five mic album.

Yeah, he wanted, he wanted to actually get dre and easy to do it, but the situation with priority at the same time had he had to wait for a year and a half or back in them days, you wait for a year and a half and it's another world, a whole other world. So you know, he came to me and wanted to do, you know, us to do it, but no, really he came to me to see what can happen when if he came to East and I try to unite him with Sam Severn and other people.

Like that, what's burn Burn? Hollywood Burn? Was that like made in that same Yeah, yeah, same ere but you're like, yo, we're gonna take this one for.

Us, And that was no, no, no Burn Hollywood Burn was me and Kane already was going to do it, and Cuba had just come out this try to look for a studio, try to look for producers or whatever on this project, and he was in the studio at the same time.

So when me and kin was talking about Cube was like on the count said ya, I want to be on that. Yeah. We both looked at him like yeah, not right, And that's how it started.

The most difficult thing keV at that time is could you get three different record labels to agree on it? Oh yeah, back there you have segregation, right and you know, no, we don't want them on that label or we don't want that song over there. So I had to do a lot of you know, I had to do a lot of godfathering at that time.

To make that happen.

That's crazy.

Yeah.

And it's so crazy too because if you think about like how the Bomb Squad was able to somehow like revolutionize West Coast hip hop in like a way that like they I don't know if they get the credit for.

We got our credit for. The whole thing is like this is like do the thing and let everybody fly with their own wings. You know, this Bomb Squad never did the same thing twice, right, and we never did two albums in a row on anybody. Once we do, you you get it, Boom, you fly like Cube, my favorite Cube albums, Kill that World.

The next thing he did after so Good Yeah, so one of my favorite covers of all time too, that covers so.

Far, Yeah, because he got it. You know, once we were there had to be like an incubation lab and once you get.

It killer well didn't have Jack and for Beats on it.

M m oh yeah of course so good yeah, beat changes and all that under it.

You know what's crazy. I always think when I like, will listen to Jack and for Beats what you said about the labels, I always think back then, like how did clear all these beats? Like you know what I mean like it wasn't like it was a mixtape. Like there wasn't the internet where could just drop a freestyle on YouTube, like he had to put that out.

Well, if anybody could clear anything from independent and labels at that particular time, it would be Brian Turner because Brian Turner also released all the rap Masters compilation tapes.

Yeah, I remember those, and.

That took a little bit of clearance to try to get because.

There was that was back then. There was a lot of compilations that you might go to a gas station and to be like a racket tapes and you'd be like be like, yeah, let me grab this.

The Swap Meet the Lah you know, Dre was making those those Swap Meet tapes in uh eighty seven, eighty six, and eighty eight is the only place where you could find songs because they wasn't on cassette yet. It was you know back then, you know, hip hop was a singles market. They did not you know what I'm saying with singles albums, but you know, if they released the twelve inch, right, the average person, you know be like, I ain't got no record player, you know, I got

One of my favorite remixes of all time is to shut Him Down remix. I think Pete Rock Rock. I think that's one of the greatest beats ever. Yeah, I love that song. So much of the original is incredible. Do you remember hearing that for the first time? Like, because you guys already had a big record, but it took a like I feel like the Pete Rock version.

Took a little further. Well, you know, this is a difference in Kevin.

You know, La and New York are two different places, and everything in between was different. They wanted that original doom because we performed that when we had the the Pete Rock version. How that started? That started real easy. The person that Columbia Sony Angela Thomas, was working with Pete and she said, Hey, I got a young guy named Peter Phillips and he wants to be able to do a remix, and you know, and I was like, cool,

I mean, where could we go wrong?

It's like down the line it's third single, and and Pete, you know, not only did you do shut him down, he also did our night Train and he did Night Train with the with the James Brown get up, get into it and get involved backtracking. So he delivered too. And then it was like should he rap on it? I was like yeah, I had them wrap him in cl And that's to me, that's a joyful moment because I felt that it also helped them in their career

You kind of kick off this new project kind of saying what rock is, right, Yeah, you and Pe have always had such a synergy with different bands and just the genre in general, whether it's Anthrax or you know, we talked earlier about Rage and all that, Like what do you think it is about the energy that Public Enemy and Chucky is always brought to the table musically stylistically that is like always meshed so well with with rock.

Louder, stronger, faster. We're gonna be faster, We're gonna be louder and we're gonna be stronger. I mean it's you know, like you do them lyrics at that speed, you're gonna kill over the average person, killing over right, and you know what, And not to get on my high horse, but the men I started the Public Enemy, bring the noise pop up on one hundred and nine beasts for a minute.

Hundred you know, and even King doing raw and all that. The real yoh man, the.

Real marathon was Anthrax doing bring the noise right because thrash metal at high speeds, yo, man, they take it from here to way higher, you know. And the motto is, Kevin, you do the songs or the songs do you? So it ain't no cop out, so you cut and do it on a song, right, it ain't nothing. Oh I can't do the third verse. I got to stop. It's no parachute man. And that's one thing I always to say about MC's I say, you know what, challenge yourself

But something that really tests you physically.

I think it's a good thing that you know, like leaders of the New School when they trained under us, we used to have a run around the track backwards and spit versus.

It's very difficult to do.

Quite literally, I don't know how to do it today.

But yeah, get to go around the track, spit your lyrics running backwards. See where that ends up.

That's wild. Yeah, that's that would explain you know why one of the greatest performers of all time came out of that's crazy think about.

And then the other thing is that you could, you know, you would be like you know, chop chop up time. Yeah, but chop up time and move it's different. Yeah, it's great to see if you're standing is a master at chop up time? Right, but you're standing still right right right, Diggie stood still right right right? Punk punk and metal, they they they're all over the place.

Yeah.

I think the only guy who I could think off the top of my head that's newer new guys. Well, I guess newers. I was going to say he's not newer, but Tech nine, Tech nine is.

Yeah, yeah, he sees in shape, he's crazy, he's he's taken. I know it's a crazy comparison, but Tech nine is taking hardcore. And also what Hammer did have to dancing?

Right?

Well, no, there's a lot of dancing and textuffy, tons of back man exactly like tons of choreography. Yeah, but it's like, yeah, it's it's crazy text a live show this.

Yeah, yeah, And so a lot of credit isn't given for that.

Do you feel like there's a lack of quote unquote I guess you could say, like protest music in hip hop in twenty twenty five, you.

Only know what you know. A lot of people only spit what they know.

That's fair yeah, you don't know what you know. I also feel like I feel like too.

It's just like.

I feel like with I feel like there's gonna be there has to be more coming well, you know, because I feel like the world is becoming more and more aware of like certain shit happening all over the planet, and I feel like I would hope there are some people we've never.

Heard of inspired right hip know for people spitting what they don't like, but on top of the list is some personal things they don't like, and that that usually clogs up the agenda.

I think the last great protest hip hop song was fuck Donald Trump by YG Yeah classic.

Yeah, and yeah exactly. I mean.

Those are guys that stuck you know, that's stuck out man, And look to me, I feel man, every song got to have a topic.

Yeah.

The key things that even back in the day that if I said anything the cube I said, just don't repeat yourself twice and don't feel like you got to have a jump up from this person to that person all overnight, gradual build up, so so your fan base can follow you.

Yo, when did you guys? Because when I think of you guys, you are so synonymous with some of my favorite movies of all time. Do the right things up there. Obviously, you guys did the he Guy game soundtrack, which I remember buying used from the warehouse. Great album. When did you guys?

That's an underrated album, Oh for sure, because I got I got ball bars in there, that that Cat.

Stois Ray Allen Man.

Exactly.

But what what what?

What was your guys' initial I guess, uh, the genesis of you and Spike Lee's relationship renaissance people at the time where he was creating film, we would creating music. Other people were creating other different things, and all in New York City at the time, So we were kind of like brought together by Bill Stephanie and you know in nineteen eighty nine, and really at the end of nineteen eighty eight then he just finished putting together School Days in School Days.

Yeah, he took Go Go Music with EU and had that highlight and Kadeem Hardison, you know, water Public Enemy sweatshirt in it, and it was about college and something that we and I was familiar with a lot, you know, fraternities and stuff like that. I mean, you say fraternities and sororities across White America. They don't know what the hell we talk about, right, But the black life was a whole different universe in there, and we were familiar

So that was a whole other universe that he tapped in.

And he said the next thing he was tapped in on the unrest that was going on, inequality that was going on in New York City at the time.

So when we had a meeting in.

Eighty eight and right before we was going on tour in Europe wud Run dmc, Spike said, I'm putting together this thing with all the stuff that's going on, this inequity going on in New York City. And strangely enough, that movie was spearheaded by the continuity and the connection that that Black Radio did for the city.

You see Samuel L.

Jackson, oh Man, Samuel Jackson is the one that ties the whole the whole movie, the whole time.

Yeah, And so Spike.

Said he needed an anthem, and the original thing he wanted us to do was a hip hop version of lift Every Voice and Sing that was quickly rejected, and to fight the power became the thing that came out of that. But who knew Spike was gonna put that song in the movie like fifteen times.

It was Yeah, I mean it's it's it's it's kind of like a character in the.

Movie Unprecedented and uh, Spike helped make that that what it was. And yeah, a lot of things on making it and sonically it was a compromising record. It wasn't punk. It was like, okay, you know this is this is the music that gets you bumping. I mean certain things set it off. I mean seeing Rosie, you know Perez at the beginning she boxing and dancing.

I mean, you the first time you see a real.

Dance element connected the public enemy who who's more about fighting knocking the head off your shoulder than dancing. So there's a lot of things that that Spike brought to fight the power that a lot of people don't give him credit for.

When I every time I watched Do the Right Thing, I'm always like, why didn't Spike act more?

He's so good in this movie.

I feel like that might be is that the only movie like he didn't really.

Do a lot of acting, Like, I mean, they Spiked don't get credit for example, Man Jordan's doesn't take off.

I mean, Jordan doesn't.

Have no personality without commercial unless you had no personality less Spike.

Lee, those commercials brought some yeah, some yeah.

Because all Nike was just like a Nike. Matter of fact, Nike was less hippo than Adidas because Adidas.

Had running in Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure.

You know, Nike was like okay, you know, you know, you track, running track, you know, a couple of people playing ball with it. Spike not only bought you know, hip hop into it, he brought Brooklyn into it.

So I'm from Phoenix, your guys a song by the time I get to Arizona, it was a record that was it was almost like, damn, we're only known and we don't know, we don't have any rappers. We're only known because we were the last state to have MLK Day. Yeah, fucking public enity Beta song about us essentially.

Yeah right, that was that was a trip too. And when we played with you two in Sun Devil Stadium, that went across like oh my goodness. You know, we played just that song, right, and then we didn't play the rest of our set. We protest the wrestler, so that made that. But we wasn't doing things.

I didn't know that happened to you guys. Yeah, we played Sun Devil only did that one song and then eighty five.

Thousand people up in there and do the fists in the air?

Did you get the back end?

Not only did we the only did we put our fists in the air, right, but we hung the Klansmen that night. Yeah, we hung the Clansmen that night. Every show where we did we hung a Klansman at the end of it.

That's amazing, can we I.

Mean, see, that's the kind of ship we need. I want to see that ship in.

But listen, you have you have a more homogen.

I would say homoginized USA, where all the kids are in the same melting pot. But that's everybody's afraid to say say something because.

They might pist the homie off the homes's parents or you know.

No, everybody, you know, everybody's a screen ager, so they're getting their ethics through the phone anyway.

But they all like minded through the same screens anyway.

So you find people that they like minded, and they knocked the visual differences off to the side, which is cool.

What's not cool is that people are learning.

Less about each other's background because there's a lot of dirt in the background on everybody. So they say, we don't teach nothing, we'll start over the twenty first century and go forward. And that ain't cool either, because everything is institutionalized in the history of what made it in the first place. So you got to teach history, you got to teach geography. And geography is like, Okay, you was in Phoenix, you wasn't in Tempe, and I mean you wasn't you was You wasn't in Tucson, and some

To try to say something like where do you start?

Well, I feel like too, that was what was so great about you, guys, was you were able to learn about things that you might You know, you listen to public Enemy, you're going to take something. If you're in your bubble, you're gonna be forced to step out of your bubble and retain some.

Information that goes along with the songwriter. Too. I do more listening than I did it, more listening and reading than I did talking, like.

I remember listening to Immortal Technic as a kid and learning about all kind of crazy shit about like the CIA and right fuck like crazy like. I mean, I think a lot of people like obviously generic, you know, people who weren't you know, necessarily like astute. But a lot of a lot of people got introduced to the nation through you guys too.

I mean, you know, popular Culture is a great gateway right for the good, bad and ugly too. You could you could introduce through culture things that make people say, well, I love culture, and I guess this is the thing that that they say that they love as well. So I'm follow that until I hit a brick wall. But culture is good. Culture is to bring that is the thing that you know, brings us together and knocks the differences to the side, right as human beings.

I feel like too, that's just music. Music is like music is the common space. Music is sports could be you could be at a fucking basketball game, right right. We agree we love the Knicks, I not agree on everything else exactly.

And it also is an age baracud if you know, it knocks down the isms you have what racism, sexism, now you get agism. All you gotta do is go around and see the lifestyles of people sixty and over and really seventy and over. And there's not a lot of in this country that can you know, save a lot of people from from themselves. And they're in the back spot. And that's one of the things that radio

That's a bar.

Yeah, well you know I've been never been mine. Yes, this is that's just factual mathematics.

Sure.

And here's the thing is about it. Like a lot of times, let's say you take an old head un.

You know they call me an unk. I think they call you an old head. I don't know. I'm an o G. I saw the breakdown of the age.

Yeah, who broke that down?

Some kid on TikTok on TikTok. As of right now at thirty eight, I'm an unk.

Yeah you are.

I'm og because I'm an uncle. People in their forties, yeah, you'd be like that. So that's what they you know, or even like a person that turned fifty. I turned fifty fifteen years ago, so I'm like, so they still gonna call me unk, and then you gotta revere. You got to own that too, because you know. But the thing about it, here's a misnomer. If he's sharp, and you have your senses and you're not brain fogged by by whatever happened during COVID.

You already seen what happened.

I've seen mc in since nineteen seventy six, so I'm seeing it in twenty twenty five at real time.

Right.

So when somebody said, oh, man, you don't know what this is, I said, I see it, I hear it, I feel it. But I'm comparing it. I'm comparing it to the first time I heard him saying, you know what fifty years Yeah. Yeah, So my timeline. What you're trying to tell me is that I can't make a compare the analysis when I've seen both, but you only see one, or your timeline of comparison might be Okay, I started to check this out in nineteen ninety six,

Yeah? Do you ever still see the old buildings while you're looking at the new buildings?

Sometimes?

But mostly, but when you see the new building.

Oh oh, you're when I'm looking at the new building.

Yeah, you see the old buildings the same time.

That just happened to me.

That's your third die in your back eye.

Yeah, that literally just happened to me.

A young head ain't got that. Matter of fact, sometimes you even see people who ain't here no more, right, that's fair. Yeah, So you can't really.

Process this in anything when you come down to evaluations. It's not like you're stuck in the day. You see both of them at the same time. Oh, yeah, of the church that used to be right there, you see that church right and you see the new building. Those comparative analysis a young head can't make.

Yeah, I feel like, yeah, there's just certain I feel like hip hop's an interesting space where there's a lot of people who aren't necessarily fans of hip hop. They have a voice in You got.

Casuals everywhere though, Yeah, but oh you mean the ones in.

Charge not even necessarily in that too. But also just like when it comes to like some of the commentary that is bigger, it's from people who aren't even like really hip hop fans.

They're like, but they can't tell you what they are fans of anyway.

I mean, like me, you know, I like who I like, like, for example, I grew up with Rolling Stones, Lan Zeppelin, who beatles right, But then there's another category R EO Speedwagon, Foreigner sticks.

They take care of that thing too, you know, the eighties, And I just barely, like, in the last five six years, have gotten very appreciative of hain't that trip some of that like seventies eighties rock shit.

Me too, I mean, and I grew up alongside of it.

Some mushrooms and I threw on the fucking one of these nights by the Eagles, and I was like, right, like you was like, YO.

For real, thorough raise thorough for sure.

Yeah, man, but within your record kind of saw YO as a statesman of hip hop, as one of the guys who built this shit. What was your just fan perspective, Chuck D perspective on Kendrick Lamar and Drake and just Kendrick's last twelve months. It's been pretty crazy and the halftime show, your boy Samuel L. Jackson is an amazing guy.

I thought that was a wonderful introduction to rap, but it was you know, a lot of thinking rap music and hip hop is top heavy. You know, when I look at your walls, I see I see, I see top middle and also start up coming in the bottom. If you're going to come on, man, if you're going to be like a ball fan of NBA, it's not all about Kobe and Jordan.

It's like could be like somebody who's like the sixth Landry Shammitt. You know what I'm saying. Like, if you don't, you got to appreciate, uh, you know, thoroughness in it.

And you appreciate Derek Fisher too, exactly so.

And so the wide body aspect of hip hop and rap I'm into when it comes down to like, oh yeah, they you know it's Drake and Kendrick. I'm like, that's casual talk, right, yeah, the casuals. It's like like I talked to people, I'm a Nick fan, man, They're like, oh yeah, well I like I like, yeah, I like Brunson. Yeah right, And it's not who else is on the Knicks. Well, you know the guys that's with Brunson, right, Okay.

What's the guy? The cat guy Cat?

All the conversations you have with your mom, Man.

How did you watch last night's game?

Come on, man, I got scars all over my body today.

But you know what listen, I just I have to do thirty eight when you saw this, you thirty eight?

How old are the How old are the players?

Uh, there're probably ten years more.

So they experience a level that they they haven't experienced before.

All those guys on both teams for sure.

Yeah, for you know, you let young guys do their thing until they figure it out.

Yeah, it was definite.

They was if they already should have been knowing about that level, they'd be forty five years old, but their body wouldn't be able to work. Like so, every time I watch sports, I said, you know, god, you know, don't make that Pass't no better than that. I checked myself. I'm like, you know what, this the first Eastern Conference finals. He twenty four years old?

Yo, man?

Let young be young man. Yeah, it was definitely, it was. It just it was some ninety shit for me to see those two teams against each other, because you remember back in the day, you would when it was like it was always the Knicks and Heat or the Knicks and Pacers.

Those our enemies. Man, we beat the Celtics. The Celtics ain't never been the Knicks enemy.

Now it was the Heat, yeah, and the Pacers The Celtics have always been big bro Nicks little bro and every time the Celtics will win.

As I'm telling you, back in the fifties, we we we we we we were losers. Yeah.

I feel like in the nineties the Celtics were losers and the Knicks.

So that's been the Knicks, that's been the Celtics, enemies of the Lakers and also the Philadelphia seventy sixes. Those are you know what I'm saying, That's where that can Nick's heat paces. I got to play in Boston two days from now, so I was on Twitter X or whatever the hell they want to call it, and I'm I'm a little I'm a rowdy as a texting fan. Of course, I'm like, beat them asses, And people are like, oh my god, Chuck D said that, Oh my god,

Next to me. Yeah.

I feel like there's like I always tell people, there's like sports hate, which isn't real hate, but it's like I could say, like I hate a player, but.

Yeah, I hate paces and I hate the heat right and here's the crazy thing about it, keV. I got fans in Miami, and I got fans in the Indian African for sure. But I said, this is this Saint Chuck d. This is Chuck a fan of the New York Knicks, and I hate y'all asses.

I think if y'all get through this, I think I think there's a good chance. I feel like, I feel like you guys matchup well against the Thunder. I'm assuming the Thunder went already.

Game by game. I hope we we it was game one.

Man only young heads is like, oh my god, well we you know, like you know, like in New York, you know, outside the garden, this is Gooden Central Station.

Man, for sure.

You know anybody it's like, oh, they should walk around with Indiana paces Jersey outside that guard.

You shouldn't know.

One of my uh favorite moments at the iHeart Festival over the last few years was you you guys doing the iHeart Festival, because iHeart festivals. Like I remember when we saw the lineup, I was like, oh, because usually I'm backstage running around drinking. I was like, oh no. Me and Doc Winner we watched while eating mushrooms, watched you guys, fucking kill that show.

That was running around, but it was real show and yeah, yeah it was a good, like shiny experience.

Yeah, it was definitely. It's always a shiny your experience. It's like it's like hanging out at a commercial and doing doing a life. Yeah it's a TV show.

And let me tell you doing public getemy so you got you gotta go through training and that was one of those shows that like, it ain't training, it's just like kind of doing it with a little bit of warm up.

But you know the regular tour thing you got trained for sure, you guys.

And you know you mentioned the public enemy logo, whether it's people wearing the shirt, whether I mean I got public going to be Vans. The licensing game for public enemies got to be crazy, like do you are you?

Are you? I used to be on top of it, and is it turned into its own things?

Pop used to have merchandise tool, merchandise company. Now it's just like out of our hands. So it has its own thing that you get checked up on. But my whole thing is like I had to get with a bigger situation because every time I see someone with it, I am a and Navana and they like are twelve and eleven years old and for.

Sure and wearing a Beatles shirt.

I get competitive, man, I'm like, damn man, Yeah, you know, how do we get up in those ranks?

It's Target.

It's just Target, Yeah, because Target's got the sick shirts for like eleven bucks. Yeah, and you'll be in there be like damn Tar got a Woot tank shirt.

Yeah exactly, I'll take that.

What keeps you so inspired in just like you you feel like you still got the battery in your back to compete to work at your age man.

Like number one, I've been doing the radio show every week for sixteen years in a row. So I see, I see everything come through it through me. I curate at least as many. It's five hundred thousand saungs and artists, no matter what else they come from, whether it's the Drakes, down to the brother Ali's down to like, you.

Know, shout to brother Manhred just here.

My brother brother, and you know, down to anybody. So yeah, I'm in the game, you know. And the game is sharpened by the radio shows, rap station, the apps.

I've built.

The Spit Slam record label with my partner Sea Doc, you know, put together the radio Armageddon, and there's always you know, hip hop gods or a man flat Line, which is basically classic artists and you know, been doing it for over twenty years, that's the category we call it, and a station and the show that he has, he's been doing it. So my whole fight is to make sure that they get known for all the work they put in all these years. It ain't about me, It's

Damn? Could I get him notoriety? Right?

Or?

Do you know?

The only ones that get notoriety is you know, here's a big corporation. They're gonna flood it with money and promotion and you know, and that's how you get big. So if they don't get big, I'm a failure.

Yo, do you did you see? Because there's so many, so many of my homies who got hip to you guys because of Tony Hawk's pro skater.

Yeah, Tony Hawk.

And before that like Bring the Noise was like I felt like like anytime you play Tony Hawk, that song is getting played.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, Tony Hawk's a big uh, a big.

It was like that and B Boy document that all of a sudden, like little white kids all over the country didn't know they were becoming like backpack fans because they're like listening to most stef and P and shit.

You know, A's a trip to it. He's a great fan and peer, you know, Tony Hawk and the whole thing. And before that was the grand Theft Auto thing. Yeah. When I was I think I was a DJ. I don't play video games. I couldn't tell you A from B from anything, but I get the feedback. You know what I'm saying. I'm not a skater because I'm from the seventies. I'm a roller skater. So at back in the seventies, we danced, right and you want to get the girls roller skating or dance on the floor.

Dancing is no longer an element in today's music.

It sure isn't. I'll tell you that. Look, you know friends that get married, Yeah, there's dancing at weddings still.

But not between the dudes. A lot of the times you see the ladies dancing together. Yeah, I feel like even the dudes is on the wall.

You know, do drink on and sure you dudes don't dance anymore. They're too cool.

The mean back in the day, they was cool too. But my job as the DJ is to yell at them and get them off the wall, right right. You also la culture to us all how to dance too, because you had soul trained. Soul Train taught all of us like get off the wall and get down and big up to Don Cornelis because that was right here in town. And for years you wasn't a big black act until you went to Soul Train.

If you had to pick one of your babies, it takes a nation or fear of a black planet.

Which album you followed? Baseball, Yes, loosely.

That's like Roger Morris's season and then the next year he had fifty four, So it's like one's an upper deck shot. The other one is like a line drive shot. So those are two home runs that I don't think. I don't think I could cook all betyet and pitches. One is a fastball one hundred and twenty miles an hour, others all Break a split Finger.

That to Oh my God, you need them both, Yeah, you need them both.

So my favorite, crazy enough, my favorite record that I liked over the last in this century was what Gary g Wiz produced called Man Plans God Lasts. Okay, the whole album is twenty nine minutes, and the whole goal to do the album was if we could do eight to nine cut or ten cuts under two minutes, that's just to do bro. But but the way he put his foot into it to That record came out twenty fifteen and we performed quite a bit on it.

You know, it was awesome.

You are in one of the greatest groups of all time. If you had to put your guys's yourself in the Mount Rushmore, who's on the Mount Rushmore of rap groups with you? There's three more spots if you had to pick three, maybe your personal taste groups of just rap Roop.

Yeah, Cypress Hill, Okay, Run, dmc WU, Tang Clan. And I'm not going to count duos because you know, you get in the outcasts.

Yeah, because you get into the duo Space Mob, Deep Run, the Jewels of the Duo.

Yeah, Yeah, yeah, duo, so their groups, but in that you know, right, and you got to put e gm D like at the top of those duos, the duos American paris just amazing. But I'll say, like when you got the full dimension d D, j MC's other things like Cypress Hill, rou Tang Run DMC.

Personally, Houdini.

Doesn't get there. They're underappreciated when we talk about that. For sure.

Houdini obliterated the eighties and performance and records and crossed over in the areas you know. So yeah, and to me, I'm a person that's missed groups, you know, I missed groups, uh dilated people's as a group and then somebody you travel with although it was two people, but it was also DJ.

Was very instrumental in their live show and it cuts.

Yeah, that's a group, you know what I'm saying.

And yeah, not to say epm D didn't have scratched also, so you get in the vague areas like that, but.

Was like an official. He had his own records on the on the album.

Yeah, I thought that the West Coast held on the groups a little bit more before they went into corporation, saying well, we're only going to sign the solo act.

Yeah.

J five was dope, drastic.

Oh my god, J five, I mean big up to I do hiro Oh.

So I do graphic illustrations, So I've released seven illustrated books. But so I know people who are artists in the hip hop fields. So people like Charlie Charlie Tuna and one.

Of the best voices, oh my god, in tones in hip hop history is Charlie Tuneman. Yeah, and then went on to have it. He's in another great group.

Which is fucking exactly crazy.

Yeah, crazy, Charlie Tuna slept on that. And that dude is huge. I remember I met him as a kid.

I was like, he's a tall dude.

Man, his voice matchress.

My voice doesn't match me.

People used to say, Man, I thought somebody's gonna come in here, like six foot five, three hundred pounds is like, uh, kars one, who's the most devastating greatest of all time rappers goat with plus and some it's a dude that you know, just like he's the only MC I know that come in the room and change the MC complexion of the room because he could come in and he does this too, Yo, who MC's here and nobody wants to say to the MC.

Yeah, dude, I mean I remember when he was doing the Temple of Hip Hop shit when I was a kid and I got to go see him live, like it was like watching Like, yeah, it was crazy seeing kiris one for the first time.

I was like another one stamina wires, which is important as that.

You guys toured together too in quite a few times.

Yeah.

Yeah, as a as a young guy and as an older person. You know, then you got n w A I mean, which is a super group before wu Jang. Then he got the roots.

Oh, the roots. He had the roots. Yeah, and then the roots too, like over time was more than just black thought. As an MC, dice were always in there and the group like yeah, the roots, honestly, the roots. The roots is in that conversation man.

Well you know, then the roots come out of what the first hip hop bands, that's the Sonic.

Then you did your underground, Yeah, Tupac comes.

Out of that, Yeah, sex packet, and then you know, and you got the.

Roots was the third man manifestation out of that.

And then you had groups that came up that didn't get to support, like the Goats got dope.

Yeah, I feel like, uh, there was a lot of like nineties rap groups that, like you said, like didn't necessarily that like if you knew you knew type like even like D I T. C.

Like yeah, yeah, yeah, because they had they had a whole c of mcs that was able to get on Diamond's work and just I mean like people like O.

C O.

Giant Man.

You know, it's crazy. Why do you think the group died in hip hop and N R and B Because I always had this conversation with R and B two because it's.

Like easier when I was easier for to negotiate with one person. See.

The problem is also when it came to Black Acts, destroy the group, take the solo member and you know so so so we're afraid of not only this renegotiation, but read negro negotiation and reading negotiation.

That's the ship that they throw at Black Acts.

Yeah, because if you think back, you know, bust the rhymes went solo. There's a bunch of the.

Last thing they wanted is like eight people yelling in the office, Like they said, now we could just take one person and negotiate with that one person their lawyer.

Oh you need a lawyer, by the way my brother. So they would, they would, they would mob up on the on the.

They would Yeah, it's crazy because that still happens where management or the label will recommend you a lawyer.

So they mobbed up telling you to go solo right as opposed that they mobbed up and you mobbed up, right, Ain't that's something right?

I see?

You know, you've always had a big voice when it comes to just like anything anything, sports, politics, et cetera. What is your thoughts just done? Like, you know, just everything that's happening in the world right now, we got you know, gods of shit is super sad what's happening over there. And it feels like every day there's some new wild shit that Trump's doing where you're like, what.

Whippings of mass distraction to get everybody to be phyxiated on bread and circuses as they continue to do the dirt. And you know, it's very easy to detach the United States of American mind away from the world. People already ain't trying to look at the world as the world. They try to look at, you know, their own county and state as that, and they don't want to go any further. Just like ask at the normal California. How much of California did they see?

That's true. You got people in laws have never been to bakers Field.

Like, what the hello, Doug, I've been a Bakersfield you Yeah, there you go.

But you did work in Bakersfield, right.

I've been to Bakersfield. I'm on the radio in Bakersfield. I've been there enough times in my life where I'm like, I've seen it. Okay, Insne to ben to Fresno. Actually like Presnel tad.

Bit Moore than a little bigger, little bigger, a little.

Bigger, little bigger. They get the college shut to the bulldogs.

Well, my thing is like people in the United States of America don't venture out to the United America for sure. And when it comes down to it, we'll talk politically.

It's crazy because I can assume that you're to the point in your career where you've had interactions with police that are fans of you.

Oh yeah, I've never had conflict with any police ever in my life. But and I was cat when I was going to college. I had to walk to it. I had to walk through a white, posh town.

But so did the cops ever fuck with you guys because of you know, nine one one as a joke or some of these records. Did they ever give you any shit?

Nah? Nah?

Anyway, listen, the Nation Islam, right, and I work with the Nation pop is in the Nation of Islam.

Number one, they teach you, number.

One, to conduct yourself civilized, so no matter where you are, your language will save you half the time. You Also, the Nation Islam teaches its people to know the law wherever you live. You only fight the law when you know the law. You know it's unjust, and you know the best way to fight the law is collectively with an organized plan, because the law nine times out of ten might be against you, you'll stop by police. There's a language and there's a behavior to untwist you out

And they're just bored.

Huh yeah, yeah, So you gotta.

Go there and figure out like, all right, this dude, man, it's like, let me untwist it. Even on a bad day, figure out how to get on out and keep it moving, get up out of there. But you know, you were taught how to govern your language, how to govern, govern your human being. And even then you gonna run into some cracker situation that might be adversarial, but then you know, collectively you could figure out the language that that would

Through right, kind of slowly roll through, no complete stop tip.

Right, yeah, yeah, my pop tell me this all the time. Now, I don't drive fast, right, so I'm up.

But none of us really are coming to a complete stop.

We should I know, I know, but then you know, the more you do it, then you get more relaxed and type of thing, you know. So sure enough, I get to stop sign. I kind of didn't go through cop right there right in the street. So I immediately pulled to the side immediately, like I start laughing, right, and he comes up to me, you know, seeing me laughing right, He started laughing right, and I like, yeah, my pops man was telling me about it.

He said, yeah, you should listen to your pops already. There. I diffuse the air, right, you know what I'm saying.

So, so as a man, you're taught to sometimes say when you air my bad, even in sports, it's like I threw the bad past, but at the same time you didn't catch it.

You gotta sometimes say, you know what, I threw it wrong? My bad? You know you learn that from sports.

In society, men teach their sons the language because basically, if you especially if you're black or a person of color, you want to be an adversarial situation, your language will save you.

Your language will save you from getting a fight that you can't handle.

I feel like too, that's why, like the nation is so dangerous to the establishment.

Yeah, because they never talked about going around with guns. Their whole policy is like the listen, their minds have to be developed. Yeah, yeah, okay, Yeah, there's situations there where where adversary is guns, even a gun happy nation.

Guns everywhere.

But can you imagine if it was known for to be an organization with guns, they would have used the same cotel practice that they attempted to wipe out.

I feel like it's interesting, Like I mean, in.

This state, the Panthers used a policy of the right to bear arms as intellectuals in this state, and immediately crack of tactics was about rubbing them.

Out because they they US law, use the law, and it was like, nigga, you got the nerve.

Yeah.

I always find it interesting. You know, I was talking to my boy. I don't know if you've heard the nineteen Keys. He's incredible. But we're just kind of talking a bit about why there's less taught about Elijah Muhammad than there is about other figures throughout history. And it's like it's that's like almost like purposeful by these you know,

And before we used to rely on family being able to transfer information down. Since everything comes to the screen, is expected that they're going to intentionally miss some things. So I always liking that there's no competition in the great leadership of people in the past before great leaders those are tools in the box. They're like, well, what do you think about Malcolm X, you know, versus Doctor King? I said, it is not a Drake, It's not a Drake and Kendrick battle and every little thing.

It's like, it's not that.

Malcolm is a tool of learning.

Is he used the phillips head and doctor King was a flathead screwdriver, you know what I'm saying his tools.

Doctor King came a little bit closer to the phillips head before he passed you know.

Yeah, well, you know that's how you use your tools, and.

Giants from our past are tools to actually make you understand how to get forward in your current and in the future, to be able to teach a little bit of it.

I know you do the radio show. I feel like you could also. I mean, I saw so many artists are doing amazing podcasts, but I feel like you could do a podcast and that would just have conversations that nobody else has happened right now. Is that something you can consider doing At the time, you ain't got the time. That's two or three hours a week.

And yeah, at the time, I don't have the brain space for it. I'd rather create the technology. I tell people, I say, you know what, rather than being on the show, get my app.

Get my app and put your show on your show on it.

I love it, Miliari.

All right, So the album is out, Everyone go go run it up.

It's dope.

A lot of the artists on there hadn't heard of so it was dope to discover some new talent on it that I hadn't been.

Here to homage, to homage, just to say to the MC and the DJ, and that's the radio. It's the radio enemy. Radio is the dj MC component of Public Enemy. Matter of fact, it is actually now the component that actually is the backdrop of our concerts now is DJ Johnny Juice joh Heath from the Bay Area. On the other turntable and t Bone the drummer from it used to be our band element.

How many I know you guys are always doing shows, so that they's no not always doing show.

We just pick it, pick and choose, especially a sixty five bro. Oh yeah, pick and choose. Man, you got listen. Why are you all over the place instead of worrying about the quality of your life?

Right? I tell people say, it's not what you accumulate, it is what you do with what you have. I like that in my art studio is.

Ten by ten, thirty five hundred dollars from lows.

That's all you need.

And inside that art studio ten by ten by ten, space magic happens.

I love it.

Would you guys ever do a new pe album?

Wait for surprises? Okay, you'll be first enough.

I feel like all the ogs are putting out amazing. The new ice Q album was fire. There's there's a lot of there's just a lot of good, good music being put out by OG's right now, so including yourself. Man, go get the album.

Chuck.

I appreciate your time. We could have done this for a much longer time.

But oh I'm glad to catch up with you since you were fourteen.

Yeah, for sure, Man, thank you for everything. Man, you haven't changed my life for real, So thank you for that.

Bro, like hey man, to be to be a OG and to get that, I just say, I get it all the time, and it's immeasurable as opposed to like, dude, Man, it's like I'm in jail because of you.

I don't have none of that.

So yeah, there are artists where you're like yo, man, like yeah, and you care the character and I love some of that music too, for sure. Yeah for sure, Chuck, appreciate you, bro, Yes, Sir Boom