2013 Daily News | Hip-Hop and Politics

J Cole Releases Song Dedicated To Slain 7 yr old Aiyanna Stanley-Jones

September 18, 2013 By mrDaveyd

This is a powerful song and video called ‘Crooked Smile‘ from rapper J Cole that he dedicates to Aiyanna Stanley-Jones. She was the 7-year-old girl from Detroit who was killed when police showing off for a reality TV show ran into her home looking for a suspect and threw a flash grenade in her room and then shot her.. It was tragic on all levels…

The cop responsible Joseph Weekley was put on trial for the killing, the jury was deadlocked and the proceedings were deemed a mistrial, which means he will be retried.

In the video J Cole makes the case that the war on drugs needs to be reconsidered being that his depiction centers around the cops raiding the home of a drug dealer. In the Aiyanna Stanley-Jones case the police were looking for a man who lived upstairs in the duplex who was wanted for murder.

A scene from the J Cole video Crooked Smile

The take away from all this is two-fold. First police need to do their jobs without playing things up for a TV crew.. Weekly was a frequent guest on the 48 Hours show and who knows what his mindset was when they raided the house.. Was his focus on doing good police work or cheesing for the cameras, making sure they caught his ‘good side’.

On the other hand, folks who are involved in any sort of dirt can not and should not bring that home where innocent kids are residing. Over the past year we’ve heard of number of horrific tragedies involving young kids being shot and killed. In fact they are too many to count. From the most recent one in the Brooklyn where a 1 year old Antiq Hennis was slain to several in Oakland including the recent slaying of 8 year old Alaysha Carradineto and 1 year old Baby Drew to a high-profile cases in Chicago where 6 month old Jonylah Watkins to 6 year old Tiana Ricks who was slain in Southern Cali which moved a number of rappers including The Game and Snoop Dogg to help pay for her funearl

In some of the instances the kids were caught up because the parents were all up in the wrong mix.. There’s an old saying ‘Don’t shit where you sleep’, meaning keep your home safe.. Don’t allow trouble to come where innocent folks live especially kids.

Another scene from J Cole video

In other instances, kids who were killed were caught up in the crossfire which leads on to ask what is wrong with folks these days that they can’t wait until kids are out of sight to settle their violent disputes. Can folks establish some sort of code of ethics?

The take away for all of us is to protect our children.. If we don’t value our own lives, at least find it within ourselves to value theirs.. This goes for out of control police to dirt doers in the community.. Props to J Cole for sparking the discussion and reminding us..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fzzMOMkjm8A&feature=youtu.be

The J Cole video reminds me of the powerful video Pittsburgh rapper Jasiri X did a couple of years back..It was called Three Little Girls…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgcVMvl-k7A

Another cut dedicated to Aiyanna was by Bay Area artists Ras Ceylon and Sinista Z called 4 Aiyanna

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nIDOvFyq5Y

Filed Under: 2013 Daily News Tagged With: Aiyanna Stanley-Jones, crooked smile, J cole, Joseph Weekly, Ras Ceylon

Boots Riley of the Coup While in Paris Speaks His Mind on Politics & Music

September 18, 2013 By mrDaveyd

“One of the problems, with political movements or music, is the fact we don’t think we matter”

-Boots Riley-

Boots Riley of the Coup

Boots Riley, from the Coup, is a true MC. He always manages to grab your attention, whether it’s on record, during a show, or discussing with him. Because he’s a rapper who speaks with power and he’s also an organizer who acts with power. As this year marks the 20^th anniversary of his group’s first album “Kill my landlord”, and the 2^nd anniversary of the occupy movement in which he was involved from his hometown, Oakland, La Voix du HipHop sat down with him, in Paris, while he was on tour promoting The coup latest album, “Sorry to bother you”.

How MC Hammer’s success (and also Digital Underground and Too Short ones) helped him get signed, HipHop activist Vs organizer, the lure of black capitalism, the criminalization of black cultures, the shutdown of Oakland Port and its meaning, but also The Coup’s strategy to be heard and evolve (among other topics), Boots Riley provided us with some useful, entertaining and pertinent food for thought. In the true spirit of the MC.

Interview:

La Voix du HipHop: Did you have the thought or the ambition of being a rapper when you would grow up, like kids of today?

Boots Riley: No. When I was 12, I wanted to do something Big. I think I wanted to be like Prince or I wanted to be on TV. And to me, what I knew was important was what was on TV.

Growing up as a child you learn about the terrible things in the world but you learn about them in a way that says there’s no change. You learn about them with no sense of power, no sense of your own agenda in that world, except for maybe you could escape. You have the power to make yourself better and to guard yourself from that…

By the time I turned 14, I joined a revolutionary and political organization. I started learning that the way the world is, it is able to be manipulated by the people, not just by the few who are in power. I understood there were certain steps I needed to take to be effective in this possible future that may happen. I was learning, not only things that were happening but also dialectical materialism, the idea that things happen for a material reason, and also that things always change. And that what you do has an effect how those things change. All these learnings gave me a sense of power and made me feel like I was doing something important. Like, “Ok, you don’t have to be on TV to be important, you don’t have to be on TV to matter…”

What led you into HipHop?

Everybody was rapping at school, it was just something you did like playing basketball or baseball. Lot of times, it was just people beating on the table and then it’s your turn! And at that time I was stealing my raps from a very good rapper named Schoolly D. I was saying his rhymes and people would be like oh shit!! In my town, nobody knew Schoolly D.

Then, since I was involved in organizing rallies, I was trying to get a couple of my friends to come. I was telling them that if they come to the rally, they could get on the mic and rap, there will be hundreds of people, and it will be like a rap show. My friend Johnny was like, ok, I’m only doing this if you’re my hype-man. So I became his hype-man. That’s how I got started… And at that time, we had the dream he would get a record deal. But his idea of what a record was a freestyle. I mean, we thought all records were freestyle and that all the albums we heard was like somebody just got in the booth and started rapping and that it was easy. Then, I started asking around about the techniques to master how to do it actually. From there I was learning and practicing… And my school was doing a play called “Eastside story”, that was a take-off of Westside story which was a take-off of Romeo and Juliet. They wanted to make it a rap musical play and I wrote all the raps for it. I was actually in the play and nobody booed the raps. So I was like wooah, I can do it! And for the record, the girl who was playing the opposite me in that play was Hiep Thi Le who ended up being a star in an Oliver Stone movie’s “Heaven & earth”.

How did you end up signing with Stud Fine’s Wild Pitch records, which at that time was an east-coast oriented rap music label with Main Source, UMCs, Chill Rob G, Lord Finesse, Gangstarr, etc.. For us, as fans, it was a huge powerhouse…

First of all, at that time, in the early 90s, MC Hammer, Digital Underground and Too Short went multiplatinum. And the record industry works like this: You got a blonde girl sing and you go multiplatinum, then every record label has 50 blonde girls in their roster. So because of these three artists, every record label had to have somebody from Oakland or from the Bay area.

Once I decided to do this rap thing seriously, because of political organizing, I knew how to launch a campaign, I knew how to plaster an area with a poster or an idea, or how to go to door to door. So we applied that to the music. We had an EP, and we put posters everywhere in Oakland. The EP was available at this independent record store in Oakland and I guess basically the record label, Wild Pitch, went in that record store and asked who were the top 3 selling local artists. And it was us, The Coup, E-40 and a guy named Dangerous Dame. Dangerous Dame has just come off a major label record deal, he wanted a gang of money… E-40 and the click? they had other income sources. So we were just the cheapest one of the 3.

And there’s another reason we got signed. Stu Fine, the owner of Wild Pitch, is a great A&R person and a terrible business person. So he signed stuff that he didn’t know how to make money on, just because he liked them. The way he got into this business actually is that He had been first in the music industry in the 70s and hen he had to quit to do baseball management or something like that. He was walking down the street and there was a LL Cool J concert, he walked in and decided to stop with the baseball stuff and start a HipHop label that day. So he decided he would just sign things he liked… So he had people like Gangstarr, he hooked up with Guru and them, he hooked up with DJ Premier, who was in Texas, and put them together. But the point is most people wouldn’t even sign them and put them out, same thing with The Coup. We’ve been shopping stuff, nobody was interested. Stu signed us just because he liked us, but he didn’t have any idea on how to market us at that time. You know Gangstarr didn’t really sell records until they went to somebody else… Same thing with Lord Finesse… He was signing people nobody else would sign. And if Stu was a good businessman, he wouldn’t have signed any of us.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsUDGxdeICw

You’ve been on a major label. You’ve been in independent label. What are the pros and cons of being independent, today. Especially when you do the type of music you do?

It’s all capitalism at the end of the day. The idea of independent capitalism that is better than corporate capitalism is bullshit. Slave masters were independent capitalists. It’s not necessarily better. It’s not necessarily worse.

Sometimes, when you have a small label, you can get more attention, but you don’t get as much coverage… Epitaph records for “Pick a bigger weapon”, for instance, was the best experience. The same label 6 years later, as music industry changed, had different tactics and strategies, and I felt that they didn’t have as much faith in our record. It’s not their fault. That’s part of the reason, a small part, that is, not so many people who like the Coup know the new album, “Sorry to bother you”. Anyway, I don’t think there’s any formula to our type of music.

The really small independent label I was on for “Steal this album”, they still owe me 60 thousand dollars. They stole it…

Talking about “Steal this album”, there is a lot of misunderstanding about “Me & Jesus the pimp”… Personally, I saw it as a critic of black capitalism, as it repeats the same violence to the same people.. Could you elaborate on this one. What’s the message?

Actually there’s quite a few messages. The main idea, to me, is Jesus the Pimp, symbolizes the idea that we can be free by black capitalism & black entrepreneurship. You know the things people get caught up in their struggle, for some sense of power in their life.

But first and foremost, I wanted to write a song about sexism. I started to realize that how sexism (that is taught to women) actually affects men’s lives in terrible ways. So in that song, I wanted to talk about that.

I went to film school, I always liked to tell stories, I liked to write descriptive things, and also after “Fat cats & bigger fish”, I started seeing people thought I had a talent for that, so I decided to write another story song…

The choice of title? Before I was on internet a lot, I had just remembered there was a revolution in Grenada in 1979. So I was like I’m going to use that for title, because it was a social revolution.

I want to address “fuck a perm”… I mean, in the early 90s, lots of black folks had jheri curls, especially on the west coast… Weren’t you dissing people who could have been fans of your music?

Back then I had natural hair and people were criticizing it like ‘what you’re doing with your nappy ass hair!’. I wrote that song as a response to the critics about my hair. Also, I think at that time I was at San Francisco State University where there were folks who changed their names with stuff that meant King or Queen. So I was influenced by the culture around and it did have an effect on my writing. A lot of those who considered themselves as revolutionary or conscious were preachy, like you need to change yourself…

Now, you said lots of people had jheri curls back then. Actually they didn’t so much by the time the song came out in 1993. Even Ice Cube had cut his curls…And to get back to the fans, here’s an interesting story. We were on tour promoting “Kill my landlord” and we went to Milwaukee. Milwaukee in 1993, stylistically, fashion-wise, looked like Oakland in 1986. We were on the stage performing and I remember E-roc saying to me, don’t do “fuck a perm”. We didn’t do it as it was obvious 90% of the crowd had curls. It wasn’t about politics, it was just style. Then we got out to sign autographs, and a group of dudes walked by and they were like “Hey Coup” – [because of a lot of people called us “Coup”], “Hey Coup, fuck a perm… Fuck you”. And they kept walking and got into their car. And they were just sitting there, not so far from us.

Then we left the venue, and they followed us, bumping the whole album loud in their car and they kept yelling “fuck a perm”. And they all had curls… They really seemed hurt. But they were bumping the album. We went to different clubs, they were still following us… So it became clear there are lots of things on the album those dudes could relate to, but the song made about appearances w as the one that touched them. And that wasn’t even the intention of the song, as if the appearance was what was all about. And things are still that way today. We had all these articles about young people sagging their pants, etc.

So you say, the problem is not how we look like nor our culture…

For years after the civil right & black power movements, we’ve been endoctrined by the media that told us the problem wasn’t the system, but the problem is people being lazy, irresponsible, savage, etc. And some of black intellectuals response to this was chiming and said yeah, but it’s because of these culture conditions: Which was we don’t know ourselves so therefore we’re lazy, violent, etc. But the reality is: That’s bullshit.

We’re so much endoctrined that what we actually see black people as dangerous, ignorant, savage. They might be black people who are dealing with drugs, yes because that’s what exists in all our society. There might be like one person hustling and doing nothing, yeah, but you got that all over the world. The problem is that Black culture has been criminalized so they look to some other culture that doesn’t exist right there to say that’s what it should be. But then afterwards, that culture will be criminalized as well… It really stems from people running away from having class analysis.

Culture in everything is dictated from how people survive. From the beginning of the humanity, things have been organized for survival. In this system, that survival has to do with labor and economics. You work for money to survive. There can’t be new paradigm on how to look at addressing that problem. But until you do, you end up blaming the people…

How would you define yourself: An activist? A HipHop activist?

I wouldn’t call myself as a HipHop activist or activist. The activist , to me, is someone who moves from event to event, like a rally or a demonstration, which is kinda what’s being pushed as opposed to an organizer which has to do with more long term campaigns, with building something. I’m an organizer.

HipHop activism is a term that came about in the early 1990s. There was a bunch of us who wanted to see the landscape of political organizing change. It was boring at that time. The idea was : Trying to make this thing (political organizing) more artistic. And in the early 1990s, we had set up this thing called HipHop edutainment concert with the Mau Mau Rhythm Collective. And a few years later, people who were in the non-profit organizations picked up on stuff like this (on what we were doing) and started selling it to foundations to get money. Like HipHop activism is the new thing.

You had these non profit organizations that would come at you like ‘we want you to come and sit at this roundtable discussion. We’ll pay you a thousand dollars, come over here”. I go there it’s like a closed door discussion about political organizing… And then they take pictures of me, use it in a flyer or brochure, and after that, they’re like “we do HipHop organizing, give us some money, look we even got Boots Riley involved”… So, many of these non profit organizations make 10s of thousands or hundred of thousands dollars off of that and say that I’m part of these things.

It was on your Facebook page: Oakland Port, December 2nd, 2011. We did it. What does the shutdown of Oakland port mean to you?

Boots Riley & Mistah Fab Address the Crowd

Boots Riley at Occupy Oakland

A lot of the folks in non-profit organizations in Oakland are politically radical and revolutionary. But they have a job. And some of them in these organizations are not necessarily politically radical revolutionaries, some of them are liberal progressives, and they’ve been the ones doing certain struggles that stayed away from economic wages struggles. They’ve been the ones doing stuff around “Stopping the violence”. We gotta stop the violence in our community, ok. But they do not address the fact violence comes out of the fact there’s an illegal business that’s happening that needs violence to regulate it. This business needs violence to regulate. You can’t come in and just take the money without fear of the police coming and locking you up. How do you eliminate the need for that illegal business? When you have jobs that pay decently. When people have jobs with decent wages, they’re going to be involved in that job, instead of the illegal business and the violence associated with it… But that’s too much, like class struggle, for certain folks. Especially for foundations, what they talk about is limited. That being said, some of those political organizations, not only non-profit ones, don’t have any base in black communities or in communities of color. Because they’re not handling what these people are doing on their everyday life which is trying to put some food on the table. And some people are like “Fuck marching on the streets, it’s not doing anything…”

We managed to achieve that shutdown because people saw it as something possible, as an economic blow to the system and as a way to have some economic leverage. That’s why people came out and drove for that.

Also we announced that at the exact right time… A few days earlier, a young white ex-marine from Occupy Oakland got shot in the face by the police.. So because it came out he was an ex-marine, a young white guy and also because it was caught on video, it blew up all over the place… people kept coming to the park Occupy Oakland demonstrators were occupying, and police kept coming back… And we knew it costed the city millions of dollars, so they couldn’t sustain doing that… So we put it out there, that we would just keep coming back, they’re gonna spend tens of millions of dollars, til they give us the park back. So they gave us the park, they opened it up, there were thousands medias from all over the world there.. So the idea of many of the organizers was like we got this world stage right now, let’s take it up one notch. It was a 3 thousand people meeting. 3 thousand people voted to have a general strike in one week from then. So the fact we didn’t say from 3 months from that, but one week, which seemed crazy for me at that time, most of us didn’t even think that would happen. We were just like we would put the call out there, put the idea that economic leverage can do something. People were like “Hell, yeah!” and it was all up in the media. And since it was connected to all the occupy movements in other cities, it made people felt like it had more power as well.

One of the problems with political movements or anything, even music, is the fact we don’t think we matter. Like you have a local rapper, a local band, and they might be really good to you, but you know they are only known in your city, you’re like “they’re only local”, and people don’t like “local”. Because if it’s only local, it can’t be that good. That’s what happened to us too. All of sudden when people from our city started seeing people from other cities liked us, they were “oh, they must be good”. Because people of other cities are better than me. That’s how we started getting a big local group of followers. Similar with this movement, people see that it is attached to something bigger. They feel they have more chance to win. So 50 thousand people came out and shut down the port.

The outcome of it? 3 years ago, a labor contract would come up and the Union wouldn’t even fight it. Workers would just lose their benefits and everything… Right now, what’s happening in Oakland is the BART workers and the train operators are on strike, the librarians are on strike. Other cities workers are striking, they’re striking and are supporting each other. That wouldn’t have happened in any other time. That’s illegal. But we put this tactic on the table. Because that’s the only way things are gonna be done, through solidarity strikes…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D3Ia-oQnZOo

HipHop (especially through videos and records) plays a big role in shaping the views and opinions of millions of people worldwide when it comes to the representations of Black (youth) life and experience. The Coup is known worldwide, today. How do you deal with these issues of representation black lives and experiences in front of the world with your music and now with the movie “Sorry to bother you”?

There are plenty of mafia shows on TV all the time, and people are not scared of Italian people all over the world… Most of those representations and images of black people come from portrayals of news medias and the political of what happens in a city and why it happens.

The image of black people that people put out or that artists put out is just the image that they are talked too or that they see on the news. It’s not necessarily the image that comes from what they know.. See, you could live in a city and have most of your information about that city given to you by the news. And often that’s the case, and you make certain assumptions and logic based on the some of these basic facts you hear on the news.

And also what is being said on some of those songs is exactly what they are taught about what the world is supposed to be about in school. They are taught that if you have money, it’s because you work hard, be smart about it, and figure out how to hustle… If you don’t have money, it means it’s on you, it’s not the system. So, that leads to everything else.

Now, whether people are afraid or not of the image of black people, has to do with how they categorize people. There’s a TV show called Dexter, about a blonde white guy who is a mass-murderer, he’s the hero of the show because he only kills the bad people. Nobody is afraid of blonde white guys. So, it’s not just videos. It’s everything, the news, the movies. We hear on the news, a random shooting happened. NO.You can explain clearly, like this is the dope game, there are no jobs paying 12 dollar/per hour in the area, it’s not random. It happens because of these things… You have non profit organization that would be like we need to stop the violence and talk about interpersonal communication. But it’s not about that. If you talk to people from these organizations, they admit it’s not about that, they admit the solution is having jobs that pay more. The question is how to get that? You only get that through making a radical militant mass movement. It’s a hard thing to do and who wants to spend their life doing that? But we have no choice.

I remember Digable Planets saying that they capitalized on their pop success (Reachin’) to put out their master plan into action (Blowout combs) which, lyrically, kinda hit as hard as any PE album HipHop. When you deal with Art & Revolution like you, is there any strategy to adopt to get your message heard?

It must be a very long strategy because I’ve been doing this for a long time… More seriously, I have strategies, the question is whether they work or not. I had a strategy with “Steal this album”, back in 1998. But at that time, there were no downloading. So back then, if you steal an album from a store, that store still has to pay for the album. We had a lot of fans, a lot more fans than those who were represented by record sales. So for instance, for me, besides an Ice Cube album, every album I ever had was dubbed on cassette tapes. One person would get an album and we would dub it, that’s how it went. HipHop when it was just in the black communities didn’t even go gold. A lot of people were listening to it, but it wasn’t what you were spending your money on.

So “Steal this album” was based on the idea that what if you have 3 millions of fans, but your 3 millions of fans are among the brokest people on earth and someone else has hundred thousand fans, but those fans are wealthier. It’s gonna look like more people like that person. It’s gonna change how people make records. So here’s the solution: Steal this album.

What’s the coup business plan today?

Today, touring is our main way of promotion, we can’t really rely on anything else. We have some fans who are more well-known, so we try to enlist them to help us. We have for example, Patton Oswalt, who is a well-known comedian in the USA. He made recently (In june 2013) a video doing an interpretation of “Magic Clap”. We’re trying to get Dave Chappelle… So that’s one of the strategies. I think I’m also going to do sort of political comedy talk shows, so I also could stay at home, I need to.

-courtesy of La Voix Du HipHop- (Paris France) LaVoixduHipHop.net

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acT_PSAZ7BQ

Filed Under: 2013 Daily News Tagged With: Boots Riley, Farnce, Hip Hop, Paris, political movements

Immortal Technique Speaks on Trayvon, Religion, Race in America & Syria

September 17, 2013 By mrDaveyd

photo credit: Ani Yapundzhyan

In the scorching San Bernardino heat, I tried to track down Immortal Technique for a good two hours at Rock The Bells. His cold, comfortable trailer had been untouched all through the day when I found him outside in the sun, at his merch booth, a few hours into signing autographs and talking to fans.

After a half a day of doing this, everywhere he walked, people rushed to him every few steps of the way: fans asking to take pictures, fellow artists talking about past and future collaborations, women who wanted to flirt and shower him with hugs. It was never-ending. And he respectfully and good-naturedly gave every single one of these people his limited time.

When it was time for our interview, he looked around and said, “I don’t even know where my trailer is.” I showed him the way and as the door closed behind us, his sociable disposition disappeared immediately as his deep eyes intently awaited my questions.

Immortal Technique is not in the game to fuck around. He is a machine on a mission that does not stop. And once his body ceases to move, his brain kicks in overtime.

-Ani Yapundzhyan-

Ani: In the wake of the Zimmerman verdit, you engaged your 200,000+ Twitter followers in a very eye-opening dialogue about race-relations in modern-day America as well as in the historically in the world. What prompted that dialogue?

Immortal Technique: The most important thing for me was to facilitate a dialogue about race and racism and there were people who contacted me who were Caucasian who said “Yo, listen, I feel like every time I talk about race, people call me a Racist. So can we have a conversation about that?” And I said, “Sure. Let’s talk about Race in America. Let’s talk about the Mythology about Race. Let’s talk about the mythology of America, because that’s intrinsically linked to Race.”

For example, some little-known facts are that when Europeans first colonized this continent, that massive amounts of Europeans defected from those colonies. They didn’t wanna be in a Puritan society, they didn’t wanna be with people who ordered them how to pray. They claimed that they were coming here looking for Religious Freedom. So if that’s the case, and you’re based on a Capitalist society, why can’t you admit that the reason you came here-dispelling the Mythology of America, which was the point of that whole conversation-you didn’t come here just for religious freedom and looking for new lands, you came here for Gold. You came here looking for Slaves. You came here looking for women and land that you could steal. Why don’t you be honest about that with yourself as a human being and that way we get to the core of the real problem.

The other thing is this: In the same way that for example, the Soviet Union, when it held on to Eastern Europe, couldn’t explain how if their brand of society was superior-as they claimed-to American Capitalism, everybody kept running away and trying to get over to the other side. The Europeans could not explain, “How is it that we have massive defections from a European society to an Indigenous society that’s supposed to be quote unquote “inferior,” full of “savages?” And that’s very important. Why? Because Native-Americans judge people based on the merit of who people Were. How did you Act? I don’t care if you’re white, I don’t care if you’re from Ireland. I don’t care if you’re from Italy. I don’t care if you’re from England. Europeans had a hierarchy amongst themselves the same way people from the Caucus region do, the same way people from Latin America and from Asian countries do, the same way people in Islamic societies in the Middle East do…but they said to themselves, “This is ridiculous, when you come to us from another culture, what you put into this society is what you get.”

Now obviously, nothing was perfect. It’s still a human society. But at the same time, we had people that were giving a willingness for mobility within the society to say, “You can be part of us and we’re not gonna treat you like property.” I’m not saying Native Americans never had slaves, I’m saying that when their societies were pitched against European societies, people could not explain the mass defections, which were punishable by corporal and capital punishment. Same thing that we see in places like East Germany or the former Czechoslovakian state, where people wanted to leave, they wanted to run away. But at the same time, they can’t explain that. And I think, when you get to that, that’s the whole point of it.

If I can facilitate a dialogue about these things that exist in our society and that permeate every relationship that a government has and get down to the human relations of it, then I can begin to heal-at least in the inner circle that I have-the cancer of Racism. Because I think that it’s about time that that became extinct. And maybe I can’t stop it completely, but I feel like if I can at least wake up a few people who are blind to its existence, people who don’t even think that it exists- ’cause unfortunately those are the most affected by Racism-those people that think that Racism doesn’t exist. That it’s just something that the NAACP does. I mean, I’ve seen people on the internet that go, “Oh, the NAACP and the KKK are the same thing!” Uh, no. The NAACP ain’t never lynched motherfuckers. They never murderedpeople for profit like that. Are you kidding me? They never tried to justify a legacy of chattel slavery.

So I think that it was really me destroying a lot of social lies that were constructed by ultra-conservative, right-wing factions that I felt needed to be addressed at that particular time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMxPKmPcZsY

Ani: All great societies were built on slave labor. Why do you think that Africa, which is the richest continent as far as natural resources in the world, is the poorest, statistically worse-off continent?

Technique: Lack of Unity. Specific division. The British were incredible at that, the French were incredible at that, and I think that they hide behind their “civilization” and “culture” when in reality, they presented the image of a “Civilized Barbarian” to the rest of the world. In other words, Ani, who’s more civilized? The African dude in the loin cloth who’s tending sheep and goats in West Africa, who is half-naked because it’s 120 degrees, who’s Gods are the Earth, and the spirits of Stream and Wood and Forest, Water and Air, who’s the more savage, him or the religious fanatic from Europe in the 13th century who hops off a boat, full of armor, unshaven, who is such a zealot and an extremist that he thinks dinosaur bones are put in the ground to test the faith of humanity, who thinks that he can excuse his behavior by putting someone in irons who is not of his exact demographic.

Ani: So how did that behavior win out?

Technique: Because I think that the human race is, honestly, confined to the behavior of a talking monkey. I think the danger that we face right now, Ani, is that when we go to a museum, and we see “Australopithecus” we see “Homo habilis” “Homo erectus” “Neanderthal” “Cro-Magnon” I think we’re in danger of some little kid a thousand years from now walking into a futuristic museum and saying, “Oh, there’s Homo sapien sapien: the well-groomed, superstitious, warrior-monkey that used to talk. And he harnessed the power of the Atom, but for all his incredible inventions, he was still limited by his incapacity to control his emotions. By his own ego, and his own over-inflated sense of self-importance. He thought the universe revolved around him. He thought that the Earth belonged to him instead of him belonging to the Earth. No respect for nation, no respect for nature, no respect for his fellow man, seeing that it’s OK to kill somebody, or it’s not as bad, if they’re not from the same demographic as they are.”

In other words, I see conservative Christian people who are so gung-ho about abortion and “we’re killing babies” but you don’t mind killing Iraqi babies. But if they were Christian white babies, you’d have a problem with that. But because they’re Muslim, dark-skinned children, you don’t care. That makes you a fake Christian to me.

Ani: And it goes back to Trayvon.

Technique: Not just to him. And I think that’s where I would differ in this. To me, I think the Trayvon Martin case was completely mishandled by the prosecution. I think that instead of focusing on Race, solely, they should’ve focused on the fact that this was still a child, that this was still a human being that was destroyed, unnecessarily. That if we’re talking about the social construct of race, what difference would it have made? Would George Zimmerman have followed a well-to-do looking, light-skinned, half-Latino, half-White kid who’s skipping in the rain, as he described him in the Sean Hannity interview? Skipping. In the rain. But that’s different. I think that when you talk about the media, they also have to share some of the blame and responsibility.

When you show people on welfare, this has nothing to do with Trayvon. When you show people on welfare, you show black people, even though the majority of people on welfare are white women. But you don’t show white women, you don’t show white working-class women. This county has always used white working-class people as a buffer. To not expose the real issue of Classism. They’ve always wanted to focus on Racism, because Classism is what will bleed this fuckin’ country. If poor and disenfranchised white people say to themselves, “Goddamit, what the fuck are we getting out of this? We’re told to blame immigrants but its not the immigrants who are making money out of this. It’s these multi-national corporations that ship these jobs over to America, so that they can make a profit that has nothing to do with helping anybody else ’cause trickle-down economics was never part of the problem. It was never part of the issue. You know why it was never a part of the problem? Cause it was never part of the solution. They didn’t give a fuck about that.

Ani: It does’t even make sense, that whole theory and idea of trickle-down economics.

Technique: Right, because the re-investment per-capita is not there.

Ani: “Take what you can get and be happy” is really what fucking “trickle-down” means. Literally.

Technique: In other words, “we’re peeing on you.”

Ani: Syria. I’m not even going to ask a question. I’m just going to say the word and let you take it from there.

photo credit: Ani Yapundzhyan

Technique: (sighs) I know a lot of people on both sides of this debate, and the people that I’ve talked to that are pro-rebels will tell me, “Yes, we know we’re making a deal with the devil. We know that we’re getting money funded through slush-funds from America, that lie about them, saying ‘We have never supported the Syrian rebels.'” Of course you have, you’ve been giving them money through all your vassal states: Turkey, you’re a vassal state of America. I don’t know if you realize that, but America has more to do with the policies that you have in your country, even if it seems that they’re against them. Saudi Arabia, as proud as you are of your Wahhabi culture, you’re a vassal state to America. They have more military bases in your country than they do in any state, individually, in America.

I don’t know if you realize this, but Israel is the biggest welfare state-no disrespect to any people of the Jewish faith-is the biggest welfare state that America keeps. They keep it afloat. Without American dollars, there would be no Israel. I think what’s important to note about these things is that those people say, “Yes, we know we’re are making a deal with the devil. But we’re trying to get rid of another devil.” The problem that I have with that, is that even though I can’t support a dictator, like Bashar al-Assad, his supporters, I’m afraid sometimes, I’ve had conversations where these people are delusional, they’ll tell me, “No, he’s never abused his power, he’s never abused any people.” And I’m just like, “Yo dude, in order for you to run a non-Democratic government, where you have not been voted into power…to have a lock on everything in the military, you have to rule with an iron fist.”

Now obviously, his father was more of a ruthless dictator than he was, and Bashar al-Assad was welcomed as a reformer, in many communities actually. I remind people of this, he was invited to stay at Buckingham Palace, he was greeted as a hero. Same way a lot of the Afghan rebels were by American society. They said, “Yeah, even though these people are radical, and we radicalize them in the name of getting rid of the Russians, we wanted to do that.” That history is now lost. And I think what people don’t understand, is that if you look at both sides of the equation, America refuses to allow Russia and China to come to the table. In the same way that the NeoCons like Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz, when they were bleeding Russia and Afghanistan, said, “You know what, we’re not gonna let you leave with your grace, we’re gonna bleed you ultimately. This is an ultimatum, an ultimate ‘Fuck You.’ This is a Rape of your society. If you want to have your troops home, they can be home tomorrow, pull them out.”

Imagine if someone that said to America, “If you wanna get out of Afghanistan, your troops can be home tomorrow.” But what is the issue? The issue is, “How can I pull them out and not seem like I’m a coward, like I’m running away?” That’s what America refuses to do stubbornly and that’s why it lost so many tens of thousands of troops in Vietnam, and if we had the same medicine that we had back then that we do now in Iraq, we would have a similar casualty rate. What we have now is people that have been maimed and had their bodies half destroyed, so the body count is technically lower, but unfortunately, when I think about it, in terms of Syria, I find it very hard to consider that John Kerry cares about the lives of 400 Syrian children, when you don’t care about the hundreds of children that have been killed in Pakistan by your drones. You don’t care about the “collateral damage.” Obviously, a lot of people that have talked to me say that they need global positioning in the area, that this is the original part of the diagram, and something that I really wanna share before I get out of here, cause I really do have to get the fuck outta here, but… some history:

Before WWI, the powers of Europe decided that they would carve up the Ottoman Empire, the sick man of Europe. And everybody got their slice. The Russians took the entire Caucus region. They said “Since you have the Russian-Turkish War, we’ll help you.” And England, France, everybody else said “Ok, you know what we’ll do? We’ll give you all the Caucus: Chechnya, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia.” That’s why they’re willing to trade pieces with America. They said, “Oh, word? Since we backed the Serbians and you wanna carve Kosovo out?” What happened, they played tit-for-tat, ’cause right afterwards, if you remember, they went into Georgia and they said, “We’re gonna carve out South Ossetia.” And if you look at it, it’s pretty much geographically the same amount of land that the other people took.

So it was a clear message to America that says: If you wanna fuck around in our backyard, we’re gonna fuck around with the people that think you’re gonna help them. Because at the end of the day, you’re not gonna commit troops to Georgia, that’s our slice.

When we went into Iraq, the French said, “We don’t wanna go.” Why, because Sykes-Picot divided the region like this: The Caucus region to Russia. Egypt, Iraq, Kuwait, Palestine, Jordan, would go to England. Now England brought in America as a Junior partner that’s now taken over. And France’s slice was Syria and Lebanon. Now if you remember, they said, “We don’t wanna go to Iraq.” Why? Because that’s not their slice. They didn’t give a fuck about that. So when they were gonna go to Iraq, people said, “Oh, the French don’t have the stomach for war.” How? They’ve been involved in every War since the very fuckin’ beginning. Get the fuck outta here.

Now if you think Sykes-Picot doesn’t affect things today, look at the reversal ten years from now. France is ready to go to war for Syria. Because it’s their slice. And who said No to war in Syria now? England. Because England’s slice is Iraq. England’s slice is Egypt. England’s slice is not Syria and Lebanon. So that little treaty that took place almost a hundred years ago still affects how European Powers see that zone today. And they say to themselves, “That’s mine, it’s always been mine. And the leaders will do what I say they need to do.”

And unfortunately, that’s why I tell people, “Don’t be worried about what the Patriot Act does today, be worried about what in a hundred years, they’re gonna use to justify it.

People tell me that I’m controversial because I discuss certain issues. No, I’m not controversial, those issues are controversial. If we say that we’ll attack people who use chemical weapons, and we still use, for example, depleted uranium that’s now caused more birth defects in Iraq than Agent Orange did in Vietnam, I’m not controversial for bringing that up. The United States’ government is controversial for having that in its arsenal.

If we’re talking about I’m controversial for bringing up the fact that there is a double standard on chemical weapons and there is a double standard on the way you mutilate and abuse your own people, and the way we didn’t pay any attention to the uprisings in Bahrain, and all these other places in the Middle East, and in Jordan, where people wanted the Monarchy the fuck out, because the Monarchy is the ultimate betrayal of Democracy, alright? That’s the most ruthless form of it. The most concentrated form of Oligarchy. If that’s the case, then are people not obliged to recognize that double standard? And I think that more people, when they’re doing that, really do awaken other people. Talk to people about it. Create a dialogue.

I know that everybody’s not on the same page. I know there’s some people out there, like I said, my friends, God bless ’em, I can understand yo, I can’t take anything away from your pain. If you legitimately had your family oppressed by that government, if you legitimately been disenfranchised by the al-Assad government and they’ve taken over and they’ve killed your family, I can understand why you would want him out. But realize that your movement has now been hijacked by people that will come in and will use you to say “We decide the future of Syria.”

And in my heart, I think the future of Syria should not be decided by a dictator, it should not be decided by Jihadists and paid mercenaries along with them, it should not be decided by Turkey and Kataar, and Israel and Saudi Arabia and America and France, I believe the future of Syria should be decided by the Syrian people.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x01BnN6B6VQ

Filed Under: 2013 Daily News Tagged With: Hip Hop, Innortal Technique, Rock the Bells 2013, Syria, Trayvon Martin

3 Dope Songs From Actitud Maria Marta from Argentina

September 16, 2013 By mrDaveyd

Actitud maria marta

Actitud Maria Marta is a hip hop from Argentine who combine Latin American and Jamaican music to bring about an innovative fusion sound.

Since its inception, the group has been linked to various social demands and human rights organizations to participate, through their music, in countless festivals unemployed workers, mothers of Plaza de Mayo , missing children , and recently recovered factories in the People’s Summit, among others.

Actitud Maria Marta – Hijo Mio

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBqjfos2l38

Actitud Maria Marta Asi esta la Cosa

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sS76aFctWHw

Actitud Maria Marta Revolution

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHlbQvO1tfs

Filed Under: 2013 Daily News, 3 Dope songs Tagged With: 3 Dope Songs, Actitud Maria Marta, female hip hop, Latino Hip Hop

Serious Concerns Arise Over Nationwide Slew of Police Shooting & Brutality Incidents

September 16, 2013 By mrDaveyd

One of the women who was an innocent bystander shot by police in Times Square this past weekend

Over the weekend there was a wave of police violence directed at citizens all over the country with devastating and fatal results. From New York City to North Carolina to Texas, innocent people found themselves on the receiving end of police brutality and as a result lots of questions are being raised.

There is tendency when looking at police violence to isolate each incident and treat them as an aberration when in fact they are long-standing and systemic. Case in point is New York City where we find the NYPD who has been praised for receiving state of the art, top shelf training that is model for other agencies all over the world to emulate. Well over the weekend, two women who were innocent bystanders in heavily populated, tourist laden Times Square were shot by officers in what was described as an over reaction to a chaotic scene.

Apparently a man who was high on something was running in between cars and got hit 3 times. Police who routinely patrol times square and are more often than not heavily armed, were called to the scene where the surrounded the man then gave chase. At one point more than a dozen officers were involved in the pursuit. The man was surrounded and according to police, he pulled his hands from his pocket and pointed his fingers like he had a gun..Officers panicked and shot 3 times, missing him and hitting two women standing nearby..People could be heard in the back ground of the video shouting to police ‘don’t shoot no more.’

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BsDe7IJDc7s

Now on the surface some might say; ‘well this is just an unfortunate accident, we should all be understanding and note that police officers are under stressful conditions and need more training’. That may be true, but unfortunately one would think such training would’ve taken place last year after two questionable shootings that took place in August 2012.

One of these shootings occurred near the Empire State building which is also heavily populated. In that incident NYPD officers were pursuing Jeffrey Johnson who had shot and killed a former coworker Steve Ercolino at the height of morning rush hour. Police who were supposed to be trained to deal with terrorist situations which they thought this shooting was, came on the scene and shot 16 rounds when Johnson aimed his gun at them. Johnson was killed instantly, but the 9 other innocent bystanders were shot by the two officers.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQQuSppItYE

At the time of the Empire State shooting an enraged public questioned the training of NYPD officers because just two weeks prior there was a feeling that police over reacted when they shot a man who they confronted for smoking weed. In that incident the man pulled out a knife as officers gave chase. The man was surrounded in the middle of the street near Times Square and shot 12 times. Many felt the police overreacted and that they could’ve subdued the suspect in other ways. They also felt the lives of innocent people were potentially put in jeopardy with them firing shots in such a crowded area.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3_p4s57nnc

Are these ‘over reactions‘ isolated incidents? Not when you take into account that NYPD’s history with other high profile situations. One of the most notable took place in November 2006 when undercover officers shot and killed an unarmed Sean Bell outside a strip club in Queens, NY.

According to the reports, undercover cops feared that Bell and his friends had a gun and was going to shoot up the establishment. They approached the group as they were driving away but never identified themselves as officers. Fearing they were being robbed Bell tried to drive off at which point officers fired 50 rounds into the car, killing Bell and hitting one of his friends 19 times. It was later discovered that one officer shot 31 times stopping to reload his weapon twice.

Another high-profile incident occurres in February 1999, when plain clothes NYPD officers in the Bronx approached Amadou Diallo, a 23 year old African immigrant as he stood on the staircase to his home. Diallo had no criminal record but according to the police fit the description of a rape suspect. As police approached they saw what they thought was a gun and shot Diallo 41 times. That ‘gun’ wound up being a wallet. It was later discovered one of the officers, Kenneth Boss who shot Diallo had previously shot an unarmed man named Patrick Bailey..

Nationwide protests erupted over the Diallo and Bell incidents.. The police in both cases were acquitted, but promises to better train officers were put forth as solutions. Obviously with these most recent incidents of innocent bystanders being shot, one wonders how much training was given and how effective was it.

It’s hard not to look at this excessive gun play with NYPD and not look at similar incidents around the country. One that immediately comes to mind, took place earlier this year in April when plain clothes LAPD officers were assigned to protect the home of a high-ranking police official from rogue cop Christopher Dorner who threatened to kill him.

In the early morning hours two women driving a light blue pick up truck were fired upon more than 100 times by six officers feared the two petite Latina women Margie Carranza and her 71-year-old mother Emma Hernandez who were delivering newspapers was the 6′ 4″ Christopher Dorner.

The women had no idea they had no idea they were in harm’s way. Officers who were looking for a dark grey truck, gave no warning when they opened fire on the women. Luckily they survived. To this day the names of the officers who shot the pair have not been revealed. As was the cases in NY, LAPD deemed this an ‘accident’ and the solution to this would be ‘more training’.

Danroy Henry

Another incident in this long sordid list of overacting police occurred in 2010 in when the life Danroy DJ Henry was lost. The star football player who played for Pace University in Westchester County, New York was an innocent bystander who drove to a bar in nearby Pleasantville just as a fight was unfolding inside.

An agitated police officer, who was on the scene named Aaron Hess banged on Henry’s car and demanded he move the vehicle. Henry unaware of what was going on drove away as instructed at which point the officer fired into the windshield killing Henry. He claimed Henry had tried to run him over. It was a claim vehemently refuted by his friends and witnesses who were besides themselves as he lay on the ground bleeding and they were preventing from helping him. You can read about that HERE.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_gksc2dreI

Kenneth Chamberlain jr holding a picture of his father

The case of Kenneth Chamberlain Sr a 68-year-old former Marine and a 20 year department of corrections officer was shot and killed by fellow officers in November 2011 inside his White Plains, NY Home. Chamberlain wore a Life Alert bracelet which accidentally went off. Police arrived and Chamberlain explained he did not call them nor did he have a medical emergency. Police refused to leave and kicked down the door. They shot Chamberlain claiming he tried to kill them with a butcher knife.

It was later discovered the officer who shot him Anthony Carelli had a violent past of racially charge incidents including beating two Arab men inside a precinct calling them ‘ragheads‘. His partner Steven Hart also had an unsavory past and had called Chamberlain a ‘nigger’. This incident raised the question about what type of people are being allowed on police forces and what type of training are they getting and how effective are they? You can read about that HERE.

These incidents are not limited to civilians. Chamberlain was a former corrections officer. Earlier this year an office duty San Francisco cop Lorenzo Adamson, was driving around his neighborhood, the predominantly Black Bayview District, when 3 white officers stopped him and asked if he was on parole. The 15 year veteran and former football player reacted to the harsh questioning and told the officers “That’s not the question you should ask.. You should ask for my driver’s license, my registration, my insurance.”.

The white officers took exception to Adamson’s response and words were exchange. Adamson was asked to get out of his car at which point officers put him in choke hold and charged him with resisting arrest. It was during the arrest that they discovered Adamson was a fellow police officer. You can read about that HERE.

Jonathan Ferell

That’s a bit of history that leaves lots of questions to be answered. With respect to the array of incidents that took place over the weekend, we have the tragedy that took place in the wee hours of the morning in Charlotte, North Carolina. A 24-year-old college football player named Jonathan Ferrell got into a serious car accident. He survived the crash and crawled out of the back window of that car and went to a nearby home seeking help. A woman answered the door thinking it was her husband..Saw Ferrell, slammed it shut, hit her panic button and called police.

According to police who had quickly arrived on the scene, the unarmed former football player charged at them..Officer Randall Kerrick shot and killed him..He was charged with voluntary manslaughter as it was determined that Ferrell was most likely running toward police seeking help not charging them to attack, as they initially suggested.

This tragic incident raises the question as to why was there this over reaction by police? What were they seeing in Jonathan? A menacing criminal or a victim of an accident? What was informing their perception? Why did Officer Kerrick shoot when he had two other officers alongside him? Couldn’t three officers handle one unarmed man if Kerrick was out of control as suggested? Couldn’t the three officer size things up and see someone in need of help vs being someone who needed to be shot?

While questions are being raised about the conduct of the officers, one might also ask what was communicated to the 9-11 operator by the woman who Ferrell sought help from. Did she express fear for her life? According to reports Ferell knocked on her door after she slammed it shut on him.. Did he cry out for help and explain he had been in an accident? Did the woman hear that and not belief him?

Glenda Moore and her Husband Damion

It’s hard not to see Jonathan Ferell seeking help and being denied and not think of the tragedy that took place during Hurricane Sandy on Staten Island. During the November 2012 storm as flood waters rose a panicked Glenda Moore sought refuge. She knocked on the door of 63-year-old George Calve who refused to help her, thinking Moore was a man trying to rob him.

Moore went to other homes banging on doors, neighbors refused to help, as her two kids Brendon 2 and Connor 4 who she held were swept from her arms and drowned. You can read that HERE.

In the case of Moore there wasn’t police brutality involved but there was, fear, distrust and suspicion. Fear of someone Black who is out to rob or do harm. One might ask what was fueling these fears? TV? Fear mongering politicians? Over zealous police? Real life scenarios? Whatever the case, the end result were two people in dire need of help not getting it. Couple that fear and suspicion with police who are already on edge who see Blacks as criminals vs contributing citizens and you wind up with harsh overreactions resulting in fatalities.

Over this past weekend, in Harris County just outside of Houston a man was followed home by a deputy with a reputation for beating people. The man he followed was not evading the officer, but was eventually stopped and then roughed up by Officer Drummond.. The family approached after the man’s ribs were broken. The officer than beat down the father and beat up the mother.. None were armed, high or drunk.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9ne7e-PAm4

In Tallahassee, Florida a white woman named Christina West was arrested for DUI.. She is shown in the video complying with police orders, although its clear she is intoxicated.. Police without provocation drag her from the back of their squad car and beat her to a pulp.. All the while they are laughing.. You can see that here..http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/10/tallahassee-police-brutality-christina-west-dui_n_3901770.html

The incidents described are occurring with alarming frequency so much so that not only do we need to question training and procedure, but we are at a point now where we can not and should not discount the possibility that there are organized gangs of rouge officers within these departments who are acting with impunity..The expulsion of seven officers in the LA sheriff department earlier this years who called themselves ‘Jump Out Boys‘ and were known to brag about brutalizing Black and Brown people may just be the tip of the iceberg.. Read about that HERE.

It’s hard to say if there is a simple solution to this onslaught of police brutality sure what the simple solution is but at this point in time hearings b4 Congress need to be pushed while simultaneously we develop ways to safeguard ourselves. Cameras are good, but they are not making a difference in terms of prosecutions and convictions.. That means we need to find new DAs or new systems that bypass the normal scenarios where those wearing badges who violate the laws are aggressively prosecuted

Filed Under: 2013 Daily News Tagged With: Jonathan Ferrell, Lorenzo Adamson, NYPD, Police brutality, Police shooting, Randall Kerrick

3 Dope Songs from Lebanese American Rapper Alyssa Marie

September 15, 2013 By mrDaveyd

Alyssa Marie

Alyssa Marie is a Lebanese-American emcee who hails from the south shore of Massachusetts in Brockton. She started out as a poet and then merged those skills into a formidable emcee who is no joke on the mic. Her first project was a mixtape released in 2010 called “Welcome Home.”..Her second project was a compilation of all her then Youtube versus called ‘5 More Minutes‘. Her latest one is a slamming ep called ‘Heartbeat‘ that you can access here-http://alyssamarie.bandcamp.com/

Here’s an excerpt of an interview that Alyssa Marie did earlier this year for: http://www.peacexpeace.org/2013/03/alyssa-marie-a-female-rapper-who-can-rip-a-mic/

I think it’s very much a gift and a curse being a female rapper. Of course, it’s easier to achieve the wow factor given that there aren’t too many females who can rip a mic and do it well. This also can lead to people spreading around the music like “Check out what this chick can do!” It’s definitely easier for a lady in the scene to get some recognition and buzz. At the same time, though, I think being taken seriously as an actual artist instead of just an impressive video to show your friends is a lot more difficult. People may feel weird about having one of their favorite rappers be a female, so instead they have you as their favorite “female rapper” or say you’re “dope for a female.” So I guess what it comes down to is it’s a lot easier to get noticed as a female rapper, but in turn you need to work twice as hard to be taken seriously.

In what ways (if any), does your background as a Lebanese American influence your work?

I’m very fortunate to be from an extremely close Lebanese family. My cousins are more like siblings and my extended relatives are closer than most people’s immediate families. I think this has affected the way I approach and create my music in two major ways: 1) I’ve always wanted to make music my older relatives can listen to and be proud to show people (which I did successfully), and 2) the support and determination I am blessed to receive from them has made it possible for me to actually pursue music 100% as a career path. It took awhile for me to come out and say to them this is what I wanted to do, and even longer to show them my music and videos, but it is because of their reactions that I’m still on this path to living my dream. My work ethic and determination are due to them, and I can never thank my family enough for that.

Alyssa Marie – Trigger Finger ft. Lady Essence (HeartBeat)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qe4P_vCYROg

Alyssa Marie – Mr Lamar Another Control Response..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tDr0JpgN72M

Alyssa Marie – Freedum

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nf1UlRTNT0Q

Filed Under: 2013 Daily News, 3 Dope songs

Angela Davis Looks Back at the 16th Street Church Bombings 50 Years Ago

September 14, 2013 By mrDaveyd

Davey D speaks with activist, scholar and freedom fighter Angela Davis about the 50th anniversary of the 16th street Birmingham bombings of 1963.

Angela grew up in Birmingham when it was called Bombingham. This was due to the fact the Ku Klux Klan conducted a campaign of terror on Black people and frequently firebombed people’s homes. The gravity of that of that terrorism has not been fully appreciated or understood. Leading up to the 16th street church bombings, there are estimates that close to 80 bombs were set off in Birmingham.

Davis said Black people were under seige but were determined to fight back. The 16th Street Baptist Church had become a symbol of Black Resistance and was a key organizing center for the Civil Rights Movement. After the huge and very successful March on Washington a few weeks earlier, the historic church became even more of thorn in the side for white supremacists and was eventually targeted with fatal results.

On the morning of September 15th 1963, a bomb was placed in the basement of the church. 4 young girls, Denise McNair, who was 11 along with Addie Mae Collins, Carole Robertson and Cynthia Wesley who were all 14, were killed when that bomb went off. Davis who was friends with two of the girls Cynthia Wesley and Carole Robertson who she noted lived two houses down from hers.

In fact the day of the bombing Angela’s mother drove Carole’s mother to the church to pick up her daughter. They had heard about the church being bombed, but sadly didn’t know Carole was one of those killed.

Davis talked at length during our Hard Knock Radio show about how and why this incident was a key turning point in the Civil Rights Movement. It was a wake up call that moved everyone to get more involved.

Davis also noted that on that day two other Black teens, both boys Virgil Ware and Johnny Robertson were also killed. One by the Klan sympathizers and the other by police who sadly had a working relationship with the KKK.

She also noted that there was a rebellion , the largest of its kind in Birmingham, which has been erased from the history books. She also noted that because of all the bombings, her father and numerous other men in the community began patrolling their neighborhoods armed with guns.. That helped turn the tide on bombings in her neighborhood which was known as Dynamite Hill, but sadly it didn’t prevent the bombing of the 16th street Baptist church…

During our conversation, Davis made it clear that it was important to connect the struggles of 1963 and the tragedies of that day with the struggles and resistance to racial violence going on today. She drew parallels to the case of Oscar Grant and how that a key turning point for many in the Bay Area and how other cases including the one involving Trayvon martin were also key turning point incidents.

We also talked about how the 16th Street Baptist Church has in recent years been used as a staging area for protest in the fight to end discrimintaion agaisnt undocumented Latinos who now live in Birmingham. Last year thousands gathered at the church to protest an anti-immigrant SB 1070 type law known in Alabama as HB56. A strong coalition of Black and Brown leaders came together to show unity. Davis talked about the importance of connecting those dots between the Civil Rights struggle of the past with the current fight around immigration.

We concluded our interview with Angela Davis by talking about the plight of political prisoner Herman Wallace who was given 2 months to live and is one of the Angola 3. We also talked about the legacy of Attica and the huge uprisings that took place 41 years ago this week.

Below is our interview with Angela Davis. Also if you are in the Bay Area Angela Davis along with fellow Birmingham resident and Civil Rights attorney Margret Burnham will be speaking at First Congregational Church, 2501 Harrison St in Oakland from 5-7:30pm

Later in the HKR show we hear a commentary from political prisoner Mumia Abu Jamal speaks about death row inmate James “Shorty” Dennis

Click the link below to download or listen to the HKR Intv

Hard Knock Radio Angela Davis 16th Bombings 9-13-13_

Filed Under: 2013 Daily News, Hard Knock Radio Intv Tagged With: 16th street Baptist church, 16th street Church bombing, Angela Davis, Civil Rights Movement

Shock G: Remembering His Friend 2Pac who Died Today Sept 13 1996

September 13, 2013 By mrDaveyd

Shock G of Digital Underground speaks on his time with 2Pac photo credit: ani yapundzhyan

As we look back on the life and times of Tupac Amaru Shakur we decided to dig in the crates and pull out an old interview we did with Shock G of Digital Underground. Here Shock G says his proudest moment was hearing 2 Pac talk about how his fondest years were spent being a part of the DU camp.

In this interview Shock G talks about the importance of 2Pac in Hip Hop culture and why he and his band mates would drop everything to accommodate 2Pac’s needs.

“There’s a time for comedy and being funny and there’s a time to be serious. When it came to 2Pac his message was too important to play around” , Shock G noted “He got the best we had”.

In this interview Shock G loans some keen insight into who 2Pac really was and how they complimented each other. It’s a fitting tribute for someone who meant so much for so many.

R pt1

Shock G of Digital Underground speaks about the first time him and 2Pac met up. He explains why Pac became a member of the group and who was the person most responsible for putting him on..

Shock G talks about the influence Digital Underground had on 2Pac and the influence Pac had on DU. In particular they focus on the way both had multiple personas i.e. Humpty Hump & Makavelli that they build their albums around.

Here Shock G goes in and talks about the influence of the Black Panthers. What many people don’t realize is that DU started out being a militant, Public Enemy type group that was an off shoot of the Black Panthers. The only reason, why they didn’t continue in that vein was because Public Enemy hit the scene first. Shock talks about the ways the Black Panthers shaped 2Pac as both a freedom fighter and a rapper.

We conclude our interview with Shock G talking about why Digital Underground saved their best tracks and hardest efforts for 2Pac. Shock said Pac’s message was too serious to be playing around and so whenever he needed top shelf material he got it.. We talked about 2Pac and political prisoners and what he would be doing to help out his ‘aunt’ exiled political prisoner Assataa Shakur. Shock also goes in and explains what it means to be a revolutionary.

Return to Davey D’s Hip Hop Corner

Filed Under: 2013 Daily News Tagged With: 2Pac, Hip Hop, Shock G

Angola 3 Political Prisoner Herman Wallace Given 2 Months to Live

September 12, 2013 By mrDaveyd

With so much going on in the world, where we are running around demanding that everyone conforms to rest of the world conform to our so-called standards of governing and we often forget that here at home we mistreat and abuse far too many of our citizens. For all the talk of us being the beacon of freedom and the world’s number one super power that all should emulate, where we fall short the most is the cruelty and torture we put upon those who are incarcerated, in particular political prisoners and those who have partook in the Prison Reform Movement of the 1970s

First we should note that this week Sept 9th- Sept 13th marks the 41st anniversary of the nation’s most violent and disturbing Prison Rebellion.. We’re talking about Attica. The root of the rebellion was folks coming together and asking for what we’re deemed reasonable improvements and an end to the isolation and torture of inmate at the hands of sadistic guards.

The violence was when then Governor Nelson Rockefeller refused to negotiate on key demands and sent in guards , soldiers and former prison workers who shot and killed 9 of the 10 prison guards who were held hostage.. along with over 20 inmates. After the rebellions prisoners were stripped and cruelly beaten after erroneous reports were put forth that they had killed prison guards. It was later learned the inmates tried to protect them.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cBG1UkxrMG0

Angola 3

1971 was the year the Attica Rebellion took place. It was also the same year that one thousand miles away, Robert King, Albert Woodfox and Herman Wallace were sentenced to do time at Angola State Prison a former slave plantation. Inspired by the Prison Reform Movement and the fact that Woodfox and Wallace had joined the Black Panthers, they began organizing inmates and pushing to demand improvement to the prisons wretched conditions. They called for an end to violence and rapes that were routinely occurring. They called for the prison to be desegregated.

In 1972 the 3 men were accused of murdering prison guard Brent Miller and were placed in solitary confinement for 40 years. All 3 maintained they were innocent which seemed to be supported by the fact there was no physical evidence connecting them to the crime. Over the years it was found evidence used against them was compromised by prosecutors and prison officials who held racial biases and that much of it has since been lost.

Witnesses were later found to be discredited and on 3 different occasions their sentences was overturned only to be appealed by over zealous Louisiana attorney generals who have made it a mission to keep the remaining two Woodfox and Wallace locked up. King who was set free several years ago after spending 29 years in solitary confinement..

Herman Wallace

In recent days its come to light that 71 year old Herman Wallace who was diagnosed with severe liver cancer has 2 months to live. Even under these conditions he has not been released ..below is a statement he released.

Saturday, August 31st, I was transferred to LSU Hospital for evaluation. I was informed that the chemo treatments had failed and were making matters worse and so all treatment came to an end. The oncologists advised that nothing can be done for me medically within the standard care that they are authorized to provide. They recommended that I be admitted to hospice care to make my remaining days as comfortable as possible. I have been given 2 months to live.

I want the world to know that I am an innocent man and that Albert Woodfox is innocent as well. We are just two of thousands of wrongfully convicted prisoners held captive in the American Gulag. We mourn for the family of Brent Miller and the many other victims of murder who will never be able to find closure for the loss of their loved ones due to the unjust criminal justice system in this country. We mourn for the loss of the families of those unjustly accused who suffer the loss of their loved ones as well.

Only a handful of prisoners globally have withstood the duration of years of harsh and solitary confinement that Albert and myself have. The State may have stolen my life, but my spirit will continue to struggle along with Albert and the many comrades that have joined us along the way here in the belly of the beast.

In 1970 I took an oath to dedicate my life as a servant of the people, and although I’m down on my back, I remain at your service. I want to thank all of you, my devoted supporters, for being with me to the end.”

Here’s some additional information on the Angola 3

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jPf23DKkb_0

Keep in Touch with Herman and Albert

Albert Woodfox #72148 Herman Wallace #76759

David Wade Correctional Center Elayn Hunt Correctional Center

N1 A3 CCR D #2

670 Bell Hill Road PO Box 174

Homer, LA 71040 St. Gabriel, LA 70776

Filed Under: 2013 Daily News Tagged With: Albert Woodfox, Angola 3, Attica, Herman Wallace, political Prisoners, prison reform Movement

How Barbara Lee ‘Spoke For Me’ 12 Years Ago in the Aftermath of 9-11

September 11, 2013 By mrDaveyd

We can’t talk about the events around 9-11 in 2001 without looking at the historic lone vote taken by Oakland Congresswoman Barbara Lee on September 14 2001 against then President George Bush‘s blank check to fight the War on Terror..Two days after she cast that vote we did an interview with her where she explained why she made her decision.

It came at a time when folks were attacking her, calling her un-Patriotic and threatening her life to the point that she needed Secret Service for protection..

Even the local NAACP chapter head at the time Shannon Reed penned an Op-Ed that ran in newspapers around the country bashing on Lee and basically calling her un-patriotic.. Complicating her situation was her chief of staff at the time Sandre Swanson had lost his cousin on one of the flights en route to San Francisco.. Flight 93..Her voting against Bush was seen as act of treason. The desire for revenge was high, but Lee stood her ground..

Below are her remarks from the floor 3 days after the Attacks

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zh_sxilhyV0

It wasn’t too long after when folks realized that Lee was right.. Below is the interview we did with her that initially ran on KMEL that Sunday Night and later Hard Knock Radio on KPFA that Monday.. as well as Op-Ed piece that ran in Black Electorate.com that talked about the importance of defending Lee

Click the link below to download or listen to the HKR Intv

HKR-Barbara Lee Interview from 2001

In Defense Of Representative Barbara Lee

by Cedric Muhammad

http://www.blackelectorate.com/articles.asp?ID=438

The more unlikely an event, the more information it yields, the maxim goes. That is our reaction to Rep. Barbara Lee’s (D-Ca.) decision to vote against the resolution authorizing President Bush’s use of “all necessary and appropriate force” – military action plus – in response to last week’s terrorist attack against the U.S.

Unfortunately, Rep. Lee’s vote has not been viewed in a similar light by many political observers, media professionals and American citizens across the country.

But Rep. Lee’s position was not only reasonable, it was appropriate and logical considering the political context out of which Rep. Lee operates.

The Congresswoman sits in the seat of former Black Caucus member Ron Dellums. Dellums, who served California’s 9th district for almost 3 decades, was a pacifist and an outspoken critic of U.S. military action, as were many of his constituents who live in both Oakland and Berkeley. Rep. Lee was Congressman Dellums’ chief of staff and succeeded him.

True to that tradition, Rep. Lee has made a political statement regarding not just her own personal beliefs but the political tradition of her constituency which was both reflected and shaped by Rep. Dellums. The Dellums legacy alone justifies and explains the Congresswoman’s vote, not to mention the fact that Rep. Lee was reelected last year with 85% of the vote.

A source within the Black Caucus told BlackElectorate.com yesterday, “Rep. Lee does have a mandate by sitting in her seat – Congressman Dellums’ old seat. She represents her district well, whose sentiments have traditionally leaned toward diplomacy. Her constituents definitely support her”

But nationally the story has been different. The Congresswoman has received fierce opposition from many across the country. In addition, Rep. Lee has received death threats as a result of her vote and is currently carrying out her legislative duties in Washington D.C. under the watchful eye of a personal bodyguard and police protection.

Those who oppose her action in our estimation are not weighing the context and rationale for her decision but even more importantly, are not considering the enormous value of this Black Congresswoman. At a time when the country is grieving over the tremendous loss of life and angry over the effects of the terrorist attack on this country, Rep. Lee, fully aware of the consequences of her position, decided to vote her conscience and use whatever influence she has in a manner that promotes clear thinking and reasoning at a time when it would be just as easy to jump on a bandwagon without knowing why the majority was correct.

This is not to say that the 420 who voted in the opposite direction of Rep. Lee are necessarily wrong. And that is our point, which also reveals the inestimable value of Rep. Lee’s position. No one in Congress really knows the details of what happened on September 11th or what led up to it. Even the supposed link to Ussama Bin laden, though suspected, has not been proven yet. This is not a mere inconvenience but a critical aspect to the search for justice and peace and the effort to win international support against the perpetrators of the WTC and Pentagon attacks. As the Wall St. Journal wrote yesterday in a front-page article:

By the standards of the Old West, President Bush has good reason to declare Osama bin Laden wanted in last week’s terrorist attacks, “dead or alive.”

But by 21st-century Western standards of law and international relations, how much actual evidence do investigators have of Mr. bin Laden’s involvement? The answer so far — based on what can be gleaned from public statements and U.S. officials willing to discuss the matter — is not enough.

The Congresswoman’s vote represents the most visible symbol of patience, caution, critical thinking, and we dare say, investigation and diplomacy in the U.S. Congress. Her action speaks louder than words; and the statistic of a 420 – 1 vote is more articulate than any speech that Rep. Lee could have made because it causes one to wonder why 1 person out of 421 has decided to lean against the wind.

She is actually a majority of 1 – a tangible factor of power – who really represents a broad but not yet visible coalition of Americans: Liberals, Conservatives, Progressives, Libertarians, Muslims, Christians, Jews, Hindus, Confucianists, Buddhists, and Atheists who privately hold serious reservations about the rapid movement toward war in this country led by the American political, military, economic and cultural establishmentarians.

That Rep. Lee is not alone in the U.S. Congress is no big secret. Privately, we have learned of several members of Congress, including other members of the Congressional Black Caucus who agree with Rep. Lee but were not willing to publicly demonstrate that fact. For various reasons other members of Congress could not muster the courage to rally to Rep. Lee’s side and vote their beliefs.

Had the vote been 421-0 as it easily could have been, the story would have been written that this was another great display of national unity at a time of crisis. The media which has been a patriotic cheerleader as much as it has provided news, would have comfortably tucked the unanimous vote, had it occurred, in its newly-created “unprecedented unity” file and everyone would have gone about their business. But because Rep. Lee placed a comma where a period would have went, we all have had to pause as a result of the fact that someone disagreed with the popular view.

We have been told by those within the Congressional Black Caucus that no one should expect to see Rep. Lee on Meet The Press, 20/20 or 60 Minutes. Her personality and principles do not encourage her to seek lights, camera and action in order to promote her dissidence. We have been told that she realizes that any mainstream media appearance in the current political atmosphere would lend itself to polarization and her own political “demonization” (she is already being referred to as a communist by many). Some may think that Rep. Lee’s low profile is unfortunate but the more we consider it, we realize the wisdom and benefit from such a disposition.

Rep. Lee’s vote speaks louder than words that could only be diminished by those who would either unintentionally or maliciously misinterpret her vote as a sign of treason or even more ridiculously, as a statement of support for terrorism. By voting and quietly explaining her vote Rep. Lee has ensured that the political establishment of this country did not shut the door on an open, frank and reflective discussion of the who, what, where, when and why of September 11.

We all owe her a debt of gratitude for that, although some may realize it later than others…

Cedric Muhammad
September 20, 2001

Filed Under: 2013 Daily News Tagged With: 911 Attacks, Barbara Lee, Shannon Reed, War on Terror

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