Category Archives: Hip Hop?

I liked rap and I liked metal. Go figure. But how could I combine the two? Rap and metal were light years apart.

One of my favorite metal bands was Anthrax. And one of my favorite rap acts was Public Enemy. Now, here’s a funny story – when I was in 9th grade, I bought PE’s “Fear of a Black Planet” (already owning “It Takes a Nation of Million…” Almost immediately after that, my parents found it and read the lyrics and promptly took them away from me.

Of course, about a week later, I found them, copied them, and again was the happy owner of the second and third Public Enemy albums. Go me!

They didn’t seem to have too much of a problem with Anthrax. I had their State of Euphoria album and dug the crap out of it. I also had the album before that, “Among the Living,” which had the song that really put them on the metal map – “Indians”

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I also had the “I’m the Man” EP, which was Anthrax’s tribute (?) to rap (which my parents, thankfully, never discovered). However, I was never sure if Anthrax liked rap or was just making fun of it. And with “I’m the Man,” how can you tell?

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But in 1991, Public Enemy and Anthrax got together and rerecorded the song “Bring the Noise,” a 1987 Public Enemy song I first heard on the Less Than Zero soundtrack that actually mentioned Anthrax (“was is for Anthrax”). I was pretty well in heaven.

By 1991 I was pretty well out of rap, diving fully into hardcore punk – even joining my first hardcore band that summer. Even so, I still listened to it a bit, especially Public Enemy. I don’t think I ever stopped listening to Anthrax. But this mixing of rap and metal really thrilled me and I still have a great time listening to it.

And, hey, I hope you did too!

Hello, and welcome back. Ready for a few more random hip hop videos from my past?

I’m still in Seattle and to pass the time (for you, not me – I’m actually rather busy!), I’m posting some videos of hip hop songs I dug when I was in middle school (circa 1986-1990ish).

Around that time YO! MTV Raps was on for two hours on Saturday mornings with Fab 5 Freddie.

It was Run DMC, however, who hosted the first show. So here’s RUN DMC’s “It’s Tricky” to start things off.

You’ll have to click here to see the video since Sony doesn’t allow embedding. Go figure.

Hey! It’s Penn & Teller when they weren’t freakishly right-wing and annoying.

The first group to have their video on YO! wasn’t Run DMC, it was Eric B. & Rakim. The first song I heard of theirs was “Follow the Leader,” which was also the first video on YO!, but my favorite cut was from the albums after that, called “Paid in Full.”

I was really getting into remixes and “Paid” had an amazing seven minute remix. This is the single version.

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YO! MTV Raps gave exposure to a bunch of groups I wouldn’t have heard of otherwise. And while this caused what I (and apparently Madhava Gosh) see as the downfall of rap and thus the hip hop culture.

One of those groups was EPMD. Now, I never really got into EPMD, but I dug their song “Strictly Business.” Great use of samples.

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Rap started to change with the increased popularity and shifting of styles from the carefree Run DMC type stuff to the more overtly political Public Enemy type stuff. I followed it up until the NWA album came out. After that, it opened the floodgates to “gangsta rap,” something that I really couldn’t relate to and didn’t care for.

One of the last acts I saw on YO! was Audio Two. MC Milk’s style was a bit off beat (literally) and that’s what a lot of rap artists are doing today. I’m not sure where he got that idea from or if he influenced anyone else to do it, but I always dug “I Don’t Care”…

YO! fans will notice that the intro to the show was largely taken from this video.

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That’s it, folks. I hope someone’s interested in this.
I realize that this is mostly a scooter / Route 66 sort of blog, but really, it’s my blog, so I get final say.

Which is why I’m now going to play “Angry White Boy Polka”

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And this…