HIP-HIP FOR THE DRAFT: From 'fight the power' to 'fight for your country' - where are hip-hop's radicals? asks Dorian Lynskey.
In the late 1980s Chuck D, frontman of rap radicals Public Enemy, memorably dubbed hip-hop "the black CNN", positing it as an alternative to the mainstream media. He surely did not foresee a day when a rapper would make the news network's patriotic fervour seem restrained.
Last month Canibus, a once hotly tipped MC, whose début album was produced by Wyclef Jean, released a song called Draft Me. Wholeheartedly supporting the war in Afghanistan, he urged: "Draft me! I wanna fight for my country/ Jump in a humvee and murder those monkeys!/ Draft me! I'm too dedicated to fail/ Justice must prevail, justice must prevail!"
In the weeks preceding September 11th, the only conflict that interested the hip-hop community was the ongoing lyrical feud between rival New York MCs Jay-Z and Nas. Canibus's sentiments are unique in their extremity, but now several other rappers have found themselves in the unusual position of supporting their government. The New York collective, Wu-Tang Clan, inserted a topical verse into their latest album, Iron Flag, that included the line: "America - together we stand, divided we fall." Mystikal, who served in the Gulf War with the US army, includes a dig against Osama bin Laden in his latest single, Bouncin' Back (Bumpin' Me Against the Wall). And Dr Dre, the world's most successful hip-hop producer, briefly toyed with the idea of recording a track called, with consummate subtlety, Kill Bin Laden.
Opposing viewpoints have been surprisingly thin on the ground from a genre that once produced such protest anthems as Public Enemy's Fight the Power and NWA's Fuck tha Police. In recent months several commentators have suggested that African-Americans have good reason to resist the tidal wave of patriotism that is sweeping the country, citing Muhammad Ali's famous explanation for his refusal to fight in Vietnam: "No Vietcong ever called me a nigger." While such undercurrents certainly exist, they are as yet virtually inaudible in the music that one would have thought should be their natural platform.
David "Davey D" Cook, a San Francisco-based writer and radio presenter whose website, www.daveyd.com, has given a platform to rappers opposed to the war, puts the blame on disproportionate reporting. "The whole point of propaganda is to eliminate voices of dissent," he says. "If you tell everybody that 90 per cent of people are pro-war, then people who don't really feel that way think: 'Well, maybe it's better to keep my mouth shut.' "
Cook points to the unlikely media popularity of MC Hammer, the rapper better known in the early 1990s for his voluminous trousers than for his bland lyrics. A former marine, Hammer poses in front of the stars and stripes on the cover of his comeback album, Active Duty, and has been popping up on US television to fly the proverbial flag in his new, and bogus, role of unofficial spokesperson for hip-hop.
Marxist duo The Coup have not been so fortunate. Since hitting the headlines last September, when they had to withdraw unintentionally prophetic album artwork depicting the twin towers exploding, they have become the music industry's loudest dissenters. They announced that anybody wearing the flag, which they described as "violent gang colours", would not be admitted to their shows. Predictably, they have not had quite as many invitations to appear on TV as Hammer.
Crucially, though, The Coup and the handful of other anti-war rappers sell relatively little, and to a predominantly white, liberal fan base, a sub-genre known as backpacker hip-hop. A New Yorkers Against Violence concert at New York's Hammerstein Ballroom last October featured the usual backpacker suspects: Beastie Boys, The Roots and Mos Def. Apart from some mild doubts about excessive jingoism expressed by Jay-Z and Grammy-nominated soul singer Alicia Keys, mainstream black stars have either been silent on the issue or unambivalently patriotic.
"Hip-hop has become depoliticised," says Craig Marks, editor of New York-based music magazine Blender. "You just don't have an equivalent to NWA or Public Enemy in hip-hop right now, a political group with widespread popularity."
But it's too soon to sound the death knell for hip-hop radicalism. There are good reasons, after all, why rappers are less inclined than, say, Damon Albarn to take an anti-war stance. New York is the hub of the hip-hop world, and rappers are famously protective of their "hood". For artists who have had little affection for the nation at large, the attack on their own backyard has provoked novel feelings.
"I have a renewed sense of patriotism," announced Queensbridge rapper Cormega shortly after September 11th. "I've never been more proud to be American!"
So far, the unity on which the war on terrorism depends seems to have held. Despite initial fears, there has not been sufficient vigilante activity against Muslim Americans to trigger a response from Muslim rappers such as Wu-Tang Clan. "For the most part, they are Americans first," says Blender's Marks. "Because of the fact that the attacks happened on our shores and anyone would probably say that they were unwarranted, there hasn't been an opportunity or reason yet to lash out at the government for its subsequent actions."
Nonetheless, there are several indications that the right questions are being asked. Chuck D and Busta Rhymes have both ventured critiques of US foreign policy and called on fans to learn more about the background to the war in Afghanistan. "A lot of people don't know that bin Laden was down with us at one time, and getting paid to be down with us," Rhymes told a Seattle radio station.
In the current climate, that kind of criticism from an artist is virtually unique. Hip-hop may not be as political as it once was, but for US music fans with reservations about the war on terrorism, it's the only show in town.
"The only patch where there's been even a little ambivalence about the swell of patriotism has been within black music, and specifically hip-hop culture," says Marks. "Why hasn't one single rock musician even come close to speaking out against it?"
If, in the coming months, the war extends to other fronts, civil liberties suffer and the recession deepens in the US, hip-hop's tradition of unrest may yet be resurrected. But the fact that one of the biggest hip-hop records in America is Cash and Computa's Ground Zero (In Our Hearts You Will Remain) speaks volumes about the current mood. There is little appetite for fighting the power just yet.