Ani vs. KRS-ONE: The Lost Interview

by ani yapundzhyan

M y KRS-ONE plates got stolen at an Afrika Bambaataa show. When I bought my brand new Honda Civic at age 18, I was more excited about getting my customized KRS-ONE license plates than I was about the actual car itself.

I thought those plates would be my and Hip Hop’s little secret. I initially expected a few hardcore heads to know what was up, but never did I imagine the impact that those plates, and thus the man himself, would have on people.

In the three years that I drove the KRS mobile around, before I got carjacked at that Bam party, I got stopped hundreds of times on the street by fans-and never have I seen such a diverse group of people so passionately express their appreciation for an artist.

Latinos, blacks, white people, old and young, would pull me over every day and shout out from their windows, “I love KRS-ONE, that is so cool!”

His impact on society was made obvious to me one day when an old Cadillac convertible with two blondie surfers inside, armed with their boards, motioned for me to roll my window down and the girl actually stood up in the car and screamed to me, “Oh my god, he’s my favorite rapper!”

‘Oh my God, he’s my favorite rapper.’

Word?

I was astounded. I realized, gleefully, that the ‘underground emcee’ known as KRS-ONE had gone far beyond the realms of Hip Hop; his music, his philosophies and his ideals had engulfed mainstream America, and even more amazing, America understood him.

All this without mainstream marketing and promotion.

His constant (and rightful) criticism of American society and his keen understanding of the impact of speech has me thinking that KRS-ONE is the Noam Chomsky of the Hip Hop culture.

Chomsky is one of the ten most-quoted writers of all time, just behind Plato and Freud as the 8th most intellectual luminary of all eras. At age 79, he is a self-proclaimed anarchist and one of the world’s leading linguistics experts.

This year KRS-ONE celebrates Boogie Down Productions‘ 20th anniversary as a true OG in the game. Whether it be his early recordings as an originator of gangsta rap where he outlined the problems of his community, or his later recordings as ‘Tha Teacha’ where he went on to address the problems of society-and Hip Hop-on a larger scheme, KRS-ONE has spit some of the most intellectual and important verses in Hip Hop history.

“You Must Learn” is a quote made famous by KRS, and it is the essential message that Noam Chomsky has been spreading for decades and decades.

Perhaps the most similar characteristic between the two intellectuals is their understanding of linguistics. KRS-ONE comprehends the fact that as an emcee, it is not just what you say that matters, but how you say it: the tone of your voice, the pace of your speech, the velocity. And like Chomsky, KRS knows that speech patterns are a tool of control.

Conversing with KRS and his emcee friend Triune, I get right down to it and ask him why there is so much structure in the American education system.

“‘Cause they want to control you,” KRS responds immediately, “Structure is Powa, and they want you to stay in the boundaries of their powerfulness and your powerlessness.”

He takes on a very low, comforting tone, “Be an idiot for me, I need you to be an idiot. I need you to be my slave right now.” KRS looks me deep in the eyes, which is his hint that I need to be paying sharp attention to his words, “If you ask somebody politely to be your slave, they’ll just be your slave. If you keep saying it politely, ‘thank you, I can’t live without you, you’re my best slave’, I’ll bet they’ll just be like, ‘awww’.”

Triune jumps in, “Will they give you a slavery certificate when you graduate?”

KRS laughs, “I’ll give you Master’s degree!”

Triune: “You are a master slave!”

KRS: “I’ll give you Master’s degree.”

“It’s all vibration,” KRS explains, “Word combinations give your thing value or decrease your value.”

It is in this ironic way that KRS gets his points across. “Today’s American education is training the student for the job market, and the job market basically leads to nowhere,” he continues, “We’re being bred more accurately, for the job market. I wish there was real job training going on in the colleges and universities. We’re being bred to take decisions, we’re being bred to not think, to obey, follow the rules. But you can get out, because the whole system is fake: that’s the freedom.” He points across the room, “If all of this is a fraud, then you’re free.”

I mention that his philosophy sounds very Eastern and Buddhist.

“No doubt its Eastern,” KRS agrees, “but its also the effects of an uninstatutionalized mind, if I may be very Zen. Nonetheless, this is how you get out: by realizing that college is not the end-all-be-all. That’s the trap, to believe in the authority of college over your awareness, over your education.”

I immediately feel proud to be a college dropout, somehow it means more when KRS speaks of it than say, Kanye. I begin to realize that maybe my dropping out is not such a big coincidence, considering I grew up on the man’s music.

I mention that college is a privilege. “Knowledge is a privilege,” KRS adds, “This is the truth: quit school and become a dj. You know of anybody who would say that? I quit school in the ninth grade, I studied in the public library, now I teach at Harvard at least three times a year. This Hip Hop shit is crazy. This whole thing is corrupt, you can educate yourself. The human mind is intelligent at birth. Can we really talk like that on Oprah? She’d be like, ‘you mean drop out? Get off the couch.'”

There is a certain word that keeps popping up in our interview. When I ask him why gangsta rap gets blamed for highly-publicized acts of violence in this country, instead of the marines or the army who breed killers every day, the first word out of KRS’ mouth is “Denial.”

“America’s number one disease is denial,” KRS emphasizes, “we’re all suffering from it. 32 people just got killed [in the Virginia Tech shootings] and they’re not blaming that on rock music or skateboarding or whatever he’s into. Whatever the school’s into, they’re not blaming it on that. ‘He was just a strange guy killer.’

The same reason that’s going on,” he continues, “that’s the same reason black people are shocked at Imus. Denial. Imus comes out, he speaks his mind, ‘Nappy headed hoes!’, he loses his job. But Stephen Hill, the program director at BET-a black man, by the way-programs that station to influence Imus’ statement everyday on television, keeps his job…in fact, he gets a raise. We. Livin’. In. Denial. We don’t want the truth. We want our emotions caressed.”

If a society as a whole would rather have ’emotional caressing’ than truth, then we can’t be mad when programs such as “Fox News” are established, to give the population unfair and biased information that only confirms their ignorant views.

“Fox News is the CIA,” KRS says very seriously, “That’s government propaganda. Nazi Germany…but to even know that its bullshit is a privilege. Don’t’ give that privilege away so quickly.”

According to KRS, America is still not ready to look at 9/11, as the news media labeled him a terrorist and anarchist when he voiced his opinions after the attacks. “When they called me an anarchist on the evening news,” he recalls, “I was like, ‘Thank you, at least you got that part right.’ It’s better than being a part of this bullshit. Its better than being geared up and jumpin’ out of a tank in Iraq, that’s what its better than. ‘All I wanted to do was get a job and pay for somethin’ and now I’m busting a big gun…’ But we’re in denial. “Terrorists” killed over 5,000 people at 9/11. the act of killing those people makes them a terrorist. Mass murder makes them a terrorist. Bush lies about the war, its clear. How many are dead…you stopped counting.”

Me: You hear people complaining every day about the dead American soldiers (up to 3,000 now) who signed up on their own accord-

KRS: -to kill

Me: -but nobody complains about the fact that there are between 62,000 and 650,000 dead Iraqi civilians who had no choice in the matter. And the reason there is such a gap in the numbers is because Bush has made it illegal to count the Iraqi casualties, so no one knows for sure.

KRS: Oh yeah, of course, we’re not even gonna go there ’cause that’s straight barberism. And its denial. And this is why you cannot put your vote down on a system that refuses to correct itself. And rehabilitate itself. Fuck all these candidates, Barak Obama as well. Until these cats step to people like me and you…you had a rhyme (speaking to Triune)

Triune: Until Bush meets deep in my community, I’m hustling for mine until I get an opportunity.

KRS continues, “That sums up the whole of America. That sums up my America, the America that I live in. And I tell you, its denial.

You look at Mexicans for instance. White people are so terrified, (in a whisper) ‘Mexicans are comin’ across the border, oh God!’ (screams) ‘We’re gonna dieeeee!’ You already got Mexicans in your house…like what don’t Mexicans run in California? From the government to breakin’ into your house. This is my point, denial…

You know who made the streets? Who actually carved the streets, it’s the Mexican population that makes the streets, the actual sidewalk. you know what kind of skill you gotta have to carve a road? Man, if you got knowledge like I do, and some kind of experience where you know that’s Math. That’s math and motion that Mexicans seems to have in their blood.

Mexican spacial awareness without measurements is some fascinatin’ shit. But look, do Mexicans know it? Do they act like they’re special? See, we go back to that again. Will one or two Mexicans out of 20 step up and say ‘Nah man, fuck this, I come from a great civilization and I’m gonna do something with myself’? Same thing with whites, blacks, Asians. Our people are lost. Every single one of our people are lost. And you know what the shining light is? Hip Hop. That is it, man. I don’t see nothing else that’s uniting our people, lifting our people up. We have a 10.5-billion dollar culture.”

Me: But the majority of Hip Hop today is not uplifting. In your speeches, you’ve mentioned the “kids of 2020.” Where will their generation end up if they’re growing up on Young Jeezy, Lil’ and Wayne?

KRS: They’ll be exactly where you are. You grew up in a time similar to now [late ’90’s], it wasn’t as ignorant, but nonetheless the ‘Golden Age’ was ignorant too. We had all kind of stupidness going on in our culture, but somehow it’s your character, not the music, not the culture-forget Hip Hop right now for a second, hard for me to do- but who are you inside?

Some people gravitate toward robberies. They like robbing people, they get a thrill out of stealing. Some people get a thrill out of lyin’, they just like to lie. They don’t even have to, they just like to. Some people get a thrill out of God. Some people love knowledge, love wisdom. Some people love Love. No reason. You can’t judge, you can’t point a finger, because he’s a pimp and she’s a ho or vice versa, that’s what they chose to be with their being. But here’s who I am. Let me not get caught up in that, that’s not who I am.

I’ll put it this way: One Dead Prez to ten Young Jeezys. That’s what the ratio is though, but that’s the strength. For every one KRS, it will take ten Jeezys to match my One rhyme. One. One lyric with one sixteen-bar rhyme out of my mouth to a crowd, even his crowd. Thugs. He’ll be rhyming “Everybody ride up. Everybody g’d up.” KRS comes out, and be like, “Yo be a father to your child,” all G’s go like this (slumps down in his chair with a sheepish look on his face) “Yo man, let me go call my baby motha, man.”

Everybody gonna break down because the truth is what it is. A kid hungry in the street, a murderer understands that. A rapist understands that what he or she is doing is wrong. They understand it. And so you must have compassion, for those who jump out there and say, ‘ I’m killin’ everybody, I’m the crack cat on the block.’ We done seen Biggie already, Tupac done taught that lesson ten years ago, you don’t know? You don’t know that lesson already? Have mercy on their souls, don’t judge them or criticize them, they’re on their way to the cemetery. They’re on their way to prison. We’ve already seen it.

Me: A lot of times, people use the beat as a scapegoat to justify listening to wack shit. ‘I don’t like Puffy but I like his beats.’ Okay, in that case, why is it that artists such as Dead Prez have not reached that commercial level of success even though a lot of their beats are bangin’ and could be played at the club?

KRS: You don’t go to the club to be taught, you go to the club to bug out.

Me: You can still bug out to Dead Prez

KRS: You can.



Me: If I can put aside my pride and integrity as a conscious woman and dance to Snoop saying ‘Put it in your mothafuckin’ mouth’, why can’t these guys do the same with some conscious shit? Who has more at stake?

KRS: It’s obvious to you because you have a higher conciousness. But lets now step out of our obviousness. (takes on the tone of a ‘thug’), ‘I didn’t come out here, spend $25 to hear some cat tell me that everything I do in my life is wrong. I’m spending $25 cause (singing): ‘I’m a flirt, boom boom, I’m a flirt, goddamn right I’m a flirt!’ I’m a flirt and I wanna hear that in the club.’

(voice gets serious) Now if I’m a Revolutionary, I wanna hear that in the club. But revolutionaries don’t really be in the club. Revolutionaries are doin’ somethin’, they got somewhere to go. If you’re at the club, you’re there with a friend, your favorite artist is there. You’re there for a reason. You’re not there to pick up a guy, you’re not a flirt! You’re not goin’ there like that, you’re not…well, most of the time…

(laughs real loud)… because I’ve been some situations, even as a married man, where I’m like ‘Man, did I just get off the stage with a whole revolutionary message, and these girls are still trippin’?’ I will say though, they say the fastest way to get a woman undressed is to spit knowledge.

Me: Isn’t it better for a woman to respond to your mind over your body?

KRS: It’s the same willpower. ‘This man is safe for me. I’m going to deal with him.’ Okay, conscious guy is safe for you, (taking on the tone of a woman) ‘The thug with the gat and the pistol smellin’ like weed, that’s safe for me as a woman, that was my father, that was my older brother. That’s what I grew up in. so even though I know these cats really dog me out and they treat me like shit, that’s still my fathah. See it even goes back to that, like how were you raised, what man did you see growin’ up? What’s in your mind?

It really hits women hard because we live in a masculine society, so boys kind of get the whole society to fall back on, if you ain’t had a father you can kind of still be a man, in this society…I grew up without as father. And I consider myself a man, no doubt, but I could see where a lot of it had to do with society. I went to the public library, and I could read about all the men, and I had Martin Luther King and Malcom X, there were other things in society…

As a woman? Nah, man. Society is not kind to women. And that’s why women are fighting for their rights, it’s unfair to women. Its an injustice to women, this society that we live in. Christian ethics are an injustice to femininity and womanhood. An injustice. And I like Christian ethics, by the way. I like it. As a man, I believe that my wife should serve me, no doubt.

Me: As you should serve her too…

KRS: Christians say the man is the head of the household and the woman is subservient to him. He is the Christ, the head. And the woman is the body, the home. Now of course no man on this planet could even live with a woman under that kind of archaic philosophy, women are not that.

Me: I mean in the beginning, Eve supposedly bit the apple, and its automatically her fault from the get green, but lets get back to Hip Hop… you started in the game making street music, there is a consenses that ‘The Blueprint’ really was the blueprint-to gangsta rap. What were the key differences between the “gangsta rap” y’all were making as BDP and the 50 Cent kind?

KRS: There’s not many differences, and here’s why. Everything you do today, its instantly YouTubed, ituned or mtv’d. When we did it, you couldn’t see it. So you hear about 50 Cent’s shootouts…well in our day you heard about ours. There was no news camera. It was ghetto news. We had beef with Shan okay? That was never on the news on the tv, but cats in the hood was like, (Fat Albert-type voice) ‘Yo yo yo, did you hear the latest? KRS went up to Queensbrige and dissed Shan, did you hear? Shan was over in the Bronx, Red Alert and Marley Marl.’

Now the difference is, everything we do today is instantly heard around the world. So it only appears that Young Jeezy and others who may be ‘gangsta rappers’ or labeled as that, are doing something so crazy. To be honest with you, they’re like kittens compared to the roaring that went down in the ’80’s. 2000, the new millennium is nothing compared to the ’80’s. West Coast 80’s is legendary. Okay. East Coast 80’s is legendary. Miami? In the ’80’s? Leeeegendary.

Everything cool though, we gettin’ money today. Everybody gettin’ money today. You really don’t have too many murders today, crews runnin’ up on crews, there is a respect that has been established today. 50 Cent and others would never disrespect KRS-ONE and I would never disrespect 50 Cent, but notice what I said:

They would never disrespect KRS-ONE. Never. In a million years. Not because they’re afraid, not because they not men either, but because there is a respect for the OGs. There is a real OG respect from one G to anotha’. There’s people still walkin’ around with lumps on their head because of that KRS-ONE [Criminal Minded] over there. Now, he chooses to clean his life up like we all really want to do. He’s doing what every thug really wants to do; go from Criminal Minded to Spiritual Minded…

But why do I get the respect? Not because of my Philosophies. Not because I have conscious lyrics. No, its because I threw PM Dawn off the stage, its because of the battles…I can say ‘Yo, you wanna hear somethin’? E equals Emcee Squared. That means all you emcees, y’all need to really pay attention to what mc means scientifically..it means Light. Energy, Mass, mc. Matter and Light. C is light.’ Cats will be like, ‘Alright Kris, ummmm…I’m gonna go play By All Means Necessary, I respect you, but its all good’…but if I go, ‘You know what I really feel like doin’ is jumpin’ across the table and beatin’ your fuckin’ ass!’ Suddenly, my philosophy’s become cleara’. Suddenly, when I show up to the club in New York with fifty thugs, and we all dressed in black, and nobody’s smilin’, suddenly, you understand what ‘Stop the Violence’ means. Suddenly, peace, love, unity, and havin’ fun is obvious now. When I came to you as a philosopher, humble, you can’t hear me. But if I come and say, ‘Listen, one more word out of you, and you’re not gonna have a mouth no more!’ suddenly, its ‘Yo, I get it.’

Now why is human nature like that? Why does the philosopher have to have an army? Why do we have to run up on your crew and prove that we are superior warriors?…don’t you realize that real Gs, real cats, ese, they study this. They’re not tattood up cause they look good, these are war scars…that’s where respect come from, you talkin’ to a real G, you watch what you say, you watch how you say it because he knows how to fight. Hand-to-hand, he knows how to fight. He knows how to break you down, with his hands. Not no gat, you gonna get broke. So you watch how you talk around him. Or her. Watch how you talkin’ around a real G.

And I bring that up why? Because these cats are fake Gs, that’s the difference between then and now. Real Gs care for their community. You ask any Crip, Blood, you ask Tookie Williams, ‘What was it about?’

‘We was tryin’ to lock down our community. These cops was buggin’, the drugs was buggin’, the government didn’t care. It just got out of control.’

Ask the Black Panthers, ‘What were you tryin’ to do?’ ‘Lock down our community.’

me: Until they got shut down…

KRS: But look how they got shut down. East Coast/West Coast. That’s the first East Coast/West Coast beef. Fred Hampton on the East coast, Huey P on the West coast, locally. F.B.I. was all in it. How long we gonna keep going for that shit? How long is the black and brown gonna keep fightin’? That’s why I say, your people goin’ to jail? My people goin’ to jail. For some reason, you and I are sittin’ here in Heaven. We in the kingdom of heaven. Be thankful that your role is what it is.

You ask anybody, ask anyone in jail, ‘How’d you get here?’ the ultimate answer, (hushed whisper.) ‘I don’t knowwww. I know I killed somebody, I know I did.’ But when you dig deep deep deep deep deep, like why’d you kill to kill to kill to kill to kill, ‘I don’t knowwww…’ Be thankful that the universe has made you an oracle and not a murderer. Be thankful that nature has made you a wise woman, and not an idiot.

Me: You did a show tonight and there were a lot of children at the theatre…

KRS: My rhymes will be focused on five and six year olds this year. Hip Hop Lives (see sidebar) focuses on the adult hip hoppa, but my personal rhymes will focus on young, young, children. I wanna apply my emcee skills in that way. I wanna show young kids what it means to be an emcee, and have them be inspired by that…the way a doctor feels that everybody should know something of medicine? I’m an emcee. I think everybody should rap…every single human being on the planet should know how to rap.

And that’s my life’s mission.

KRS speaks his last words truly as ‘the Teacha’. “I believe rhyming is healthy for you, I believe it helps you think faster, I belive it helps your vocabulary, it helps you read faster as well. I think that every adult, every child, should learn how to emcee. E-M-C-E-E.”

If Chomsky is the intellectual luminary, KRS-ONE is a cultural luminary. His Hip Hop roots allow him to communicate the same message his counterparts are spreading, but to the hood.

The motherfuckin’ hood better be listening.

words/article by: ani yapundzhyan