Hip-Hop References that fly over your Head

To be fair, the NOI, in the image of Elijah Muhammed and Louis Farrakhan, is already Islam gone horribly wrong (a point that Malcolm X was shot for making and which Muhammed's son split with his dad over). A lot of what flew over my head in hip hop lyrics during the 'conscious' era could be boiled down to loose and self-contradictory borrowings from NOI and 5% rhetoric which, over time, were mixed with offhand drug and gun references. (For example, how could Paris be both NOI and a Black Panther i.e. a Maoist i.e. adamantly aestheist?) Five percenters did something interesting when they said any male could call themselves God (women get to be 'Earths') in reaction to the corruption in the centralized leadership of the NOI. At the same time, it meant that it didn't work as a highly disciplined service organization like the NOI did (and it did a lot of good on that level). You could be a very lazy 5% adherent - calling yourself God without having to do or think much more about it.

Interesting to note too that Muhammed's people were in periodic contact with Sun Ra in Chicago in the 50s and allegedly cribbed a fair chunk of their mythology from him. The difference is that they turned it into a misanthropic ideology that slides easily into a simple inversion of old style scientific racism. That stuff has actually crept into parts of academia and borderline mainstream race politics in the States (especially around race + sexuality).

Nuwaubianism is interesting too. Another offshoot of the NOI. Zevlove X/MF Doom, Pos from De La Soul, and Bambaataa are linked to it. The leader is in jail for money laundering and child molestation. If you listen to KMD's 'Nitty Gritty' ft. Brand Nubian the opening chatter mentions the 'God Squad': the 'Now Rule Mob and the Ansars together...' Now Rule means Five Percenters from New Rochelle, NY (Brand Nubian) while the Ansaaru Allah Community is another name for Nuwabianists.

nomos said:

Nuwaubianism is interesting too...KMD

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isn't there a picture of Doom & his brother Subroc at a Nuwaubian temple or something on the back of Operation: Doomsday? also I seem to remember that Prodigy from Mobb Deep is well into this stuff, one of his bizarre & highly entertaining communiques from prison was all about that guy Dr. York (the dude who's in jail - seems like quite an odious figure tho I'm no expert).

another interesting group, tho it hasn't any impact on hip hop, are the Black Israelites. similar to all the NOI-type groups but taking Judaism instead of Islam - they're also kinda like Rastas, into clean living & stuff. actually they're vegan, they have a whole chain of vegan soul food restaurants, Soul Vegetarian. a bunch of them moved to Dimona, in Israel, back in the 70s, had all kinds of problems w/getting the govt to recognize them as Jews (which, tbf, is kind of iffy). I remember talking to my dad about it, I think he did one if his IDF tours in Dimona. anyway.

Poisonous Dart said:

Six man WETTING. Being shot continuously in different places methodically a la the two man wetting/execution in the film "Sleepers" or being sprayed with automatic fire from all members of the crew...The end result? A body/scene WET with blood.

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yeah I did pick that up eventually. still thought it was, yunno, one of those amusing misunderstandings.

padraig (u.s.) said:

isn't there a picture of Doom & his brother Subroc at a Nuwaubian temple or something on the back of Operation: Doomsday? also I seem to remember that Prodigy from Mobb Deep is well into this stuff, one of his bizarre & highly entertaining communiques from prison was all about that guy Dr. York (the dude who's in jail - seems like quite an odious figure tho I'm no expert).

another interesting group, tho it hasn't any impact on hip hop, are the Black Israelites. similar to all the NOI-type groups but taking Judaism instead of Islam - they're also kinda like Rastas, into clean living & stuff. actually they're vegan, they have a whole chain of vegan soul food restaurants, Soul Vegetarian. a bunch of them moved to Dimona, in Israel, back in the 70s, had all kinds of problems w/getting the govt to recognize them as Jews (which, tbf, is kind of iffy). I remember talking to my dad about it, I think he did one if his IDF tours in Dimona. anyway.



yeah I did pick that up eventually. still thought it was, yunno, one of those amusing misunderstandings.

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the head of Nuwaubanism, Dr York, put out some disco and boogie records that range from good to terrible...

the black israelites may actually deserve their own thread,,, they used to have youtube channel, but they took it all down...

I find all this NOI and 5% stuff absolutely fascinating for some reason so please continue all!

Some amazing bits in the Wikipedia entry about Nuwaubianism -

'Furthermore, some aborted fetuses survive their abortion to live in the sewers, where they are being gathered and organized to take over the world.'

'The Illuminati have nurtured a child, Satan's son, who was born on 6 June 1966 at the Dakota House on 72nd Street in New York to Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis of the Rothschild/Kennedy families. The Pope was present at the birth and performed necromantic ceremonies. The child was raised by former U.S. president Richard Nixon and now lives in Belgium, where it is hooked up bodily to a computer called "The Beast 3M" or "3666."'

viktorvaughn said:

I find all this NOI and 5% stuff absolutely fascinating for some reason so please continue all!

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i have this record:




it stinks...

http://www.zshare.net/audio/58788978a770db31/

^I read on the wikipedia entry that he claimed disco was an evil tool of the white man or something...

padraig (u.s.) said:

another interesting group, tho it hasn't any impact on hip hop, are the Black Israelites. similar to all the NOI-type groups but taking Judaism instead of Islam - they're also kinda like Rastas, into clean living & stuff. actually they're vegan, they have a whole chain of vegan soul food restaurants, Soul Vegetarian. a bunch of them moved to Dimona, in Israel, back in the 70s, had all kinds of problems w/getting the govt to recognize them as Jews (which, tbf, is kind of iffy). I remember talking to my dad about it, I think he did one if his IDF tours in Dimona. anyway.

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Were Blood Of Abraham known to be proper Black Israelites? They didn't spout a large amount of ideological mumbo jumbo, well apart from "By the way/The god that you pray to/Is a black jew".

cobretti said:

Were Blood Of Abraham known to be proper Black Israelites? They didn't spout a large amount of ideological mumbo jumbo, well apart from "By the way/The god that you pray to/Is a black jew".

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no as luka said just afrocentric white Jews from L.A. who were for some reason down with Eazy-E.

the Black Israelites aren't "Jews" as such - hence their problems with the Israeli govt over right of return & all that. eh, it's hard to explain, they have a a kind of tenuous relationship with Judaism (there are also regular Black Jews - not a whole lot of them tho, well except for the Ethiopians, who make up like 2% or so of Israel's population I think?) but these days they're doing better, they have resident status & they serve in the IDF & stuff. they definitely don't have any of the "white man=devil" stuff like NOI. the Soul Vegetarian restaurant in Chicago is part of a whole complex, way down south on 75th street, there's a clothing store (they make the clothes themselves), an organic corner market, etc.

Ah, I never knew they were white. Reading up on wikipedia, it appears will.i.am had his first ever appearance on a Blood Of Abraham track

Why did Prodigy go to jail? I thought he was a nice middle class chap.

some kinda guns business. possession, it was like his 2nd or 3rd offense. I dunno if Mobb Deep were middle-class (I mean they're supposed to be from Queensbridge right?) but they definitely didn't start off as hard men. they went to art high school like Tupac, plus Jay-Z's infamous ballerina diss. hence the irony of their & especially Prodigy's incredibly tough & nihilistic image (tho don't get me wrong, The Infamous is certainly a great record). Dart Adams would probably know more about this.

i have a funny picture of them from a year before they broke. definite image makeover. i'll see if i can dig it up later.

EDIT: there we go. july 1991.



next time i saw them they were waving scythes and had pantyhose on their heads

Prodigy ain't even from Queens. Hav, yes. But Prodigy was born and grew up in LI, somewhere in Nassau County, can't tell where. Hence the real reason why Keith Murray hated him... Nothing's a bigger insult than a Long Island guy fronting like he's from NYC for image sake. (I'm looking at you Busta! You too Aesop Rock!)

Both are middle-class, and I believe both of them went to art school. But, you know how it is, rappers. Gotta stick with the times.

That pic is amazing! As good as jigga on the back of Hawaiian Sophie.

viktorvaughn said:

That pic is amazing! As good as jigga on the back of Hawaiian Sophie.

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lol. i have that. it's terrible

CrowleyHead said:

It's like NOI, gone horribly wrong.

5%ers have some of the most colorfully bad science in the history of mankind. Wu-Tang managed to salvage some of the most brilliant of 5% lingo and turn it into slang...

I'm really bitter about 5% because, the devil is 6, and is usually automatically 'the (white) man'. However, there are so many white kids who over the years start spouting 5% analogy, their defense being that "Clearly, they mean the corrupt white man", trying to backpedal and defend the occasional racism that pops up in 5%, and it's infuriating.

Nothing's more obnoxious than some slightly chubby, nerd, dressed in cliche 'hip-hop gear', giving MCs a pound, telling them, 'We have to build on the day's mathematics, God." Even proceeding to watch the mix of disgust/confusion on said MCs face isn't even worth it.

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i met ghostface last night and he called me "god"... tho i just called him Ghost and was wearing a fred perry tracksuit top...

also Hayley Joel Osmond ("i see dead people") was there and spent a while kneeling in front of Ghost (no homo)... Ghost was seated in a hotel lobby and everyone who came up and talked to him did that... like an audience with the pope... i caught him on the way out and asked him to sign my "run" 12"... he was cool...

rza's got a book out soon, probably a book of knowledge 7,
God

i rather like the 5 percenter stuff as an idea, its bonkers but it's kinda laterally very creative inward not outward and kinda hermetic.

what's on 'the columbo tip' mean - epmd used to say it, i want to say it but i want to say it correctly.

good topic this on the old esoteric linguistics.

basically anything divine styler ever said is my choice