Ask Chuck D what he thinks about Elvis.
I'll rather ask BB King, Bo Diddley ("my white brother"), Ike Turner (
"Rocket 88" might or might not be the first Rock&Roll record ), Howlin' Wolf ("he started from the blues, he made his pull from the blues"), Little Richard etc about Elvis.
The "Elvis stole black music"-line from Chuck D did make some good headlines,
but Chuck later backtracked saying he used "Elvis" in figurative speech.
A speech made decades after the fact and from a "safe position";
I consider a Public Enemy commenting on Elvis to his fans
as predictable as Chris Martin of Coldplay "attacking" record label shareholders.
They are both just cosying up to their own herd.
Elvis and early Rock'n'Roll is much more complex than "Elvis stole it" -
and Chuck D knows this (if he is this great librarian).
A binary choice is given "Elvis: putting his hand in the black mans pocket
or gospel-loving whitethrash made good?"
- the one thing which always goes down well with Americans, "good or evil"
you are either for us or against us etc . When the world is complex - give the people a binary choice
to make it simple for them: and make one part really "evil" so it's easy to choose.
So easy that in fact you are not making your own judgement - you just think you are.
I don't really care what Chuck D thinks about Elvis or even about
Elvis himself.
But it makes more sense to listen to the older statesmen of gospel, blues
and rock on Elvis. From what I've seen and read it's almost universally good
- not in some sort of "Duran Duran"-revisionst way - but because the man was unique and a
force for good.
Taking history lessons on Elvis and the birth of rock from Chuck D is like
listening to the fools on "I love 1982" go on about how great Michael Jackson
was then - when they weren't even born at the time.
(for the record: I've got twice as many records by Public Enemy as by Elvis: two is the magic number).