Back in 1990, a leaked document revealed that the FBI had compiled a report entitled "Rap Music and Its Effects on National Security" for the US Congress. Evoking, rather pathetically, earlier "moral panics" about popular music (Elvis, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Sex Pistols, "Rave" music), it was an astonishingly paranoid document - even by FBI standards.
The fear appeared to be that those nasty, evil messages contained in rap music (especially if you play the records backwards) about crack cocaine houses and drive-by shootings would infiltrate white suburban neighbourhoods (where most of these records were bought, funnily enough) and pose a threat to "national security".
Five will get you 10 that the underlying fear was that the clear and distinct message sent out by rappers about adopting self-defence tactics in the face of brutal, racist police force action might well ignite urban riots. After all, Los Angeles burned when people saw what happened to Rodney King and what later happened to the men who beat him to within an inch of his life.
The main band featured in the report were Public Enemy, a.k.a. "the Sex Pistols of rap". Amid all the dumb, Ali G, macho bluster of "bitches" and "hos", Public Enemy always favoured a more eloquent approach. One of their best known songs, 911 Is A Joke, was written after the band researched figures on how quickly (or how slowly) US emergency services responded to incidents reported in black ghetto areas. As champions of controlled noise assault and musical radicalism, it is oft mooted that Public Enemy cleared the way for the Prodigy, Rage Against The Machine and more latterly Atari Teenage Riot and Asian Dub Foundation. Their songs have been covered by acts as diverse as Tricky and Duran Duran (very embarrassing for all concerned) and, while it sometimes seems that the rest of the rap world are either shooting or suing each other, Public Enemy remain true to their initial purpose. Formed in Long Island, New York, by Chuck D in the mid 1980s, they made a dramatic entrance with Yo! Bum Rush The Show, and follow-ups such as Fear Of A Black Planet ensured that the only other hip-hop band in the world who could touch them at the time were NWA.
Ten years after the FBI report, the band have a new mission. When they wanted to put out tracks from their new album, There's A Poison Going On free on the Internet, they had a spat with their record company, Def Jam, and left the label. Setting up their own label to produce and distribute the album was, they say, always part of their masterplan to take on the major label record companies and support the democracy and cheapness (for the consumer) of MP3 music.
"The way we are releasing this album (as a downloadable sound file) is a statement," says Chuck D. "Public Enemy like to make succint, focused, laser-like statements that are templates for the rest of the music industry to follow. Because of our actions, maybe, a lot of artists will prosper and persevere and do much better than we have ever done. Trailblazers never get the full glory but we're not looking for it. This is not about self-gratification."
He's pretty fervent in his belief that MP3 files and the Internet in general will change the way music is made available. "You have to be on the right side of the divide on this one. Otherwise you're going to be picking electronic cotton and digging digital ditches. My whole thing is trying to tell my neighbourhood where I come from to get on it - to make the Ark before the flood comes."
There's A Poision Going On is available on PIAS Recordings or at www.publicenemy.com. Public Enemy play the Red Box, Dublin on Friday June 2nd
