Free Mumia

In continuing with the theme of mid 90s hip-hop, I'm posting the lyrics to a KRS joint from '95 with the group Channel Live. I particularly like its slam of C. Delores Tucker, Jesse Jackson, and the Rainbow Coalition. We don't exactly see C. Delores Tucker, Jesse Jackson, and Colin Powell as House Negroes. Jackson in particular is a more advanced justification for white supremacy who embodied the language and dress of black power. The House Negro phenomenon is indicative of pre-Black Power politics and is all but superseded by a relatively new multiracial ruling class. These aren't sellouts but folks who have a vested class interest in white supremacy and in denial of people of color's self-governance.

Mumia Abu-Jamal has little to do with the song other than to underscore the hypocrisy of the civil rights leaders for joining with official society in an attack on people of color and a boycott of WEA (Warner, Elektra, Atlantic). Mumia is a clear and iconic example of State repression of Black people and in the 90s radical youth were organizing to free him. KRS' essential point is that the State, not hip-hop artists, is the real threat to people of color. "Warner, Elektra, Atlantic equals WEA, instead of fightin them why don't you go Free Mumia?!"

Knowledge, where the people at?
Free Mumia!
Channel Live! (KRS-One, come and represent)
(The wisdom)
Hah hah hah hah hah hahaha!
Free Mumia!

Everywhere I look there's another house negro
Talkin about they people and how they should be equal
They talkin but the conversation ain't goin nowhere
You can't diss hip-hop, so don't you even go there
C. Delores Tucker, you wanna quote the scripture
Everytime you hear nigga, listen up sista

Verse One: Hakim, KRS, Tuffy

I met up with this girl named Delores, a prankster
I said I MC, she said, "You're a gangster"
But she was caught up, she hit the floor like a breakdance
Wrapped her up like the arms in a b-boy stance
Recognize moms I'm one of your sons I'm hip-hop
in the form of Channel Live and KRS-One
Representin MC's across America
She said, "You're the one who be causin all that mass hysteria"

Wisdom shall come out of the mouths of babes and sucklings
But you blinded by cultural ignorance and steady judging
But judge not, lest ye may be judged
For the judgment ye judge ye shall surely be judged, you gets no love

She said, "I like it, that's why I jock it"
Then I said, "You only on my back because I fill brother's pockets"
Got em drivin Benzes Jeeps and Rolls Royces
Attackin me will leave youth with no voices
The choice is yours not mine hang with me
I'll have you freestyle and bombin graffiti
We can cut it up like like wax
Claimin I cause violence but America was violent before rap, FACT

Chorus: KRS-One

Warner, Elektra, Atlantic equals WEA
Instead of fighting them why don't you go free Mumia
(repeat 2X)

Verse Two: Tuffy, KRS, Hakim

Wild recital, I kicks the vital, like the Final
Call as I watch, Babylon fall
I had to Rush Limbaugh, get that pig with an axe
Tuffy dips to the side, buckin cannons that's phat
Because he censors the uses of the metaphor
You can get the dick bum up
Because it's you that brings the, real horrorcore
Expenditures forgettin, gut from the poor

Why sure! Back before we were born they sold us out
Yeah J. Jackson we know what you about
You's a Slave Mason, not a Free Mason
Before long the Goddess Tiamat through hip-hop you'll be facin
Don't start me, cause I be the, lyricist
At the nineteen ninety-nine millenium party held at Giza
Sayin he's a, fraud, oh my Goddess
Never in your life should you disrespect an artist
Instead, focus your attention on astronomy
And the up and coming, shift in the economy
If you can't do that, then heed the final call
To free Mumia Abu-Jamal

Hate to be so rough, it could be the White Owls
House niggaz are full of crap, like my Colin Powell
Kickin vowels, is how we relieve the tension
Until we start to bounce white people like suspension (revolution)
You paint the pictures, the black man on the corner
But tell me, who blew up Oklahoma?
The City, ain't no pity, for the beast
It's Hakim that voice from the East

Chorus

Verse Three: KRS, Hakim, Tuffy

Buck buck! Buck buck buck!
It sound like gunshots but it could be the plot
of a chicken, definition, is what you're missin and
listen to your children instead of dissin em
Senator Dole doesn't understand the young people
Like they be sayin want to, but we be sayin wanna
They gettin dumber every summer as they walk the rope
Maybe because they cannot understand the quotes

Word, in actuality, this Norman Bates mentality
always seems to represent, minus three-sixty percent
For degrees full circle, dead from the purple
rays of the sun I gots melanin so check it
Bag your nuts quick or get sick from being naked
Suspect it, was it a means for the end
For just a few to drive the Benz while you eat the pigskins
Turned you into mannequins, cause the trick of technology
A revelation, revelations
Sensation gives me inspiration of revolution
That's my solution, there will be no sequels
I'm audi hundred forty four thousand with my people

From Caligula to Hitler, now it's Schwarzenegger
A lust for the violence is the science of their behavior
Who enslaved ya (it's the Devil) but the God of virtuosity
And of the world created, could it be mental sodomy
Got my mind twisted like the blades of fonta leaf
I sit in disbelief as he crawls underneath
the rock cock back the glock, cause I don't trust
the Devil I rebel until Babylon is dust

Chorus