Jasson Perez of BBU described his group as Hypnotize Minds meets Native Tongue’s—that sounds about right. The Chicago Hip-Hop group is extremely political while also being a whole lot of fun. BBU (Bin Laden Blowin’ Up) is a good mix of Chuck D and Flavor Flav which makes the group affable.
The group’s latest release is a free 17-track mixtape titled bell hooks. Mixed by DJ Benzi, bell hooks features production from Tony Baines, Montana Macks, Stefan Ponce, Classick, The Schwarz, Tapez, and the Hood Internet. GLC, Das Racist, and Mic Terror also make guest appearances on bell hooks.
To celebrate the release of bell hooks BBU will perform in their hometown of Chicago at Schubas on Thursday, February 23, 2012.
Much like my first interview with BBU almost two years ago, my second conversation with the crew was spirited. Just like the groups music, BBU was both serious and silly. At the request of the group no specific band member will be quoted in this interview. “We always speak as the entity called BBU,” I was told. With that being said, ladies and gentlemen, BBU…
SS: Explain the title of the new mixtape bell hooks.
BBU: bell hooks is a really dope black feminist writer. More than anything she really believes that in order to build a strong movement of black liberation you have to look at women’s rights in the black community, queer rights within the black community, but you also gotta speak to the people in the language that you come from. Feminism and Woman-ism is not about talking down to men but it’s a labor of love and uplifting each other. It was just something that we felt was a pretty dope name. We appreciate people that bring really dope concepts to the practice of liberation in accessible real ways. You get a bell hooks book and it’s not a thick hard to read text. It’s like Hip-Hop in many ways. It accessible language, it comes from a place that a lot of people come from, it confronts titles that people appreciate, like the book All About Love. Our artistry was the same so we wanted to represent that. We also wanted to stand in solidarity with sisters that make us better black men.
SS: The song “The Hood” features another artist from Chicago, GLC. That’s not really a traditional collaboration, how did you guys hook up with GLC for that song?
BBU: Chi Don’t Dance. The beat for Chi Don’t Dance was sold to GLC, also. GLC had his own track for it with John Legend. We had a rap with him about it like, “Hey GLC, are you cool with us both having the rights to that song?” There was some confusion and the beat got sold to both parties. GLC was hella cool about it. Mind you the track had John Legend on it. There was no drama with signing over the rights for it to make everything legit. The conversation came up that we should do a song together and he was ready and rolling.
Illekt came up with the concept for it and it spoke perfectly to GLC and his slang. GLC’s vocabulary is consistent with Chicago slang. It was a perfect track for him because when he came to the studio he was like, “Wow, I’ve been waiting for a track like this!” GLC is another black man from Chicago and he’s like an ambassador of the city. He’s been in the game forever so it was a blessing to have the brother reach out.
SS: What is Outlaw Culture?
BBU: [Laughs] Outlaw Culture is a book written by bell hooks. The homie Zack hit us up with a file of beats and this kid from B-more made custom made beats for BBU. A lot of times when people custom make beats for BBU they make some sh*t you can’t even rap on. The kids name is The Schwarz. The beats were impossible to rap on and I was like, what am I gonna do? I sat up with the beat for a minute. We were throwing words around and the hook just kind of came together. Outlaw Culture is addressing one of those woes. It’s addressing the contradictions. It’s a new anthem for RBG but we also tried to make it all encompassing. It encompasses the queer community, the heterosexual community, women of color, and the revolutionaries. Sometimes revolutionary sects are the most divided. You have the communist folks over there, the queer liberation folks over there, and the sisters of the struggle over here. The divisions create less power in the movement that way. If you get everybody together and identify that all of that is RBG we have more power in numbers. We have all of those folks at the same table fighting for the same cause. That track was in your face, we’re calling on all people to go with us for liberation.
SS: Whose idea was it to re-do the Chappelle’s Show skit on “Spaghetti”?
BBU: [Laughs] We were in the lab with Tony Baines doing a collabo with Mic Terror. Jasson is random so he just came in the studio and started yelling, “Spaghetti, spaghetti, spaghetti!”
Mic Terror was there, Epic is there, Illekt was there and it can be hella intimidating when you’re rapping so you have to find that chi, that energy. It just came in and it was some sh*t I could see Chappelle doing the black sheep dance to. Tony picked it up and said we should roll with it seriously. I was just joking.
The hook before that was some straight up backpack Hip-Hop sh*t like, “Yo this is BBU and Mic Terror! Juke them hoes! I don’t dance!” Tony was like, that is way too serious. You got Mr. Porno Music and we’re “Chi Don’t Dance” so we had to figure something out. It came together perfectly.
SS: You guys sampled Nirvana on the mixtape. I’m pretty sure that’s a Hip-Hop first. How did that song come together?
BBU: Get out of here! Really?
SS: I think so.
BBU: I didn’t know that. That’s what’s up. It was Tony Baines. Tony is an older head. He’s a producer and a friend of my older brother. He remembers me when I was six years old. He’s an older school producer but he’s sick with it. It was like a rebirth for him. He was trying to create new music so he asked us to come down to the studio. We were at Tony’s studio at least once or twice a week.
Tony crafts the beat right in front of you. He has an MPC, not all this computer stuff. It’s like how people talked about Dilla making beats right there while you’re chillin’. I never experienced that. Tony was doing that as we were talking to him and he’s smoking a blunt.
By the time the blunt is gone the beat is ready. He took that Nirvana sample, was talking to us and in fifteen minutes there was Kurt De La Rocha. It was so solid.
The thing with Tony is he’s a producer, not just a beat maker. He’s very hands on. With Spaghetti he helped with the direction of where we should go with the track. We love making songs on our own but at a certain point you need that musician voice to say, “Do this here, do that there,” so we can really focus on the lyrics.
SS: Since the death of Usama Bin Laden does BBU still stand for Bin Laden Blowin’ Up?
BBU: It’s always going to stand for Bin Laden Blowin’ Up. The idea of Bin Laden Blowin’ Up is a critique on U.S. foreign policy and home policy, too. This year alone hundreds of thousands of young Afghani and Iraqi folks died at the hands of U.S. bombs. There’s all this counter-insurgency stuff that we do for the countries we fund. The majority of foreign aid goes to Israel which goes to bombing Palestinians. The majority of our money goes to Egypt which goes to killing protestors who want to fight for their freedom. As long as we keep on doing things like that we’re going to have to confront things that it creates such as Usama Bin Laden. We want to liken it to what goes on in the hood. Why are brothers killing brothers? Why are people having babies that they can’t necessarily raise? Why aren’t we getting the education that we need? Why do we act this way in response to the oppression that we face? It’s because of the oppression we face. It’s because we’re being stepped on for so long that after a while people will just scream and shout even if it’s in a dysfunctional or violent way. Until we get to the root cause of it we’re not going to be a free people or a better people. It’s always going to be Bin Laden Blowin’ Up. We always went by BBU anyway. The meaning behind it is Bin Laden Blowin’ Up and we always wanted to have that conversation with folks and push that. Bin Laden dying doesn’t mean terrorism is ever going to die until we get to the root cause.
One of the most important components of it is when you think about a young black dude who gets caught with say an 8 ball of crack because he’s selling it. He didn’t know what he was doing was wrong, it’s the only way to really make money in the hood and he got caught up. He serves his 4-5 years, gets out of prison and he’s reformed now. I’ve seen these brothers come out of jail consistently and they want to work a 9-to-5. They apply for a thousand jobs and get denied on every aspect because of that bag of crack. They’re no longer eligible to go to school so now they’re stuck. They’ve been applying for jobs for months, they have a shorty or a shorty on the way and they’re living with their mom. Their mom is like, “You need to get a job!” America indentifies men as being to provide for their families, if this man goes back out to sell dope to his own community even if he knows the consequences, that’s Bin Laden Blowin’ Up. That’s the foundation of what we’re talking about. The fact that the brother can’t get a job and he’s been out of prison for two months and the system is built for that man to have no other options other than to sell dope, until America faces the fact that they built that monster, that’s Bin Laden Blowin’ Up. That’s the same reason them brothers strap bombs to their chest and die in the name of their father or whatever. It’s because of some wrong that the U.S. has done to them that the U.S. still refuses to recognize. It’s the same reason why shorty’s are killing each other in the hood. There is an issue going on that America refuses to face and analyze. That dude Bin Laden can be dead. We didn’t agree with him or his policies, what we agreed with was if somebody does you wrong and pushes you up against the wall and gives you no other option and you choose to strike back. Whether that be somebody selling dope in your face and knowing they’re being watched and still willing to take that charge, or somebody strapping a bomb to their chest walking into the World Trade Center and blowing that bitch up, it’s the same thing. There is something about American policies that creates these demons and monsters and we sit back and look at them like, “Wow, how did that happen,” that happened because that motherf*cker couldn’t even get a job at McDonald’s! That happened because you blew up this motherf*ckers entire village! It happened because you’re funding the country next door to them to bully them up and you sit back and act like you had nothing to do with it! This is why BB will never be on MTV [laughs].
SS: I just left Indianapolis so I’m in redneck mode. What would you say to someone who’d say, “If you don’t like the country why don’t you just leave”?
BBU: First of all I’m black. I’m black, I’m a n*gga, I built this bitch so I ain’t gotta go nowhere. We’re the only people indigenous to this country that came here by no choice.
We built it but outside the concept of ownership and having rights to it it’s the point of the democratic process. Those same people hold up the constitution and say they love this country, well if they believe in and love this country then they can handle a radical critique of the country. That’s the very point of the constitution they claim to protect. The point of the Bill of Rights is the democratic process which allows me to hold my government accountable up to the point of revolution, which is the point of the second amendment which guarantees the rights of guns to protect yourself from government intrusion in your life. Either they believe in those principles or they don’t. They’re being hypocritical in their own nature. Either they believe in the democratic process or they don’t. I don’t understand why radical criticism of your own country so it could be a better place became a call for you to get out of that country.
As if the Civil War was like, “Y’all should just leave the country and go back!” It isn’t about that. It’s about the option of revolution. I’m a revolutionary and I believe that there can be peaceful revolutions but at the same time I feel like it’s my job to identify those woes in the community. It’s my job as a black man with a voice and a microphone to express that. Yeah there are a few black millionaires but there are a whole lot of shorty’s out here hurting in the community. You can’t just say, “Why don’t you just leave,” because if I leave the problem still exists.
Why didn’t the founding fathers leave? They hated England but no, you gotta stand up to oppression. You gotta stand up for justice and stake your claim on the right side of humanity.
We are pro-America. We are Americans. That’s an undeniable truth. We just want a better America. We don’t America to settle for the status quo.
We don’t want America to settle for fascism, sexism, racism, or settle for the BS that it does. We want it to live up to its promise.
SS: What do you have in-store for the fans at Schubas in Chicago for the bell hooks release party on February 23rd?
BBU: We’re gonna have a dope show. We’re gonna do almost all of our new songs. It’s a chance for folks to hear our new stuff.
We got STV SLV coming out from Hood Internet, we got the homie ShowYouSuck, we got MattBoyWhite, Stefan Ponce, Kevin Coval, and Malcolm London who is a poet from the Young Chicago Authors who is going to do a piece—he opens up the mixtape. It’s going to be a BBU extravaganza. Jasson made sure we got the poets on there and that’s always been BBU. We’ve always been the kids that leave the poetry set and go to the juke set. It’s going to be all of that and then some. We got a really dope mixtape out and we hope folks enjoy it.
Three 6 Mafia meets Arrested Development [laughs].
SS: [Laughs] Wow, that’s a hell of a mix.
BBU: I’m gonna come out there with a kufi and a gold grill in. That’s what I’m talking about!
See BBU on February 23, 2012 live at Schubas in Chicago
Download: BBU – bell hooks
Comments