Lord Jamar is citing the “DNA” of Hip-Hop in his rebuttal to KRS-One‘s claim that Puerto Ricans contributed significantly to its creation.
The Brand Nubian MC‘s retort was in response to The Teacha literally teaching a room of rap lovers about the origins of the culture, taking issue with those who’ve minimized the role of Latinos in its development.
“Today, people want to downplay the Latino role in Hip-Hop,” he began within the now-viral clip. “They are so stupid. Hip hop cannot— would not have existed without specifically Puerto Ricans … specifically. Cubans were here, Haitians were here, Dominican Republic was here, everybody was here. All of South America been in the Bronx, okay?
“But Puerto Ricans in particular sided with the Black folk here, and the Jamaicans were coming in as well, and this group of Puerto Ricans, Jamaicans and American Blacks made Hip-Hop — not American Blacks, not Puerto Ricans, not Jamaicans; all of them made the culture.”
Days after the video made its rounds on the internet, the “Supreme Mathematics” MC shared a clip of his own disputing KRS-One’s claims.
Responding to those asking if the Bronx legend’s statement made him upset, Lord Jamar replied, “I wasn’t upset, but I knew he was wrong,” followed by a light chuckle. “I knew he was wrong, and…some people posture themselves as super official,” he went on, admitting that he’s been accused of the same. “And they’ll use whatever to try, whether it’s record sales, their reputation in this rap game, or some kind of sh*t to use to try to act like you can override a motherf**ker, you know what I mean? I got ni**as two and three years older than me talkin’ about, ‘You were not old enough to know what was going on, you weren’t there,’ shut the f**k up!”
The wordsmith went on to argue that we were not present when our parents conceived us, but we know we are of their DNA, comparing that to the “DNA” of Hip-Hop.
“You know how we determine parentage? Through DNA, motherf**kers. Through DNA. Now, when I look at the DNA of Hip-Hop [and] the double helix of Hip-Hop, what I see is soul music, funk music. I see parents that might’ve come up in the South, who moved to the North — specifically the New York City area — and whose children came up in that post-civil-rights era with that northern attitude that was like, ‘Motherf**ker, I wish I was around during slavery times, I won’t have let motherf**ker’s [mess] with me.’
Brand Nubian attend Vibe Magazine’s 15th anniversary party on August 12, 2008 in New York City. (Photo by Johnny Nunez/WireImage)
“Like when Roots came out when we was young, ni**as was like, ‘I wish a ni**a would’ — that’s the energy that birthed Hip-Hop; those kids that watched Roots and all that type of sh*t. That’s the energy that birthed Hip-Hop, bro, and that’s the DNA you see all in Hip Hop. We hear it musically with the type of samples that we choose or chose to play at the time with the breakbeats, but we also hear it in the language, okay? We see the DNA of the Five-Percent Nation very much inside of Hip-Hop, with terms like ‘peace’ and ‘cypher’ and ‘god’ and ‘son,’ y’know what I mean?”
He continued, “But nowhere do you seen the DNA of Puerto Rican culture. Not talking about Puerto Rican individuals; I’m talking about Puerto Rican culture, Jamaican culture. Those things did not influence Hip Hop regardless of how official motherf**ker’s sound saying it! I’m sorry! I hate to hurt your heart, that the things that you adore and love is something that Black American youth created.”
“This is a f**king fact,” he went on, “No one said ya’ll wasn’t there — sure you were there — but if I’m building a house, and you watch me build a house, does that mean you built it too? No! When the doctor births a baby, is the doctor the father or the mother of the child because he was present at the time of birth? No!”
“Yeah, you were there, but there’s a difference between a creator and a participator.” Check out Lord Jamar’s take below.
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