Public Enemy

26/05/08 - Manchester Academy 1

Two things made me anxious about going to this gig:
a) it was a legacy gig, performing an album from the past - would that make it no more than a nod in the direction of former glory?
b) Flavor Flav has become a bit wayward, not done himself justice in recent years.

a) & b) got blown right out of the water. Public Enemy were AWESOME last night. A speeding locomotion train - wild but firmly on tracks leading directly to their destination, Rebels Without A Pause!

Chuck D spoke in between songs with his simple eloquence and absolute authority, without a hint of preaching or machismo - he's simply a man who knows what time it is and knows he knows what time it is and knows that because he knows the time when plenty of people out there don't know the time he has an OBLIGATION, a RESPONSIBILITY to tell people what time it really is.

They performed the entire It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back album as though it was something they'd written just yesterday and just couldn't wait to share with people. Flavor Flav has an amazing connection with the audience, and he and Chuck D just bounce off each other with searing energy - 'My partner Chuck D gonna tell ya all a story, tell em Chuck!'

During a song Chuck D saw someone wearing a clock in the audience and pointed at them. The man threw his clock up on stage and Chuck D put it on. When Flavor Flav noticed this he almost fell right over - he was blown away. At the end of the song Flavor Flav told us that it was the first time in twenty years he's seen his partner Chuck D wearing a clock. Chuck D told us he used to wear a clock but took it off years ago when everything went crazy and they briefly lost what time it was. So we witnessed a great and momentous moment last night, Chuck D wore a clock along with Flavor Flav - it felt like a genuine and real moment. A great symbolic moment.

When they reached the end of the album tracks Chuck D announced that they wouldn't be leaving us yet - and they ripped on til after the curfew. Then Chuck D handed over to Flavor Flav to pull the whole audience together and leave them with a message of Peace and Togetherness equals Power, and we must use this power to resist War, and we must use this power to fight Racism.

For another fifteen minutes after the curfew and as many people filed out of the venue Flavor Flav remained on stage talking to the audience - he spotted a little child and his mother and asked the child up on to the stage. He hugged the kid and told everyone that this is who we have got to go out there and fight for - it starts with us right now, we fight for the kids, don't leave it too late. And he took off his tshirt and put it on the little boy - who looked like he was in the middle of a moment that would change the direction of his whole life. It was real, genuine and moving.

Public Enemy took hip hop to places it had never been before and has never been since. True pioneers, innovators, and probably right at the top of the league for connecting with their audiences. But what it is that truly makes Public Enemy Great is that they are vital, they are necessary. You hear it in everything they do... they do it because it is NECESSARY. And that passion, that commitment and raw energy will always cut through the shitfest of sound and smoke that is out there and take people that little bit higher, give people that vital inspiration to keep them going. But the message is clear: you've got to fight. You've got to stand up and fight and be counted and you've got to be politically smart and committed. Fail to do so and some people somewhere will be enslaved, and one of these days it's gonna be you too.

I've said for years that music provides all I need that religion does for some people. I'm careful about who I go and see, what I listen to - this is my greatest passion and the main reason I am able to live... Public Enemy, like Mavis Staples, like Kris Kristofferson, have just topped up my well of inspiration til it's overflowing. For some music is no more than entertainment, for me it is my whole spiritual being, it is my soul. Chuck D, Flavor Flav, Soul Brothers.

As Flav told us to remember, we are ALL brothers and sisters.