Brand Nubian's 1990 Album

Quotes
"It's time to start the revolution";
"Dance to My Ministry"; Brand Nubian, One for All, 1990, Elektra Entertainment, Warner Communications, Time Warner.

"Drop the bomb on the caveman crew. . . . beware, devil-man, your days of purge is almost over; the army is on the range. . . . Armageddon is gonna hit you. . . . send the devil right back to his cave";
"Drop the Bomb"; Brand Nubian, One for All, 1990, Elektra Entertainment, Warner Communications, Time Warner.

"It's time to drop the bomb and make the devil pay the piper";
"Wake Up"; Brand Nubian, One for All, 1990, Elektra Entertainment, Warner Communications, Time Warner.

Article
      Like all "gangsta" rappers who put out violent racism, Brand Nubian chooses victimhood, and they use extreme terms to describe their victimhood. For example, on Track 3 of the debut album, called One for All, we hear the rappers rally listeners with comments about stopping "racial injustice" and about the view that the US today is a "form of slavery" for blacks, a place where there is "modern day lynching" for them. All blacks, they say, "felt the pain" over the killing of Yusuf Hawkins. By connecting two phrases together, Brand Nubian seems to want to connect the race of the killer of Huey Newton to the race of the killers of Yusuf Hawkins, and the following quote shows how: "now Huey Newton was slain, and we all felt the pain of Yusuf Hawkins." (For information about events surrounding their deaths and about media coverage, go to the following link: Murders of Yusuf Hawkins and Huey Newton.) The rappers complain about confrontations at a rally with law enforcement officers who are referred to as "feds." They describe their music as a "manifesto for life." Concerning "racial issues and tension," New York City is described by them as "a powder keg," and a voice speaks of revolution as inevitable, saying the following: "when the revolution comes." Their album, they say, should be categorized, in record stores, under the heading "black war." Brand Nubian calls black men gods, which conforms with the terminology from the affiliation of blacks known as Nation of Gods and Earths, women being the earths. ("Concerto in X Minor.")

      Rapper Sadat X announces his affiliation with Nation of Islam by first telling listeners that he does not eat "pig," and immediately afterwards saying that he is "speaking that knowledge like Farrakhan." Rapper Lord Jamar says that he speaks the facts and does not exaggerate. While Nation of Islam doctrines pour out on later tracks, the rappers seem to be warming listeners up with the first several ones. Rapper Lord Jamar lets doctrine leak out when he tells listeners that he will take listeners back to a time "when black was defined as original, god-like, supreme-divine." Rapper Grand Puba calls himself "a pharaoh." ("Ragtime.") Listeners are told to clap their hands for "Zulu Nation." Lord Jamar calls himself Allah Jamar. Listeners are told that they are seeking, in Brand Nubian's music, "a message from a black man." ("To the Right.")

      At the beginning of Track 6, the rappers dialogue in standard hip-hop terms. "What's the science," one asks, "elevation," the other answers. "Ready to drop math on this," one asks, then "it's time to start the revolution," they conclude. Brand Nubian describes blacks today by terms from Biblical Revelations, such as by "Lost Tribe of Shabazz" and "the Alpha and Omega." They hint at Nation of Islam's racial Armageddon, saying that blacks were "first on the planet Earth [and] definite to be the last." Islamic terms are used such as Allah and Qur'an. The rappers say that they will "destroy all the villainous criminals [who are] perpetrating constant subliminal signs to brainwash the minds." Blacks must become "conscious," and even though some "may disagree," they say, "the truth hurts." They call themselves "the civilized," "the all-eye-seeing black-man supreme," and they say that they produce "black facts." It is with their music, they say, that they "jam these facts" in order to "spread over the thoughts of the white bred," because, after all, "we've been misled for the longest time." Brand Nubian lets listeners know their affiliations by sending out the greeting "peace" to "Father Allah & Justice," to "the Gods and Earths," to "the God Sincere," to "the God Supreme," to "Lakim Shabazz," to "the God Jahwell from Mount Vernon," and to the following hip-hop artists: Q-Tip from A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, and Afrika Bambaataa of Zulu Nation. ("Dance to My Ministry.")

      The expression "dropping the bomb," in hip-hop culture, means to issue propaganda for the purpose of destroying or changing. Referring to Nation of Islam's belief in a renegade scientist named Yacub, who it is said created the white race 6,000 years ago, Brand Nubian uses common hip-hop code words for whites, namely Yacub's crew, and the rappers threaten as follows: "drop the bomb on the Yacub crew." Probably stemming from television coverage of discoveries of Neanderthal bones in Europe, hip-hop culture sometimes refers to whites as cavemen, and to white women specifically as cave-bitches. Brand Nubian says of themselves that "we gonna drop the bomb on the caveman crew. Sometimes whites are said to be ignorant, but it is also said that blacks are ignorant when they do not know about Nation of Islam's doctrines. Brand Nubian says that they will "drop the bomb on the ignorance crew." Usually the term "belly of the beast" means prison, but Brand Nubian uses it doubly in an expression to also mean the entire US system. Blacks "protest because this land ain't just," they say. "Gangsta" rappers use dire terms saying that blacks are not free in America, and Brand Nubian says that blacks seek "equality and freedom." They say that they "rise the dead from the graves of slaves" and that they deal with "the head of the men in the caves." They will help to unify blacks and teach them to have no fear of "the devil." Blacks are called "cream of the planet Earth." "The first soul [was] black like coal," they say, and "the devil couldn't check" to find the birth records of the first blacks because their origin goes so far back. The information Brand Nubian's lyrics provide, the rappers say, "will collide with devilish ways of thinking," and for an example of such a collision, they say that they are "erasing false facts that started with Abe Lincoln," who did not really free the slaves when one considers the following: black illiteracy, understaffed schools, inability to understand mathematics, black men unable to make purchases, breakup of black families, blacks in prison, and "the welfare system" giving rise to "black horror" by creating "cycle[s]" of "dependency." The "devil" put blacks into that state because "the devil" wanted it that way. America does not belong to whites, Brand Nubian says, because "the Indians was here first." The whites dispersed "the red man" with "savagery." The rappers are out to "squash the whitewashed-brainwashed line of thought." Brand Nubian issues forth a threat at whites: "beware devil-man, your days of purge is almost over; the army is on the range. . . . Nubians is in the picture; Armageddon is gonna hit you." The rappers, calling themselves "the God Hajji" and Egyptians, say they will guide the "blind, deaf, and dumb," being the blacks who do not know the "truth." They affiliate themselves with the beliefs of the black group 5 Percent Nation, an offshoot of Nation of Islam, when they say that they bring the word of "Allah, God Islam," to the "85's," who, they say, do not understand the "truth." "The devil" divided blacks, and an example of it happening is the fact that Jamaicans and Christians eat bacon. Grand Puba says that he greets "brothers" with the Islamic greeting "As-Salamu 'alai-kum." Grand Puba says that blacks are Asiatics, that he "loves Allah's mathematics," and black men have been taught to speak in ciphers. He uses his "third eye" to release the "black man" from mental chains, so that the "black man" will no longer be a slave. Grand Puba warns whites as follows: "here comes the god to send the devil right back to his cave." Any black who acts too much like a white, the "Uncle Tom," should be "alarmed because it's time to drop the bomb." ("Drop the Bomb.")

      Brand Nubian will "civilize the uncivilized," referring to blacks who have not been exposed to or who refuse to believe in Nation of Islam doctrine. The rappers says that he is moving "blackwards," that he is an "Asiatic black man," and that he is "a dog spelled backwards." Blacks are "father of the civilization and god of the universe." Listeners are told that "the planet is designed by the colored man." A black mother does not have enough money for food because she gives it to the preacher. Blacks who died from crack cocaine were "set up by the devil" who looks on and smiles. Brand Nubian says that the plot whites have to destroy blacks with crack cocaine, called a "game of tricknology," will be overcome with "black unity, unification." A background voice utters the word "murderer" over and over again. A rapper asks, "can a devil fool a Muslim," and the answer is "no." Yet, they relay that "the devil fooled us 400 years ago," referring to the beginning of historical slavery in America. Whites told blacks back then, the rappers say, that they would be given gold for their labors. The rappers use the pronoun "we" to make it seem as if blacks today personally suffered what black slaves suffered historically. The rappers warn of reparations or violence as follows: "it's time to drop the bomb and make the devil pay the piper." Blacks are called "the righteous people." The rappers say about the "blind, deaf, and dumb, we've got to change their mind state." A line by Brand Nubian in reference to 5 Percent Nation was sampled by Da Lench Mob two years later on the "Buck tha Devil" track of their Guerrillas in tha Mist album, and the quote is as follows: "civilize a 85'er; gotta let them know the devil is a conniver." The Brand Nubian rapper sends out the greeting "As-Salamu 'alai-kum" to who he calls "the universal family." Blacks are called "Allah's children." ("Wake Up--Stimulated Dummies Mix.")

      Grand Puba says that he has sex with many "girls" who he also calls "skins," and he says that he drinks 40 ounce beers. Describing himself as "raised in the ghetto, singing songs called survival," Grand Puba says that he is "like Super Fly, the title of a movie that refers to the main character, Priest, who is a black drug dealer who outwits corrupt white cops and who tells black nationalists, when they tell Priest to give them money for the cause, that he would help the nationalist effort by fighting in a race war, but only once the black nationalists would convince blacks to get guns and to be on the streets starting a race war.("Step To the Rear.") Grand Puba, joined by a rapper Positive K, talks of making a lot of money and of "spread[ing] the skins." The rappers call the television show character Kojak "a fed." Grand Puba lectures "brothers," telling that they are wrong if they think crime pays. The very next statement is that he does "not like gays." He says that since he is a "righteous man," he does not eat ham. Positive K says that his lyrics "can be nice [but then] flip like the Son of Sam." ("Grand Puba, Positive and L.G.")

      Blacks should not change their look with such things as "green" eye-contacts. ("Feels So Good.") The rappers indicate a belief that blacks are superior as follows: "to put it exact: dominant means black." Some have a "hard time trying to swallow" the idea that blacks are dominant, the rapper says, and he scoffs at blacks who are "wearing blue eyes and green eyes," calling them "fake." Brand Nubian rappers directly embrace 5 Percent Nation with the following: "make the people aware that black means first; 400 years and we're made to feel cursed; but now it's our time to rule; student of the old [rap], teacher of the new school [rap]; my inspiration is the 5 Percent Nation." History is given about Nubians forming a "powerful empire between Egypt and Ethiopia." Sadat X says that he is from the Sudan, letting them know that this is the central region of Africa. Whites are encapsulated as "Elvis" when the rappers say that it is "Elvis" who keeps blacks "blind, deaf, and dumb." Wisdom to the rappers is represented by "someone like Assata [Shakur]," or is found in being black like Afrika Bambaataa, Tasa Kuma, Achmed, or Kenyattam because they are "brothers that will fight for the cause." Brand Nubian says that they make sure that their music is not only good for dancing to, but will also "seep into the mind, the brain." ("Brand Nubian.")

      The last track is dedicated to Public Enemy, Boogie Down Productions, X-Clan, Heavy D, Rakim, Big Daddy Kane, Kool G Rap, LL Cool J, MC Lyte, Queen Latifah, Monie Love, Linque, DJ Chuck Chillout, Awesome 2, Red Alert, Bizmarkie, Da La Soul, Jungle Brothers, EPMD, Kid Capri, Andre, Sean "Puffy" Combs, and the SD's. The following are some artists are thanked in the liner notes: "X-Clan, Public Enemy, Jungle Brothers, A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, KRS-One and Boogie Down Productions, Black Sheep, Afrika Bambaataa and the Universal Zulu Nation, Pete Rock, Red Alert, Kid Capri, Queen Latifah, Monie Love, Kool G Rap, Big Daddy Kane, Stetsasonic, Ice-T, MC Lyte, Funkmaster Flex, Nice & Smooth, Doug E Fresh, Bizmarkie, and Paris.

      Brand Nubian extends "peace and blessings to the following: Master Farad Muhammad, the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, the Father Allah & Justice, Marcus Garvey, Noble Drew Ali, Martin Luther King, Kwame Toure, Haile Selassie, Minister Louis Farrakhan, Huey P. Newton, Assata Chukur [Shakur], Fred Hampton, Malcolm X, Immam Isa and most of all we would like to give thanks to the original black mentality which manifestated all things in existence."

References
One for All, Brand Nubian, 1990, Elektra Entertainment, Warner Communications, Time Warner.

Super Fly, directed by Gordon Parks, Jr.; 1972, Warner Bros., Time Warner.

Posted at http://home.att.net/~phosphor on June 30, 1999.

Last editing was posted August 31, 1999.

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