Fugees Awarded at the 39th Annual GRAMMY Awards

Quote
"I run marathons like Buju Banton; I'm a true champion, like Farrakhan reads his daily Koran; it's a phenomenon; lyrics fast like Ramadan. . . . Armageddon coming, you know, when we soon be done; gun by my side just in case I got to run; a boy on the side of Babylon trying to front like he down with Mount Zion. . . . we got to get our family together. . . . we got to get organized. . . . we need captains and lieutenants";
"Fu-Gee-La," Track 6; Fugees, The Score, 1996, Columbia Records, Sony Music Entertainment, Sony.

Article
      Fugees were awarded "Best Rap Album" in 1997 for The Score, and group member Lauryn Hill was awarded in 1999 for her solo work The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill. The Fugees other main rappers are Wyclef Jean, Prakazrel "Pras" Michel, and John Forte, and like all "gangsta" rappers, Fugees rappers use their names throughout the lyrics when relaying stories and lessons, magnifying their personal commitment to the cause.

      Their debut album in 1994 opens with the declaration that they are issuing a prophecy with their music, and they say that black men are afraid to stand up to "injustice" because they are afraid of the image of the KKK. ("Introduction.") Biblical characters are placed into present time. Moses will not be stopped from bringing about "exodus" because "the force comes from Genesis." The chorus identifies the people who will be saved as those with "nappy heads," the word nappy standing for kinky twists of hair, or Afros. The names Frederick Douglass and Harriet Tubman are singled out for attention, and named along with them are Public Enemy and Bob Marley. (The black raggae artist Bob Marley was a proponent of revolution and of Rastafarianism, a religion originating from blacks out of the Caribbean. Rastafarianism holds that blacks will be led back to the promised land, Ethiopia, at the new millennium. The movement has been steeped in calls for revolution and in beliefs of black supremacy.) Historical slavery must be up front in people's minds, the Fugees seem to be saying, when they doubt Louis Armstrong's words, "what a wonderful world," and follow up with a substitution of their own words, "what the fuck was so wonderful about picking cotton." They issue a violent proclamation: "coming on the mic' from a higher level; broke is no joke; choke the hell out of the devil; what about Martin; what about Malcolm, Rosa Parks." ("Nappy Heads.")

      Track 3 opens with a skit of several characters smoking marijuana, and one accuses the "white man [of] trying to keep this away from" blacks because blacks build "knowledge" when smoking it. After the rapping begins, a Fugees' rapper says that he cannot "stand the white man," and so he, the rapper, will write "thoughts until [the white man] is dead." The rappers lets everyone know that he pays his taxes so that he will not have to "mess with Sam." Again rapper, Lauryn Hill, puts Moses into present time as the savior of blacks. ("Blunted Interlude.")

      The Black Panthers are referred to heroically in the next track. In addition, we are told that "the streets are like a jungle" and that "Tarzan is a black man." Lauryn Hill says that she cannot forget about Yusuf, and the adversary is referred to as 666. (Yusuf Hawkins was a young black who was chased by some 30 young whites, some wielding bats, and he was shot and killed. The incident happened August, 1989, in a predominantly working-class white section of Brooklyn called Bensonhurst, ethnically being mainly Italian-American or Jewish.) She issues forth the following: "I guess I'll start a revolution with the Tranzlator Crew." At the rap's end, a stand off with the law is given as follows: "black man fire M-16; policeman fire AK-47." ("Recharge.")

      Listeners are told to "emancipate" their minds and not to be slaves to poverty. The Fugees speak of their "blackness," and blacks are told that "united we stand/divided we fall." The call "the black man [the] all original gunman." They talk about Babylon falling. ("Vocab.") A rapper says that he uses a "third eye" to see and to state that "justice is righteous in the eyes of the beholder." ("Temple.") The rapper finds that there has been a notion, built up for "Jack," of white being good and black being bad, and the rappers say that they will save listeners "from the wicked." ("Some Seek Stardom.") President Jean-Bertrand "Aristide" is said to be "the Haitian Pope, a figure of Gandhi," and to have the "courage of Malcolm X." Listeners are told to watch out for "the devil [because] he comes" for them "after the revival." Those who want to send Haitian immigrants back to Haiti are labeled as being "Uncle Sam." ("Refugees on the Mic.") "Some nappy heads need to check they necks for red," listeners are instructed. Listeners are invited to follow the Fugees "to the land of Abraham," and they are told that "the blacker the black man, the better the next man." Also on the final track, Lauryn Hill gives a solution to the problem of fear which was brought up on the opening track. She says that she never feared the Ku Klux Klan, and instead her own "clan is acting up." ("Nappy Heads--Remix.") In the liner notes, Lauryn Hill sends out "special thanks" to a hip-hop musical group called The Last Poets.

      On the album The Score, they refer to themselves as Refugee Camp, Refugees, Fugees, Wyclef, Lauryn, Pras, and Forte. Sometimes they refer to themselves as black, and they also refer to "my family," "our family," "knowledge of your family," "my niggas in the NAACP," and "Haitian Sicilians." Much of their style fits the usual one used by "gangsta" rappers, which is cryptic poetry designed to be understood only by those who listen regularly, therefore by fans. Messages can be extracted, however, with careful analysis.

      On the one hand, in some songs on The Score, the rappers let listeners know that criminals die violently or wind up in prison; on the other hand, in other songs, they glorify criminal life. For example, on the track called "Red Intro," an observation is made that black gangbangers stand around and watch the "beating" of a man by the "pigs," and it is indicated that gangbangers are at fault for letting it take place, in other words, for "only [being] gangsters when it comes to being gangsters to theyself." The rappers seem to find it absurd that gangbangers call themselves after well-know Italian mobsters when all the while "those people don't even like" them, and then boasts are made that they "got power." On the "Family Business" track, the rappers suggest to listeners that blacks should "stay silent to the end" and should not turn in black criminals. Afterall, they reason, "government funds are minimal, oppression subliminal." In the middle of boasting about their musical prowess, the rappers say the following about their choice of topics: "I'm black; I'm first. . . . appetite to write like Frederick Douglas with a slave hand." In the same rap, it is said that chaos in the world is "set up by the feds [and that] they're 'scoping' us out with their infrareds," and at the track's end the following paranoia is relayed about a confrontation: "ready or not, kid, they gonna move on us. . . . we gotta get prepared; we gotta get the forces together, man; we got to get our family together. . . . I'm gonna haul ass down to Mexico. . . . better safe than sorry; let's be ready." (From "How Many Mics.")

      There are no phrases positive about law enforcement, and nearly every mentioning of it says that "cops," or "the Beast," steal drugs from blacks and then deal the drugs. We hear about police brutality: "the biggest niggas on the blocks get murdered, and they deserved it, or so the Beast said when they served it." ("Family Business.") The rappers announce that major records companies and major retailers "steal" from the rappers, and so the rappers along with the gangbangers from Newark are "gonna settle the score, once and for all." ("Red Intro".)

      The rappers relay a fantasy as follows: "if I could rule the world, everyone would have a gun in the ghetto, of course, we get the 'uping' on their horse." Lauryn Hill says that while some blacks are imitating Al Capone, she is going to be like Nina Simone. (Nina Simone sang "To Be Young Gifted and Black" which was used on the Higher Learning soundtrack.) Wyclef Jean mentions Super Fly, a movie that portrays a black drug dealer as a "hero" who outwits corrupt white cops and who tells black nationalists, when they tell Super Fly to give them money for the cause, that he would help the nationalist effort by fighting in a race war, but only when the race war were to have begun already, only once black nationalists would convince blacks to get guns and to be on the streets fighting. Wyclef Jean talks of dancing "around the border like [he is] Cassius Clay. (Muhammad Ali was known for his allegiance to Elijah Muhammad and Nation of Islam, and for holding before national media cameras, the group's founding doctrine, Message to the Blackman in America, or its newspaper, Muhammad Speaks.) ("Ready or Not.")

      On the track called "The Beast," the usual description of the dire state of ghetto life is given along with paranoia. In "ghetto Gotham," the rappers say, there are "conflicts with nightsticks, illegal sales districts, hand-picked lunatics [who] keep poli-trick-icians rich, heretics [who] push narcotics," and gatherings where music is played. Newt Gingrich is made analogous to "666," and the rappers say to "warn the town [because] the Beast is loose." "The Star Spangled Banner" is analogous to the "cops [who] are more crooked than we," say the Fugees, for, after all, the police rob "niggas for ki's [kilos of cocaine]." The military is crooked, and the rappers are harassed even though they pay a lot in taxes. The Fugees rapper complains that the police will search him "without probable cause." The rapper complains about the "subconscious psychology" used against him which may make him lose control and wind up in prison. It is "the streets of corruption [that] got [him] busting and cussing in the concrete jungle," and he tells the audience to meet him "at the corner store so we can start a street war." The Fugees rappers say that they have thoughts about "the Beast coming to get" them, and they warn listeners to "watch out for Gestapo." Malcolm X is referred to as "El Hajj Malik [El-]Shabazz" while the rappers speak of "subconscious psychology" used against them and of them being harassed while the "high class get bypassed." (Malcolm X used the name El Hajj Malik El-Shabazz after his trip to Mecca in 1964, the title "Hajj" being allowed only to those who make the pilgrimage.) ("The Beast.")

      There are three tracks called "Fu-Gee-La," and on the first one, which occurs just after "The Beast" track, the rappers say that they are great rappers who bring the "truth." They repeat their support for the main character of Super Fly who said that he would be in favor of a race war but only if it were already started by black nationalists, and the following shows how the Fugees turn a song title into a code word to show support for race war: "I'm Super Fly when I'm super high on the 'Fu-Gee-La.'" Next on the track, the Fugees praise Farrakhan and warn about Armageddon, and when they combine those elements, they actually are warning blacks about a race war. Nation of Islam's Armageddon is, after all, a racial one in which the whites are annihilated. Furthermore, not only do Nation of Islam factions interpret Armageddon as a race war in which blacks have to assist Allah in killing off the whites, but the Fugees also say that blacks should go around armed in preparation for racial Armageddon. The reasoning for the above lines is developed from the following quote: "I run marathons like Buju Banton [black raggae artist]; I'm a true champion, like Farrakhan reads his daily Koran; it's a phenomenon; lyrics fast like Ramadan. . . . Armageddon coming, you know, when we soon be done; gun by my side just in case I got to run; a boy on the side of Babylon trying to front like he down with Mount Zion." The "family" must become organized with "captains and lieutenants," which are familiar terms for Nation of Islam's militant ranks. ("Fu-Gee-La," Track 6.)

      A rapper calls on listeners to redirect all future crimes at other targets: "it's easy to kill niggas 'cause they look like you. . . . smell like you. . . . live on your same motherfucking block. . . . the only problem we have is, killing the people who don't look like us, who oppress us. . . . if you want to impress me, shoot the motherfucker who turned off my light. . . . shoot somebody who making my bills high all of the time. . . . we got to stand up and do something about it." By grouping together Jesus Christ, Haile Selassie, and Jah Ras Tafari, Lauryn Hill promotes Rastafarianism. (In Rastafarianism, Emperor Haile Selassie I, born Tafari Makonnen, is considered God of the blacks. He governed over Ethiopia as Regent and as Emperor between 1917 and 1974, and he died in 1975, having been known as "Lion of Judah." The title "Jah" is short for Jahweh which is a version of Yahweh, meaning God in Hebrew.) ("Manifest/Outro.")

      A rapper warns, on the one hand, that crime and "hustling crack" leads to a quicker death, but, on the other hand, boasts that his "whore slaps cops like Zsa Zsa Gabor." More about Nation of Islam is also given as follows: "it's the Fugees. . . . Wyclef. . . . hooked up with the Refugees; will be with my niggas in the NAACP, mad niggas . . . smoking homegrown out tobacco pipe. . . . steel your contraband; walk away with your gold mines. . . . like them Islam brothers, we march through your 'hood like them million motherfuckers; so let's get high off the 'Fu-Gee-La.'" ("Cowboys.")

      Many artists are thanked in the CD pamphlets including the following ones: Dr Dre, Flavor Unit, Queen Latifah, Naughty by Nature, Redman, Keith Murray, Sean "Puffy" Combs, Notorious BIG, Craig Mack, Busta Rhymes, DAS EFX, Dogg Pound, Kurupt, Cypress Hill, Kris Kross, Jermaine Dupri, Wu-Tang, Method Man, The RZA, Soul for Real, Heavy D, Lost Boyz, Nas, Guru, Salt-N-Pepa, Rage, Digable Planets, AZ, Coolio, Yo-Yo, KRS-One, Channel Live, Mobb Deep, Flava Flav, Kool G Rap, Boyz II Men, Speech, Tribe Called Quest, LL Cool J, The Pharcyde, Onyx, 2-Pac, and Ol Dirty. Lauryn personally thanks the Farrakhan clan and Sister Souljah.

      The Fugees put out other versions of songs from The Score on a 1996 album called Bootleg Versions. Although song titles remained the same, lyrics were changed, and the group showed greater affiliation with doctrines of Nation of Islam, 5 Percent Nation, and Rhastafarianism. Wyclef Jean came out with a solo album in 1997, and Lauryn Hill came out with one in 1998, one for which she won GRAMMY Awards.

References
Blunted on Reality, Fugees (Tranzlator Crew), 1994, Ruffhouse Records, Sony Music Entertainment, Columbia Records, Sony.
The Score, Fugees, 1996, Columbia Records, Sony Music Entertainment, Sony Corporation.

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

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

Last updates: 8-7-99: info about newspaper coverage of marches and demonstrations surrounding the murder of Yusuf Hawkins was moved to the following link: Murders of Yusuf Hawkins and Huey Newton; 8-10-99: link to Onyx.

Last editing was posted July 23, 1999.

The above article is not a complete summary of the Fugees' connections to violently racist music, and readers may want to research and expose more of it.

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