["Hip Hop" by Dead Prez]
♪ Uh, uh, uh, 1, 2, 1, 2 ♪
♪ Uh, uh, 1, 2, 1, 2, uh, uh ♪
♪ One thing 'bout music When it hit, you feel no pain ♪
♪ White folks say it controls your brain ♪
♪ I know better than that, that's game ♪
♪ And we ready for that Two soldiers, head of the pack ♪
♪ Matter of fact, who got the gat? ♪
♪ And where my army at? ♪
♪ Rather attack and not react ♪
♪ It's bigger than hip-hop Hip-hop, hip-hop, hip ♪
♪ It's bigger than hip-hop Hip-hop, hip-hop ♪
[sirens blaring]
[dance music]
♪
[Shad] New York City is the undisputed
birthplace of hip hop.
♪
New York's pioneering hip hop artists
created a sound and culture
that gave a voice to young black urban America.
♪ Boom boom boom ♪
[Shad] But on the West Coast,
it was a different story.
It's been said in Los Angeles
everybody's a star
but the stars of the early '80s L.A. music scene
were the furthest thing from hip hop.
["And my beat goes boom" by Egyptian Lover]
♪ Boom boom boom boom boom ♪
♪ I live in L.A. ♪
♪ There's lots of catch action there ♪
♪ Say freak menage a trois ♪
♪ Come closer, dear ♪
♪ Let's pretend you're a Ferrari ♪
♪ and I will drive ♪
♪ I'm gonna show you why Egyptian Lover ♪
♪ Is so live ♪
♪ And my beat goes boom ♪
♪ Boom boom ♪
♪ Boom boom boom ♪
[MC Eiht] At that time in L.A.,
we didn't have history of "rap."
We didn't have, like,
Grandmaster Flash with "The Messages"
and-and the Treacherous Three's,
you know, in the parks with the light poles
and setting up in the empty apartments
and the break dancing.
Our scene
for a long time was strictly techno,
like, we didn't want to come out of the Donna Summer,
KC & The Sunshine Band era.
[Arabian Prince] You know, on the east coast
it was more about
poverty in the streets
and the government.
And on the west coast we were, like,
party, women.
You know, party and women, that was it.
[Lonzo Williams] We were laid back
'cause we out in L.A., man, you know.
Shit, we by the beach. We ten minutes from the beach.
What are we mad about? Okay?
♪ Hey, Baby Doll ♪
♪ There's a new guy in town ♪
♪ I'm rockin', girl, I'm shockin ♪
♪ Every chick around ♪
[Arabian Prince] Most of the parties back then
were either at roller skating rinks
or people would rent out little ballrooms
and have like these little things.
[DJ Yella] The scene would be more like,
you know, you got a couple of turntables, a mixer
you know, and you just go do parties
and you didn't make no money but
back then DJ'ing was like
being a star.
♪ Now it's time ♪
♪ To rock this place ♪
♪ Rock the party so hearty ♪
♪ See the sweat on your face ♪
[Lonzo Williams] So it was about four or five promoters
at that time
that were
specializing in doing mobile parties.
[Greg Mack] Groups like Uncle Jam's Army,
who was the biggest concert promoter
in Los Angeles.
You also had, uh,
World Class Wreckin' Cru.
♪ Seven days a week ♪
♪ He's on call ♪
♪ To get the party people up off the wall ♪
[MC Eiht] From The World Class Wreckin' Cru you had
Dr. Dre,
DJ Yella,
Lonzo came up out of there.
♪ I'm Dr. Dre ♪
♪ Gorgeous hunk of a man ♪
♪ Doing tricks on the mix ♪
♪ Like no others can ♪
♪ The nurses say I'm cute ♪
♪ They say I'm fine ♪
♪ So you betta beware ♪
♪ Because I'll blow your mind ♪
The inspiration behind
Wreckin' Cru's image and sound
was pussy.
Straight out, okay.
Everybody was trying to sell sex
and we was trying to buy it, okay.
Bottom line.
Understand this, we were in the middle of the Prince,
Morris Day, Vanity Six era, okay.
That's why we had the Jheri Curls
and the sequin suits 'cause
there were no tennis shoe,
t-shirt, jean groups out there at this time.
So World Class Records had to come up with an image
that was gonna be sexy enough to get laid
after the show.
Dr. Dre to surgery, Dr. Dre to surgery.
[B-Real] Kids out here in Los Angeles
would be fucking waiting every Friday night
to hear that shit that they were gonna play.
[vinyl scratching]
[B-Real] And then they'd go fucking pop, lock and break
and battle each other out.
[vinyl scratching]
[Arabian Prince] Uncle Jam had already moved up
and they were doing like,
the Sports Arena and,
and doing, you know,
like the Convention Center,
five, ten thousand people.
No MC's, only DJ'S.
So people would come
just to see the DJ's perform.
They would have a hundred speakers
stacked up like it was a concert.
It was a party scene, man.
It's what started that thing.
It was the, that west coast party.
[heavy drum machine beats]
♪
[Shad] L.A.'s music scene was all about the party
and Dr. Dre might have been on the mic
but the World Class Wreckin' Cru
had more in common with Prince and Funkadelic
than Run-D.M.C.
But there was one dancer that was popping
and locking on the pier
who would eventually put L.A. rap
on the map.
[dance beats]
♪
[Ice T] Hey-hey, Coco?
Oh, that's you, I thought that was the dog.
Oh, you over there squeaking that shit.
Hey-hey Max, Max, Coco?
Did she leave?
[Shad] She left. It's okay.
[Ice-T] Uh, King Max, you can't-- You gotta chill.
This motherfucker right here,
he'll go away.
He'll go away.
[Shad] So let's talk about the early L.A. scene.
You've described the,
what the west coast added sonic,
some more musicality.
Well, we didn't have a sound.
We didn't have a sound
because our sound was techno.
I used to call it aerobic music.
Lots of breathing.
[inhaling and exhaling]
[Ice-T] You know, we were dressed kind of crazy.
It was all pastel colors and shit.
Fila sweat suits, K-Swiss.
You know, I had a perm.
Niggas was wearing perms,
trying to look like, looking sharp.
Everybody looked goofy back then.
You know, that was the time,
that was the era.
But I look at it today,
I kinda cringe.
We were pop locking and breaking
and doing all that kind of stuff too
but L.A.'s musical scene was secondary
to the gang scene,
the hustling scene.
[heavy drum machine beats]
♪
[Ice-T] The stars of L.A.
were drug dealers and gangsters
and hustlers.
Where I came up you had the
Rollin' 60s Crips,
the Hoover Crips,
the 30s which are called the Harlem Crips.
Then you had the Family,
which was the Inglewood Brims.
Pirus, Athens Park Boys, Denver Lane.
I basically was in
the Crips side of the gang thing
'cause that's what's surrounding Crenshaw.
But I was never
jumped into a gang.
I was what would be considered
a gang affiliate.
A gang affiliate will wear the colors
but you're not
a hardcore gang member.
But if you get yourself connected to players,
the world flips backwards.
Doing what's right is for suckers
and you're living in a world
with all these villains,
fiends and scoundrels and
you take pride in that.
It's really strange.
[laughs]
The world actually becomes backwards.
♪
[Ice-T] It was a turning point in my life,
you know, I had one foot in the graveyard,
the other one on a banana peel.
The streets are pulling me this way,
you know, I already got a Porsche,
I got jewelry,
I look like a rapper
but I'm stealin' and robbin' and
doing what
street niggas do.
Hip hop was just starting to happen and
it just gave me a chance to kinda
sit back and realize, like,
I can't just live the game,
I gotta document the game.
So I stated making Crip rhymes
and a Crip rhyme would go like,
"Rollin' through the city in the middle of the night,
niggas on my left
and niggas on my right,
yelling Ca-Ca-Career to every nigga I see.
If you bad enough come fuck with me.
I seen another nigga, I say Crip again.
He say fuck a Crip nigga,
this is Brim.
So we pulled out the Roscoe's,
Roscoe say crack.
I look again, nigga was shooting back.
So we fell to the ground,
aimed for his head,
one more shot,
that nigga was dead.
Walked over to him,
took his gun,
spit in his face and began to run.
So if you see another nigga laying dead in the street
in a puddle of blood from his head to his feet,
hope it's time all you busters get hip,
that it's fuck a Brim nigga,
this is west side, Ca-rip."
You know, 'cause being a Crip affiliate,
sometimes if you keep these wild motherfuckers entertained,
they like you, you know.
Even gangs have their entertainment divisions,
you know what I'm saying?
So I just had to figure out
how to put that content
to a beat
and that's where "6 'n the Mornin'" came from.
♪ 6 'n the mornin' police at my door ♪
♪ Fresh adidas squeaking across the bathroom floor ♪
♪ Out my back window I make my escape ♪
♪ Didn't even get a chance to grab my old school tape ♪
♪ Mad with no music ♪
♪ But happy 'cause I'm free ♪
♪ And the streets to a player is the place to be ♪
♪ Gotta knot in my pocket weighin' at least a grand ♪
♪ Gold on my neck My pistol's close at hand ♪
[MC Eiht] When I first heard "6 'n the Mornin'"
I basically was like,
"Oh, this is the gangbanger's anthem.
This is the drug dealer's anthem."
It was so like,
"Can he do that?
Like, can he say
they were selling dope?"
Because niggas was doing that.
Like, them was ballers who did that.
♪ The batter rams rollin' ♪
♪ Rocks are the thing ♪
♪ Life has no meaning ♪
♪ And money is king ♪
So they hear a cat on record talking about drug dealers,
I was amazed because it was like
a street anthem
and we didn't have that type of music.
And so just to hear somebody
come into the forefront to speak about
shit we were seeing every day.
♪ Looked in the mirror ♪
♪ What did we see? ♪
♪ Fuckin' blue lights, L.A.P.D. ♪
Oh, man, I loved Ice-T for that song,
you know, he was representing.
That song to me was
our version of what a
day in the life of Los Angeles is like.
[Shad] So when you made "6 'n the Mornin',"
the term "gangster rap" didn't exist.
You would have probably called, I read you would have
called that reality rap or something like that.
I didn't know what it was.
It was reality rap but it really wasn't
because it was just my reality rap.
It wasn't everybody's reality.
I was inspired by a guy named Schoolly D.
He actually should be
noted with the first gangster rhyme,
you know, Park Side Killers.
When I heard P.S.K.
I was in a club and the beat came on
and I-I said that shit is,
I called it dust music.
[beatboxing]
♪
[Shad] Ice-T may have put L.A. rap on the map
but the roots of gangster rap go even deeper.
According to Ice himself,
it was a Philly rapper, Schoolly D,
who birthed gangster rap.
Now Schoolly rarely does interviews
but he made himself available
on one condition.
[knocking]
[Schoolly D] What's up, brother?
[Shad] What's going on man?
[Schoolly D] I'm good, you know.
[Shad] I got your cake, as requested.
[Schoolly D] As motherfucking requested.
Let me see what you got.
Alright, motherfucker.
That's what the fuck I'm talking about, nigga.
Come the fuck over here.
This is awesome, yo. This is beautiful.
[Shad] Where does this rate in your
top cakes you've received?
I've got to taste it.
Well, who did this.
[Shad] No interview if it's not good, right?
Oh, it's actually pretty fucking good, yo.
[Shad] We don't mess around.
Alright, let's do the interview.
[P.S.K. 'What Does It Mean?' by Schoolly D]
♪ PSK, we're makin' that green ♪
♪ People always say ♪
♪ "What the hell does that mean?" ♪
[Shad] "P.S.K." was obviously a seminal song.
What inspired that?
It was so fucking amazing
to have the sound of Philadelphia,
to have James Brown come through.
We broke Isaac Hayes,
Earth, Wind & Fire,
we broke Parliament-Funkadelic.
♪ S for the way we scream and shout ♪
♪ One by one I'm knockin’ you out ♪
[Schoolly D] That sound inspired us
but we had to have our own voice.
We had to be rebellious.
P.S.K., that was the song where I was like,
I want to make a new way,
a new sound, a new voice.
And um, my homies was like,
"Well, why don't you just talk about us
'cause that's what you talk about like,
all the time any goddam way,
and finally, and like,
Richard Pryor and Redd Foxx
and Wild Man Steve,
so why don't you just be like that".
[Shad] What about the sound of "P.S.K."?
How did that come about?
[Schoolly D] We went to the studio.
We was high as shit, man.
We were smoking tons of weed.
That's how you got that goddamn sound, man.
The speakers was being sucked,
it just sucking like, back and forth
and this-and the cat was like,
"Man, these motherfuckers, man,
they gonna fire me tomorrow."
I'm like, "Fuck that bullshit, man,
you're going to keep that shit going."
♪ Drivin’ in my car down the avenue ♪
♪ Towin’ on a J, sippin’ on some brew ♪
♪ Turn around, see the fly young lady ♪
♪ Pull to the curb and park my Mercedes ♪
♪ Sayin’, "Fly lady, now you're lookin’ real nice ♪
♪ Sweeter than honey sugar and spice" ♪
♪ Told her my name was MC Schoolly D ♪
♪ All about makin' that cash money ♪
♪ She said, "Schoolly D I know your game ♪
We took it home and I woke up and I played it.
I was...
I was like, "Man...
how high? What? What the fuck?
I was-I was about to take some of that reverb out
and this is... this is true shit."
My homies made a bunch of copies
and passed it around the neighborhood.
I walked out the house, man, and it was just like
the whole neighborhood was just like,
standing there
and just like, goddamn.
They gave me an ovation
and I was on my way to the studio to change that shit.
I told my boy, Len.
He was like, "Motherfucker, you change that shit
we gonna shoot your motherfucking ass.
This shit is the shit.
It's the fucking shit."
♪ A thought ran across my educated mind ♪
♪ Said, "Man, Schoolly D ain't doin’ no time" ♪
♪ Grabbed the microphone and I started to talk ♪
♪ Sucker-ass nigga, man He started to walk ♪
[Kurupt] Schoolly D was one of the first
original gangster rappers.
Ice-T said,
"This is where I got this record from.
'P.S.K. we making that green,
people always sa, 'What the hell does that mean?''"
I said, "What record did you get from there?"
"6'n the mornin', police at my door,
fresh Adidas squeaking across the bathroom floor."
♪ Out my back window I make my escape ♪
[Ice-T] "6 'n the Mornin',"
same cadence as Schoolly D,
you know, same laid back approach,
"6 'n the mornin'," it's basically
inspired by him
but I just got a little more graphic.
♪ Gold on my neck My pistol's close at hand ♪
[Ice-T] Instead of the yelling that we were doing,
kind of gave you that laid back vibe
of reality.
[Intro to "Colors" by Ice-T]
♪
♪ Colors, colors, colors ♪
[Shad] Ice-T may have taken his musical cues from Schoolly
but Ice's real inspiration
came from his immediate environment,
the streets of South Central L.A.
And these streets were becoming more dangerous
and more violent
with the arrival of crack.
♪ Colors, colors ♪
♪ I am a nightmare walking ♪
♪ Psychopath talking ♪
♪ King of my jungle just a gangster stalking ♪
♪ Living life like a firecracker quick is my fuse ♪
♪ Vendetta's a death pact the colors I choose ♪
[reporter] Police estimate that there are now as many as 600 street gangs
in Los Angeles County
and 70,000 gang members.
Thanks to cocaine,
L.A.'s so-called "homeboys"
have become entrepreneurs extraordinaire,
selling it has enabled the gangs to become richer,
armed and better organized.
♪ We gangs of L.A. will never die ♪
♪ Just multiply ♪
♪ Colors ♪
[Ice-T] Prior to crack,
you know, what did the gangs do?
They low ride.
You know, they start to sell some weed,
maybe a little bit, a little hustling here and there,
you know, and you had different degrees.
You had the robbers,
you had the, the hustlers,
the slick cats, the pick pockets,
the dippers,
just like any other city.
But once you put this product into the neighborhood
that can make thousands and thousands of dollars,
it releases a lot of savage individuals.
♪ My life is violent but violent is life ♪
♪ Peace is a dream Reality is a knife ♪
I mean, I got friends that were making like,
close to ten million dollars a week.
I've had friends
that had so much money rats were eating it.
Part of the dope game is, you know,
you got the hustlers and you got the wolves
so you going to sell the dope,
I'm going to wait until you sell it and I'm going to take it.
It creates an ill dynamic in the neighborhood.
♪ My homeboy got jacked ♪
♪ My mother's on crack ♪
♪ My sister can't work 'cause her arms show tracks ♪
[MC Eiht] It would be nerve-racking
just to stand out on the corner in front of the house
and smoke a cigarette
because there was a fifty percent chance
somebody's fittin' to come through here shooting.
There's a chance you could be sitting at the light in the car
and the car behind you knows who you are
and they start shooting at you, you know.
You can't stop at particular liquor stores,
you gotta make sure you're in a neutral zone
to get gas,
you know,
because it's a war zone.
Even for the innocent.
You don't know who's fitting to shoot.
You don't know where the shots is coming from
and it's a blessing just to make it back home
and get in your bed at one o'clock at night
to go, "Man, I got to do all this shit all over tomorrow."
♪ Give me a break ♪
♪ What world do you live in? ♪
♪ Death is my sect ♪
♪ Guess my religion ♪
♪ Colors ♪
It got in the territories where
you can't come here no more.
"What? But we're here every day."
"Nah, but you can't come here no more.
We sell dope here now."
And these cats was like,
"I'm taking off my pop locking clothes and my thing.
Here's the shotgun,
you're going to go throw down for the family now."
The streets weren't free no more.
And the music wasn't so happy no more.
[sirens and heavy beats]
[reporter] Another night,
another siren in South Central Los Angeles.
[reporter] Tonight in Los Angeles
there are some 200 cops working the streets,
trying somehow to control the gangs.
[Shad] As the streets of L.A. grew more dangerous
electro DJ's like Dr. Dre,
Arabian Prince
and DJ Yella
would respond to their new reality,
joining forces with a local hustler
and two prolific lyricists,
they formed the world's most dangerous group.
♪
[Shad] So can you tell me,
how did N.W.A. come together?
Well, the N.W.A. crew came together,
we had Yella and Dre over with the Wreckin' Cru.
I was doing my thing producing
and me and Dre used to kick it,
like real tight, hang out,
and we were like, "Man, we want to do something else."
And we were all talking about that
'cause we were young
and we had records
but we weren't really getting that money.
♪ Let it rip ♪
[vinyl scratching]
[Brian Cross] Dre is still making
electro music at the club
and then at the studio he's
starting to work on this new music
which is slower,
which is more menacing,
which is more story-driven.
[heavy beats]
♪
[Cheo H. Coker] Yella and Dre start thinking,
"What we really should do
is basically make a record about
life in South Central L.A.
Maybe we should recruit some of the best MC's
in L.A. to be a part of this super group."
[Arabian Prince] Dre had met Eazy.
Eazy was a gangster.
And that was one you don't mess with.
I mean Eazy was like a little
Napoleon dictator kinda like.
He's crazy.
Eazy was straight crazy from the hood.
But I remember, I think we were at Eazy's garage,
he had like a little garage in the back
and we were just talking about it
He was like, "I got some money, you know,
I can put some money up,
get some equipment."
Ren's like, "Yeah, let's just do this record,
put some stuff together and see if it works."
And Ren actually lived around the corner from Eazy
so that was Eazy's homeboy.
Ice Cube used to live down the street from Dre.
[Ice Cube] Eazy and Dre picked me up one day.
They just say,
"Yeah, we got the perfect name for the group.
N.W.A.
And I was like,
"Initials?"
You know what I mean?
The only initials I knew was Run-D.M.C.,
you know what I'm saying?
So I was like, "N.W.A.,
what dat mean?"
And he said,
"Niggaz Wit Attitudes."
And I was like, "Damn!"
[Arabian Prince] Cube was like a prolific writer.
I mean, all he would do is sit down and write all the time,
write, write, write.
"Boyz-N-The Hood,"
that's the one that blew up.
That's what started it all.
♪ Cruising down the street in my 6-4 ♪
♪ Jockin' the freaks, clockin' the door ♪
[Ice Cube] I wrote "Boyz-N-The Hood"
in 11th grade, in class,
writing it.
You know, it's like
"6 'n the Mornin'" part two.
I wanted to tell my version of what L.A. feels like
and then Dre just convinced Eazy
that he should do it.
[Arabian Prince] At that time,
Eazy wasn't even thinking about rapping
so it was hard for him to get the rhythm of it
and Dre would have to
have him do a part,
stop it, punch it,
do another part, stop it, punch it.
But eventually you pieced it together over hours.
It would get done.
And it just came out like it came out.
And it was dope once it sounded done
'cause he had such a unique voice.
♪ Motherfucker say what? ♪
♪ Dolla b'z in the place to give me the pace ♪
♪ He said my man JB is on freebase ♪
♪ The boy JB was a friend of mine ♪
♪ Till I caught him in my car tryin' to steal a Alpine ♪
[Brian Cross] Eazy-E sounds like he just came into the studio
after selling some weed or crack.
It has that immediacy.
He's not a reporter, he's not a narrator.
He's a participant.
♪ 'Cuz the boyz in the hood are always hard ♪
♪ You come talkin' that trash We'll pull your card ♪
[Ice Cube] "Boyz-N-The Hood"
is a great introduction
to what we would eventually develop into
and so many things have
sparked from that one song, you know.
[DJ Yella] When we did the "Boyz-N-The Hood,"
you know, that was it.
This is the direction we're going, right there.
No more techno whatever you want to call it.
Electric died in L.A. that day.
It was like a page in the book just turned.
That was over.
We didn't look back. Nothing.
♪ You are now about to witness the strength ♪
♪ Of street knowledge ♪
♪
♪ Straight outta Compton ♪
♪ Crazy motherfucker named Ice Cube ♪
♪ From the gang called Niggaz Wit Attitudes ♪
[B-Real] When N.W.A. came,
that shit hit the block,
it was bananas.
We were like, "What the fuck is this?"
♪ That's how I'm goin' out ♪
♪ For the punk motherfuckers ♪
♪ That's showin' out Niggaz start to mumble ♪
What was it like hearing that first N.W.A. record?
Oh, man, let me see.
How can I say it?
Like a out of mother fucking body experience.
♪ Mix 'em and cook 'em in a pot like gumbo ♪
♪ Goin' off on the motherfucker like that ♪
[Ice-T] When N.W.A. hit,
they hit like a ton of bricks.
When Cube said, you know,
"From a gang called, Niggaz Wit Attitudes",
not a group, we're a gang.
♪ AK-47 is the tool ♪
♪ Don't make me act the motherfuckin' fool ♪
[Kid Frost] "Straight Outta Compton"
was a testimony of the repression
that the streets of
south central L.A. had been feeling
for a long, long time.
[Eazy E] Yo, Ren [MC Ren] Whassup?
[Eazy E] Tell 'em where you from!
♪ Straight outta Compton ♪
♪ Another crazy-ass nigga ♪
♪ More punks I smoke ♪
♪ Yo, my rep gets bigger ♪
♪ I'm a bad motherfucker and you know this ♪
♪ But the pussy-ass niggas won't show this ♪
[MC Eiht] It was just some brothers telling the truth
about where they came from.
Not everybody was able to see
the reality of what gang life was.
It's about
the police brutality.
It's about the poverty.
It's about homeboys being killed.
N.W.A. showed the world
this is how we are on the west coast.
This is how we grew up.
This is what we go through
and now everybody can experience our world.
♪ Straight outta Compton ♪
♪
♪ City of Compton ♪
[reporter] Before we get into our next story,
we do have a warning for you tonight.
What you are about to see and hear
may not be suitable for everyone.
Not all music stars, as you know,
are model citizens
but now a few musicians have taken that
to new heights.
You may have never heard of some of these stars,
but your kids have.
They're heroes to a whole new generation.
[Arabian Prince] It became big news,
I remember
on TV
they were talking about it.
That's when I knew it was serious like,
taking our records and bulldozing them
or burning them or whatever they were talking about doing
it was, like, crazy.
[woman] Gangster means
one who engages in criminal activities
and that's what gangster rap
is doing to our children,
turning them into gangsters.
We now propose one generic warning label
to inform consumers
in the marketplace
about lyric content.
[Arabian Prince] That's what scared Tipper Gore
and those kind of people in the government,
it was the fact that
here's a type of music
that's now transcended
into regular America.
The young kids in the suburbs across the country,
in the white neighborhoods,
they was like,
"Oh, yeah, my mamma don't want me to hear this."
Any time your parents said no,
you're gonna go get that.
Hey, Mom!
[MC Eiht] When white America was like,
"Oh, my kids are putting on
Raiders hats and they're going out
striking up walls and, you know,
being somebody that they're not."
They scared. That shit'll scare you.
♪
♪ City of Compton City of Compton ♪
[Shad] N.W.A. had sparked the fear in suburban America
and hip hop was a new menace,
threatening living rooms across the nation.
And one N.W.A. song would have the highest level
of U.S. national security
knocking on their studio door.
♪
♪ Fuck the police coming straight from the underground ♪
♪ A young nigga got it bad cause I'm brown ♪
♪ And not the other color so police think ♪
♪ They have the authority to kill a minority ♪
♪ Fuck that shit, 'cause I ain't the one ♪
♪ For a punk motherfucker with a badge and a gun ♪
♪ To be beating on And thrown in jail ♪
♪ We can go toe to toe in the middle of a cell ♪
♪ Fucking with me 'cause I'm a teenager ♪
♪ With a little bit of gold and a pager ♪
♪ Searching my car Looking for the product ♪
♪ Thinking every nigga is selling narcotics ♪
[Shad] I wanted to ask you,
do you remember coming up with the concept
for "Fuck Tha Police"?
Yeah, I remember coming up with it.
Um, the-the issue was Dre
had, you know,
he was always getting tickets.
He was always getting arrested.
He was always, you know,
having issues with the police.
You know, Dre go to jail three, four weekends in a row
and I'm like, "Man,
fuck these police, man," you know what I mean?
They just arresting good dudes and letting criminals,
I'm looking at all these criminal dope-dealing
dudes everywhere and, you know,
so I'm-I'm just frustrated.
I'm mad
and I wrote the song and uh,
everybody was like, "Yo, whoa, wait a minute, man.
Are you ready to grapple with these
sheriffs and LAPD around here? You ready to do that?"
And I'm like, "Man, we got to do something."
♪ A young nigga on the war path ♪
♪ And when I finish ♪
♪ It's gonna be a blood bath ♪
[DJ Yella] People always wanted to say it,
they just wouldn't say it in public.
But once we finally did it
everybody was just like,
"I always wanted to say that."
When they came out with
"Fuck Tha Police",
everybody's like "Oh, oh,"
but all of us black guys, we were like,
"You know what? Fuck the police!"
'Cause we were living it
and we were getting pulled over.
If I went to dinner with a white lady
uh, I would get pulled over
'cause they thought I was pimping her.
[officer] You know what would make me feel real good today?
Putting you in jail.
It's almost like somebody's got to hit you in the head
with a brick, you know?
[B-Real] They were cold blooded, man.
If you looked a certain way,
they were, you know,
profiling you right off the bat.
[officer] Spread 'em.
[B-Real] Throwing you up against the whip,
roughing you up.
They were as much of a gang
as the gangs were.
You know, just more organized.
[crowd yelling]
We had a police chief
that considered us the gorillas in the mist.
They considered every day was war.
L.A. has got more aggressive police.
You know, they're like robots.
They're all in the gym, they got their vests on.
When you see them coming
they're not coming to say anything nice to you.
They was fucking with us.
[crowd yelling]
[Ice-T] "Fuck Tha Police" came right after the
big gang sweeps that happened
where they was jacking everybody in L.A.,
bringing us to the L.A. Coliseum
and fingerprinting
the whole fucking neighborhood.
I mean, I'm talking about all of South Central.
It's documented.
[Ras Kass] They constantly target you.
Sometimes, you know,
there's the responsibility
that we all got to say,
"Man, that shit is fucked up."
You know, nobody tells you
there's something wrong with being black,
you just start feeling it.
They make you feel that fucking way.
♪ Without a gun and a badge What do ya got? ♪
♪ A sucker in a uniform waitin’ to get shot ♪
♪ By me, or another nigga ♪
I think it kind of caught the police off guard
to where they just didn't think like,
they would be that bold
but freedom of speech, man,
you know what I'm saying?
I mean, I kind of figured
it would catch them some bad press.
I had no idea it would be that extreme.
♪ But take off the gun so you can see what's up ♪
♪ And we'll go at it punk And I'ma fuck you up! ♪
[reporter] The group's name itself is controversial.
Niggaz Wit Attitude,
known as N.W.A.,
has taunted law enforcement
with its lyrics urging violence against police.
♪ I'm a sniper with a hell of a scope ♪
♪ Taking out a cop or two ♪
♪ They can't cope with me ♪
♪ The motherfucking villain that's mad ♪
[Eazy-E] Put the dot on your target,
then you blow the shit out of the motherfucker.
♪ Fuck Tha Police ♪
[Arabian Prince] I just remember,
our manager at the time,
Jerry Heller, talking about it but it was
pretty much the FBI going,
"You can't rap this.
You can't say this."
Yeah, we can.
Like, "You going to stop us?"
[Ice Cube] Yo, can y'all hear?
[cheering]
[Ice Cube] Hey, sound man,
pump that shit up.
[Arabian Prince] I remember we did a big show in Detroit.
We got off the airplane,
the police were waiting for us at the airport
and I remember Dre talking back to the police
and they tried to, you know, take him,
didn't arrest him, they just kind of harassed him,
took him away for a while.
They said, "You can't sing that song."
They were like,
"Not in our city."
Like, "We run this right here.
We're the police.
We ain't gonna allow it."
Since we been doing these records and shit,
we been getting a lot of flack.
[DJ Yella] Detroit was packed,
you know, twelve, fifteen thousand people
and for some reason,
I don't know who came up with it,
I heard it come on and I'm just like,
"We ain't supposed to be playing this song."
♪ Fuck the police, coming straight from the underground ♪
♪ A young nigga got it bad 'cause I'm brown ♪
[DJ Yella] When that song came on,
every cop from that place came rushing the stage.
We left the stage.
We just left everything there.
We didn't get paid that night for that.
[Arabian Prince] That Detroit thing was crazy, man.
They stormed the freaking stage.
You know, that's crazy.
Who was the gang there?
[police radio chatter]
[Ice-T] That concert was just
totally out of control.
It's a lot of tension with the cops.
Thank God for videotape recorder, you know,
'cause they-they felt they was a gang.
[helicopter buzzing]
[foreboding music]
♪
[Ice Cube] On April 29th,
a guy came in and was like,
"Cube, you know, I know that you probably don't know now
but, man, none of the officers were found guilty".
[Jury Foreman] We the jury,
in the above entitled action,
find the defendant, Laurence M. Powell,
not guilty of the crime of assault.
[man] Congratulations.
I just kind of went into a fog.
I was like, "Damn."
[reporter] Hundreds of people came by
just to try to get in the courtroom but
only about seventeen seats in there
so they couldn't get in
but here's the reaction afterwards.
How can we be calm
with all of this technical, political nonsense?
[crowd chanting in protest]
And I'm hearing that the uprising started.
[dramatic music]
♪
[crowd chanting] No justice, no peace!
♪
[sirens blaring]
[reporter] Good evening. Los Angeles is a city under curfew as fires,
looting and street violence continue.
All this a reaction to the acquittal
of four white police officers
in the beating of black motorist, Rodney King.
[man] Rodney King!
[officer] No part in the city is safe.
We're stretched so thin.
They know it.
They're playing everything they can against us.
[Ice Cube] All the homies were out there
so I drove down to see them
and you got everything burning all around us and
it's going crazy and they saying, you know,
"Cube, man, get the hell out of here, man.
You don't have to be down here, man, don't do that."
You know, and I'm like,
"I need to see what's going on."
[man] What's taking place right now is revenge
for the Rodney King trial, the verdicts.
Unjust.
[Eazy-E] I think that somebody should come out
and do a song called, "Fuck Tha Police".
[female reporter] Somebody did do that.
Is that right?
[female reporter] Yeah.
Two years ago before this even happened, you did that.
That's because we foreseen the future.
See, a lot of people didn't like the song
but now
they understand.
[Kid Frost] When I heard "Fuck Tha Police"
it was, "Wow, they had enough.
You pushed us to the brink.
You pushed us to the edge."
They're telling you the anger of
thousands of kids that didn't get the chance.
That got in a police car
and got handcuffed in the back of it
and got sweated for no reason.
It's still, you know,
using our voice as a weapon against oppression.
Um, and that's why that song holds up.
I think it voiced the angst
and the frustration and the anger we had.
It made everything we were saying valid
and, you know, it wasn't like we went and said
"I told you so" to America, but you know?
Fuck it. We told you so.
[Shad] For the many critics of hip hop,
the L.A. rebellion
rearranged the perception of gangster rap.
Their rhymes were no longer viewed as a menace.
They were now dispatches from the front line.
The west coast had America's attention
and in this post-rebellion climate
of fear and anticipation,
the newly solo Dr. Dre
recorded an album
that would reshape the future of hip hop
and American popular culture.
♪ This is your chronic doc radio station ♪
♪ So you gots to be listening to The chronic ♪
♪ Creepin' down the back street on deez ♪
♪ I got my glock cocked 'cuz niggas want these ♪
♪ Now soon as I said it Seems I got sweated ♪
♪ By some nigga with a tech 9 tryin' to take mine ♪
♪ Ya wanna make noise Make noise ♪
♪ I make a phone call my niggas ♪
♪ Comin' like the Gotti boys ♪
[Arabian Prince] I remember right after Dre, he left
Ruthless,
you know, and N.W.A. to go do his thing,
me, Yella and Dre had a meeting at my house
and I had, like, a little studio in my house at the time and
Dre was talking about, man, you know,
"I'm about to go do my thing,"
and that's when he had first hooked up with Suge,
that whole thing.
Like, Death Row was just about to happen
and I remember going down to um,
S.O.L.A.R. Records building at the time,
they had a studio and Dre was in there doing some stuff
in the studio just and Suge had set it up.
[Snoop Dogg] Put it on.
I got my natural. I'm an effect for the nine-trey.
Ah, fuck a bald head, really, though, I'm with the afro.
So you don't know, so we don't love them hoes.
[man] Dr. Gin and juice.
[background chatter]
[Arabian Prince] I remember going down there.
I'm sitting in that studio, I knew nobody.
I'm like, I knew Dre,
and I kinda knew Suge,
but everybody else, real gangsters.
You know what I mean?
I think Dre needed those kind of people
to give him that, uh, justification
to do that Chronic album.
♪ There's a lot of people out there be talking all that ♪
♪ But I could kick a fat fat type of known rap ♪
♪ See when talk all that You know I like to show up ♪
♪ Niggas think they cocaine Knowin' that they blow up ♪
We came up with the name, The Chronic,
which was the name on the streets for orange bud
'cause it was just so bomb,
it was indica,
see, and it was something that nobody else had
but California
so Snoop said you need to name your album
"The Chronic" because it's the bomb.
♪
Snoop, kick it.
♪ If you're wicked now kick it, slick it, ♪
♪ Not with them condom hoes, coochie ones ♪
♪ I don't need them hoes 'cause I'm just so smooth ♪
♪ Break the beat out for me ♪
♪ I'm the fucking Dr. Dre's on the piano ♪
The Chronic was not just about, uh,
what was going on, but more about
how we felt about what's going on.
Dr. Dre was like,
"You got to rap about something people can relate to, man."
♪ Just another motherfuckin day for Dre ♪
♪ So I begin like this ♪
♪ No medallions, dreadlocks Or black fists ♪
♪ It's just that gangster glare ♪
♪ With gangster raps ♪
♪ That gangster shit ♪
♪ Makes the gangs snaps, uhh ♪
♪ Word to the motherfuckin streets ♪
♪ And word to these hyped-ass lyrics and dope beats ♪
♪ That I hit ya with That I, get ya with ♪
♪ As I groove in my four on deez Hittin’ the switches ♪
♪ Bitches relax while I get my proper swerve on ♪
♪ Bumpin’ like a motherfucker ready to get my serve on ♪
♪ But before I hit the dope spot ♪
♪ I gotta get the chronic, the Rémy Martin and my soda pop ♪
♪ Now I'm smellin’ like Indo-nesia ♪
♪ Bus stop full of fly bitches and skeezers ♪
♪ On my dick, 'cause my four on hit ♪
♪ Pancake front and back, side to side and all that shit ♪
You know, you could feel how dangerous the times are
in that record.
♪ It's the motherfucking D-R-E ♪
[Ice Cube] It was less about
rage or pinpointing these
different issues that we dealing with in the hood
and it was more about
you still can have fun no matter
what obstacles you facing.
♪ Rollin in my six-fo' ♪
♪ With all the niggas saying ♪
♪ Swing down, sweet chariot Stop and, let me ride ♪
[Ice Cube] You know, it captured the house party feel
that we grew up with, you know?
Just hanging, partying,
drinking, smoking, girls,
forget about your problems, you know what I mean?
It just was the perfect record at the perfect time.
To me the record really helped L.A. heal.
♪ Swing down, sweet chariot Stop and, let me ride ♪
♪ Hell yeah ♪
♪ Swing down, sweet chariot stop ♪
[Ice-T] If you say
L.A. sound,
that's Dre.
Initially, we kind of like stole New York sounds
with a kind of a west coast influence
and then Dre came with the G funk.
It's like, doodadada, you know,
it's to low ride, to ride with me, you know.
♪ One, two, three and to the fo' ♪
♪ Snoop Doggy Dogg and Dr. Dre is at the do' ♪
♪ Ready to make an entrance So back on up ♪
♪ Cause you know we 'bout to rip shit up ♪
[Cold 187um] A very hard-edged record
but it's got grooves on it, you know,
and that's just because of how in Cali
we're brought up on grooves.
We're brought up on a lot of funky stuff,
you know what I'm saying?
From L.A. to the Bay, you know,
we're brought up on real funky music.
You got to move people, man.
♪ Ain't nothin' but a G thang, baby! ♪
♪ Two loc'ed out niggas so we're crazy! ♪
♪ Death Row is the label that pays me! ♪
♪ Unfadable, so please don't try to fade this ♪
It was a record that was,
for the first time, not using samples
as it's main base.
It was replayed.
It was instruments.
It was the first time,
you know, hip hop had accepted melodies
and, and singing and-and the-the merge,
the true merge with
hip hop and R&B.
♪ Well, I'm peepin', and I'm creepin', and I'm creep-in' ♪
♪ But I damn near got caught 'cause my beeper kept beepin' ♪
♪ Now it's time for me to make my impression felt ♪
♪ So sit back, relax, and strap on your seat belt ♪
♪ You never been on a ride like this befo' ♪
♪ With a producer who can rap and control the maestro ♪
♪ At the same time with the dope rhyme that I kick ♪
♪ You know, and I know, I flow some ol' funky shit ♪
[Brian Cross] Nobody was really prepared
for a hip hop record at that moment
that was that hardcore
and that was going to sell
on the level that it did
and have the kind of mainstream
appeal that that record did.
This is about the power of Dre and Dre's music.
When I heard that I was like,
"Oh, yeah, there it is," you know, I mean like,
about time somebody did this right here
'cause I'm a big funk fan.
I'm a big Parliament-Funkadelic P-Funk fan
and that album,
that's pretty much what it was.
It was just gangster
Parliament-Funkadelic, you know?
And I'm like, "Oh they finally reached the top."
That's it, like,
this is the biggest thing on planet Earth.
And they were selling more records than like,
pop music at that time.
♪
[LL Cool J] It really blew the doors off
the suburbs.
The melodies, the funk, the grooves.
It was like, yo, it's like he said,
"I'm gonna make a record for the projects, period,"
and then every suburban kid
got to be a fly on the wall
so they were all in the window like "Ooh, look at them."
♪ No one can do it better like this ♪
♪ That and this and uh It's like that ♪
The mainstream finally accepted hip hop all the way
and just pulled it on over and wasn't afraid of it anymore.
♪ It's the capital S, oh yes I'm fresh, N-double O-P ♪
♪ D-O-double G-Y D-O-double G ya' see ♪
♪ Showin' much flex when it's time to wreck a mic ♪
♪ Pimpin' ho's and clockin' a grip like my name was Dolomite ♪
♪ Yeah, and it don't quit ♪
♪ I think they in a mood for some motherfucking G shit ♪
♪ So Dre. (What up Dogg?) ♪
♪ We gotta give 'em what they want (What's that, G?) ♪
♪ We gotta break 'em off somethin' (Hell yeah) ♪
♪ And it's gotta be bumpin' (City of Compton!) ♪
♪ It's where it takes place so I'm a ask your attention ♪
[Shad] In the twenty years between Dr. Dre's world wide cookout
and Kool Herc's rec room party,
hip hop has been a lot of things.
Sometimes it's lyrically dexterous and socially aware,
other times raucous and comedic.
It's mind-exploring poetry,
raw biography
and intelligent rebellions.
But The Chronic made hip hop
the one thing it had never been.
It made it pop music
and made rappers the new pop stars.
And it did it by completely rewriting the rules
of what a pop star meant.
Hip hop turned the underground
into the mainstream
and the world hasn't been the same since.
[funky break beats playing]