Music Ruined My Life: Public Enemy

I grew up in a modest, middle-class suburb of Chicago. Well, several really, but Wheaton, Illinois (John Belushi represent!), was where the beginning of the end... began. I had a crush on this girl that lived across the street, Shelby, who's older sister had the Rockmaster Scott & The Dynamic Three "Request Line" single. I fell in love with it the first time I heard it. I really had no idea of what they were saying, but it was the first music other than Michael Jackson that I liked. It was 1985 and I was seven years old. My older sister and I walked to elementary school because the shit was still safe, my parents were happy, dad had a good job, enough for a three bedroom crib, a new Cressida, a Cocker Spaniel puppy and a happy homemaker wife.

In 1988 we moved out of the burbs to a small town called Elburn in the middle of fucking nowhere. My dad got a raise/promotion and decided to buy a 4,000sq ft. house on three acres with a pond, a beach, and a 72' Nova SS. I remember sitting on this bench swing next to my sister the day we moved in and saying "we're really lucky", and she agreed. I had two bedrooms, one on the first floor and one on the second with a jacuzzi and balcony overlooking the pond, no bullshit.

Two years later, my dad is banging his newly-hired assistant and moves out, the house is up for sale, and I'm the angriest 12 year old kid in the world. I stopped talking to my father completely, my mom was working her ass off to pay the rent, and my sister was a teenage guinea pig for Prozac. Meanwhile I'm balls-deep in daily humiliation at school. Back in Wheaton (if you're from the Chicago area, this may be hard to believe) we were b-boying in gym class to "Rockit" per my instruction, but at my new all-white school in West BumbleFuck, I was an outcast. I didn't look that different, speak differently, or act any different than my classmates, but I loved hip hop and wore it on my sleeve. In fact, I'm pretty sure the term "wigger" was coined at my middle school. I just didn't give a Fuck enough to let it bother me, I was already pretty numb.

One day I'll never forget was when I walked into the mall that was 30 minutes away and saw a big display for Fear of a Black Planet in Musicland. I hadn't really heard of Public Enemy yet, was more into LL, Kane, Kool G Rap, Run-DMC and EPMD, but was instantaneously drawn to that album cover. I grabbed the tape off the rack and asked my mom to buy it. We didn't have shit from shineola, but she had $10 on a record or tape every now and then. I got in the car, threw it in my Walkman, and was floored. Like, couldn't move my body, frozen in time-style. That guitar riff on Brothers Gonna Work It Out and Chuck D's loud, angry voice had me all but hypnotized. I was the biggest P.E. fan-boy in less than five minutes and wasn't even through the first two songs yet. I also found an outlet for my anger... redirection.

I stopped giving a shit about school because Chuck D and KRS told me they were teaching me lies. Plus, they seemed like the most honest dudes around since my dad was a pathological liar. I got my first B on my report card at age 13 and really never gave a shit about school again. I spent all of my time at home blaring my headphones and then going to the library to look up microfiche articles about Farrakhan, Joanne Chesimard, Huey Newton and Malcolm X... stumbling upon Che Guevara and a few others along the way. I wasn't trying to be different, it just went down like that. I was perpetually bored and simply wanted to know who these people were that Chuck kept talking about. I resisted the urge (thank the good lord sweet baby jeezus) to do shit like rock Cross Colours outfits, but the more P.E. t-shirts and Jordans I wore to school, the more I got teased. At a certain point, after reading a ton of stuff I probably wasn't ready for, I started to resent my own race and country. In reality, I just hated my dad for leaving us, didn't understand my sisters disease, and was mad at the world after going from rags to riches, and back to rags again, and was getting picked on by a bunch of redneck assholes on a daily basis.

By Freshman year, I was almost like a novelty to my classmates instead of a punching bag. Other white kids discovered groups like N.W.A. and rejoiced in every "Fuck", "nigger" (or "nigga", whichever you prefer/offends you the most), "bitch" and "ho" they could get in their stupid ass ears. I felt like I was there first and it pissed me off, but instead of abandoning the music I had come to love so much because my peers were now getting into it, I embraced it even more. I felt like it was mine. Like I needed to protect it from them.

I'm 33 now and still hate my dad, just never think about him. I still love hip hop, and I still feel like an outcast. I'm still not rich again, but I'm cool with it. I'm angered on a daily basis by politics (thanks for the awareness, Chuck D!) and social issues that I'll never be able to change. Tragically enough, I'll never be able to stop giving a shit either. I know nothing of apathy. Had I not walked into Musicland that afternoon and blindly chose Public Enemy and Fear of a Black Planet, I can't imagine what I would be like today, but I have a hard time believing that I would be that much different. Strangely enough, I wouldn't have it any other way.