Fear of a Black Planet

Public Enemy had just the best product.

The Bomb Squad, It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, Fear of a Black Planet, Fight the Power.

These were the best hip hop songs out of all the hip hop songs that were coming out.

Chuck D was the hottest rapper.

How much would licensing the samples have cost at today's rates? Just like James alluded to, Public Enemy would actually have lost money on every record.

So their hit album, Fear of a Black Planet, instead of making money, would have cost them $7 million.

Uh-huh.

So who could still afford to sample? The label's own superstars.

Where, yeah, there is incredible diversity for various reasons, you know, whether you're talking about this 1988-89 moment where you get public enemies, it takes a nation millions to hold us back, De La Soul's Three Feet High and Rising.

Beastie Boys is Paul's boutique, right? I mean, Public Enemies, like Fear of a Black Planet, you know, Slick Bricks, The Great Adventures, like, and just so on and so forth, right? I mean, like you mentioned a bunch of other groups, you know, whether it's PM Don, Arrested Development, you know, you get the sort of beginnings of

Game of Star.

Whatever it is.

And in a two-year period, they just really went from, you know, almost nobody knowing them to everybody knowing them for either good or bad reasons, but they just skyrocketed.

Where is Public Enemy? What's the deal? What's your latest hit, brother? Fear of a Black Planet.

In 1990, in April 1990, they come out with-

April 10th.

I'll tell you why I remember that date so well

...

April 10th, 1990, Fear of a Black Planet comes out.

It's their third album.

You don't really need to go pa- the first...

Honestly, Fear of a Black Planet, um, and Itation- It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back are pretty much all the Public Enemy you need.

Brilliant.

Uh, and then just slightly later, Wu-Tang Clan, um-

But here's the thing.

Speaking of Public Enemy, I would say that Fear of a Black Planet is one of the 10 best rock and roll records ever.

And it's all going back to that source.

It starts with the blues.

Name that album.

May I take this one myself? Fear Of A Black Planet.

[bell dings]

That is correct, and we are traveling into 1991.

After It Takes a Nation to Million.

After Fear of a Black Planet.

After He Got Game.

All these things right here by this group, man.

Their findings as well.

They advanced their sound and style and everything to me on it takes a nation to me.

But then you got some fans that, who came to me recently when I was talking about Texas Nation to me, their favorite Public Enemy album was Fear of a Black Planet.

You know what I'm saying? Another amazing album.

I mean, I'll say this much, um, uh, the, the unit that Public Enemy produced, uh, th- they're called The Bomb Squad.

There's, there's nine albums in their production canon that I almost feel became the blueprint for everything that came afterwards, you know? I mean, there's even EDM electronic producers that will probably say, like, if you ask them, like, "What's, what's your North Star?" They're probably gonna say, "You know, the moment that I heard, uh, Public Enemy's Fear of a Black Planet." So, you know, after the success of Fear of a Black Planet, um, I'll say that, uh, their production on Ice Cube's very first record, America's Most Wanted-

Mm-hmm

... um, is a great example of that.