Straight Out of Compton Article by Max Turner

Straight Outta Compton

On August 14th, the Hip Hop world and movie lovers will get to see the story of the world’s most dangerous group in their bio pic “Straight Outta Compton”. Before Dr.Dre was the first Hip- Hop billionaire; before Ice Cube was accepted in the homes of white America; before the drug life of the ghettos of America was glamorized in video games and mass media; Eazy E lived it and talked it. These three men with MC Ren and DJ Yella were known to the world as N.W.A, a name that shook the nation and frightened America with their no holds-barred lyrics. N.W.A is the most important group in the history of Hip-Hop and their debut album changed the outcome of Hip-Hop forever. The aggressiveness of N.W.A was not the first time such abrasiveness was seen in the state of California. Twenty years earlier, the Black Panthers who came out of California brought a raw attitude in the sixties that hadn’t been seen before. Unlike the nonviolence of the Civil Rights Movement in the south, the Black Panthers were fighting anyone who stood in their way. They were not scared to carry rifles and call the cops “pigs”. With this stand-up mentality, the Black Panthers ignited a flame in America that was unprecedented. For the Hip-Hop world, that’s what N.W.A stood for; five young men putting their anger in their music. With crack becoming an ever so increasing epidemic in the ghettos of America, N.W.A was the new voice of a new generation. Dr. Dre brought a whole new style of producing to the world of Hip-Hop. What made Dre different from other producers was switching beats back and forth during the songs. Eazy E was the first real drug dealer turned rapper, Eazy E talked about life as he knew it from a hustler’s point of view of selling drugs and growing up in the hood. MC Ren was the true lyricist of the group. Ren, better known as the villain, talked about the dangers prevalent in California at the time. DJ Yella was another producer of the group right alongside with Dre. Overall, it was Ice Cube who invented gangsta rap with his delivery and aggression. He made you feel like you were in danger as you listened to him. N.W.A brought a whole new concept that not only scared white people, but scared black people as well. Even some of the Hip- Hop world were frightened, and others didn’t take them seriously with all the profanity and their style of life. “Straight Outta Compton” was the name of their debut and the first track on the album; N.W.A welcomes the world to the streets of Compton. But it was the second song on the album that sent shock waves around the nation and a letter from the F.B.I. “Fuck the  Police” wasn’t a song that was made out of the blue, it was a song of frustration that had been building for twenty years. From the 1965 Watts riots that lasted for six days; until the eighties with the police storming into people’s homes with steel tanks. Public Enemy, who was the militant rap group of the eighties, talked about liberation and shared the beliefs of Malcolm X and the Nation of Islam. N.W.A., however, were viewed as the Black Panthers marching up with pistol in their hands ready to take control. White America’s biggest fear was their kids listening to this music and repeating the lyrics. For blacks, browns, and people who lived in the bottom could relate to the stories that they were telling. On March 3, 1991,  the world got to see why N.W.A and other Hip-Hop artists felt so perjoratively about the cops. Rodney King was almost killed by four L.A. cops, officers Stacey Koon, Laurence Powell, Theodore Briseno, and Rolando Solano. The beating of Rodney King was captured on video for the whole world to see and the whole world got to see how long it took for Chief Daryl Gates to take the matter serious. On April 29, 1992, the words of N.W.A became a new theory used for all people who had been and still are harassed by cops. In Boyz N The Hood, Ice Cube says said an iconic line at the end of the movie, “Either they don’t know, or don’t show, or don’t care about what’s going on in the hood”. But on that day, American citizens who never really cared about Hip- Hop or Black Americans could not ignore what was going on and had to pay attention. It’s only important for me just to talk about the first two songs on their album and how they played a pivotal part in the history of America and shaping it as well.  There is no need for me to discuss the rest of the album or go into the second album. No need for me to talk about the break-up between Ice Cube and N.W.A, and the diss songs that was thrown at one another. No need for me to talk about how listening to Parliament inspired Dr.Dre’s The Chronic album. There’s no need for me to get into anything else about the world’s most dangerous group. The only thing I need to get into is a seat at my local theatre on August 14th with my Golden State hat and watch the movie. I suggest everyone else do the same.