When I speak about Harlem I speak to the world / The little Afghan boy and the Bosnian girl / The African in Sudan, the people of Kurdistan / The third world American, indigenous man / Palestinians, Washington Heights Dominicans / Displaced New Orleans citizens / Beach-front Brazilians, favelas that you living in / The ’hood is prime real estate, they want back in again … “Harlem was once was red-light district-rated / Designated ghetto like the yellow star of David … / Until after the invasion of gentrification / Eminent domain, intimidation – that’s not negotiation … / Ivy league real estate firms are corrupt / They lay siege to your castle like the wars in Europe / They treat street vendors like criminal riff-raff / while politicians get the corporate kickback …
And if the equation of commercial rap to chattel slavery stretches credulity, the multiple analogy in ‘Harlem Renaissance’ powerfully links US urban political-economics to world-system wars and cultural recuperations past and present: In the same way that First World superpowers have continuously exploited the Third World for its natural resources, land, labor and industry, the major label superpowers have done the same” (Immortal Technique, So the into, ‘Death March’, emphasises that “We are now in a state of guerrilla warfare … through the streets of your psychology”. Moreover, in terms of cultural production, “the struggles of developing countries … are mirrored within the rap industry. The 3rd World’s concept relates “the streets here in the US to those around the world”. Both doubtless suit MC-battling but can become soporifically monotonous – militating against appreciating his prodigious lyrical dexterity astutely condensing contrasting levels of analysis into each theme with ferocious wit and insurrectionary wisdom. His vocals too have greater texture and engaging thoughtfulness than prior default tenors juggling psychotically omnipotent bragging and sneering hectoring when dropping political science. Apart from legendary single ‘Bin Laden’ (with refrain: “Bush knocked down the towers …”), Immortal Technique concentrated on consolidating talent like producer Southpaw and MC Akir, whose Legacy is the best hip-hop album in years.* At long last, then, a new album – The 3rd World, produced in mixtape fashion by Green Lantern (formerly house DJ for Eminem’s Shady Records) – continues Tech’s maturation, adding contemporary hip-hop styles to raucous minimalism. Also far exceeding sales expectations, this was swiftly followed by Viper Records’ establishment to regain self-control. The debut’s burgeoning buzz prompted distro collaboration with independent labels for 2003’s Revolutionary, Vol. Many of us are in the same boat and it’s sinking, while these bougie motherfuckers ride on a luxury liner, and as long as we keep fighting over kicking people out of the little boat we’re all in, we’re gonna miss an opportunity to gain a better standard of living as a whole … You cannot change the past but you can make the future …” As much as racism bleeds America, we need to understand that classism is the real issue. “My revolution is born out of love for my people, not hatred for others … As different as we have been taught to look at each other by colonial society, we are in the same struggle and until we realize that, we’ll be fighting for scraps from the table of a system that has kept us subservient … I have more in common with most working and middle-class white people than I do with most rich black and Latino people.
1 (2001) heralded his agenda in the ‘Poverty of Philosophy’: From the get-go favouring precarious autonomy over commercial straitjackets – McJobs paying for studio time, handling distribution personally – Revolutionary, Vol. So far, so classic ‘boy from the ’hood done good’ – except for the parallel awakening of revolutionary class-consciousness translated into the most explicitly political rap recordings yet. Harlem-raised after his family fled Peruvian civil war, Immortal Technique’s misspent youth included incarceration for violent offences, wherein he honed his hip-hop flow before redirecting rage onto rivals, winning open-mic contests across New York and further afield. Globalising Ghettocentricity by Tom Jennings
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