as the President of the nation.
Several months before his birth in Honolulu, Hawaii, on August 4, 1961, a group of civil rights activists known as the Freedom Riders left Washington, DC, on a courageous quest to challenge the nonenforcement of the desegregation of public buses in the South. Obama belongs to a generation of African Americans who were not old enough to have been active in the classic phase of the civil rights struggle or even the heyday of the Black Power era. Nearing age sixty, he is also too old to be considered part of the hip-hop generation as delineated by journalist Bakari Kitwana—who, in 2002, identified “the birth years 1965–1984 as the age group of the hip-hop generation.”63 Situating Obama within a conventional generation in American culture is perhaps easier than placing him within a distinct African American generation. He belongs to the earliest cohort of Generation X (Gen X) and can also be considered a late “baby boomer.”
Obama has directly spoken about hip-hop on several occasions. In a brief interview with BET’s Jeff Johnson in early 2008 that has received roughly one million views on YouTube and has been sampled by more than a few deejays, Obama conveyed his stance toward hip-hop after he was asked a straightforward question: “Do you like hip hop?”64 He promptly answered, “Of course.” When he was asked which artists he admired, he responded that he had been listening to Jay-Z’s popular tenth solo album, American Gangster (2007); that he appreciated it because it “tells a story.” He also remarked that he was fond of Kanye, who he would later call a “jackass” for his shenanigans at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards show. Obama qualified his veneration of modish hip-hop by insisting that he was “still an old-school guy.” “Honestly,” he said, “I love the art of hip hop, I don’t always love the message of hip hop.” Without specificity, he then criticized Jay-Z and Kanye for sometimes denigrating women, using “the n-word,” and being preoccupied with making money and materialism. This mainstream and often elicited critique of hip-hop is something that Obama would continue to summon up.
On July 28, 2008, Christopher Brian Bridges (aka Ludacris) released his mixtape, The Preview, produced by DJ Drama. On the track “Politics as Usual,” Ludacris leveled insults toward Hilary Clinton, George Bush, Jesse Jackson, and John McCain. A spokesperson for the Obama campaign quickly issued a statement condemning this “dis” track. “As Barack Obama has said many, many times in the past, rap lyrics today too often perpetuate misogyny, materialism, and degrading images that he doesn’t want his daughters or any children exposed to.” The Obama campaign spokesperson politicked:
This song is not only outrageously offensive to Mrs. Clinton, Rev. Jackson, Mr. McCain and President Bush, it is offensive to all of us who are trying to raise our children with the values we hold dear. While Ludacris is a talented individual he should be ashamed of these lyrics.65
This was situational politics in its purest form; Obama welcomed Ludacris into the White House in 2009 and 2015.
In his interview with BET in 2008, Obama pointed out that hip-hop could be effectively used to help educate African American youth. He remarked that hip-hop had the potential to help the youth think more critically; he labeled hip-hop “smart” and “insightful” and conceded that emcees can deliver, in his words, “a complex message in a very short space.” He also urged artists to move beyond hip-hop’s essence of “keepin’ it real” and chronicling the realities of everyday life in urban America. Instead, he appealed for emcees to awaken the possibilities of a brighter future and “change.” They should, he concluded, embrace his mantra, “the audacity of hope.”
Several years after his interview with BET, on October 14, 2010, Rolling Stone magazine featured an absorbing interview with Obama. In response to the questions, “What music have you been listening to lately? What have you discovered, what speaks to you these days?” Obama rejoined:
My iPod now has about 2,000 songs, and it is a source of great pleasure to me. I am probably still more heavily weighted toward the music of my childhood than I am the new stuff. There’s still a lot of Stevie Wonder, a lot of Bob Dylan, a lot of Rolling Stones, a lot of R&B, a lot of Miles Davis and John Coltrane. Those are the old standards. A lot of classical music. I’m not a big opera buff in terms of going to opera, but there are days where Maria Callas is exactly what I need. Thanks to Reggie [Love, the president’s personal aide], my rap palate has greatly improved. Jay-Z used to be sort of what predominated, but now I’ve got a little Nas and a little Lil Wayne and some other stuff, but I would not claim to be an expert. Malia and Sasha are now getting old enough to where they start hipping me to things. Music is still a great source of joy and occasional solace in the midst of what can be some difficult days.66
Obama’s reference to Jay-Z is not surprising. The hip-hop mogul whose net worth is estimated at approximately half a billion dollars had been supporting him since the early days of his first presidential campaign. Obama included Nas most likely because of his 2008 “Black President” track. Obama’s reference to Lil Wayne is more perplexing, especially given the subject matter of the vast majority of his rhymes. I wonder which Young Weezy tracks Obama had in his iPod and if he would be willing to share this with the public.
Since the Fisk Jubilee Singers performed for President Ulysses S. Grant in 1872 or soprano Marie Selika Williams sang for President Rutherford B. Hayes in 1878, numerous African American entertainers have showed off their skills in the White House. Obama has set himself apart from his post-Carter predecessors by welcoming hip-hop in the Oval Office. More than a few emcees—Doug E. Fresh, Jay-Z, Queen Latifah, Common, Big Sean, Wale, and Kendrick Lamar—visited and/or spit rhymes in the White House during Obama’s presidency.
In May 2011, Obama was criticized by various Republicans, conservative political pundits, and police authorities for inviting Common to perform at the White House for Michelle Obama’s “White House Music Series.” Common’s critics were offended by his anti-Bush, anti-police brutality, and pro-Assata Shakur lyrics. A veteran New Jersey State Trooper deemed the black activist who Common celebrated in his 2000 tribute, “A Song for Assata,” “a domestic terrorist” who “executed” a New Jersey State Trooper on May 2, 1973.
In “A Song for Assata” from his commercially successful first solo album Like Water for Chocolate, Common played the role of an amateur historian; he evoked the story-telling tradition of hip-hop’s early years in detailing the struggle of Assata from about 1973 until her escape to Cuba in 1979. Informed by Shakur’s autobiography and interviews that he conducted with her in Havana, Cuba, Common stressed the relationship between her activism and the present state of black America. “I read this sister’s story, knew that she deserved a verse / I wonder what would happen if that would’ve been me? / All this shit so we could be free, so dig it, y’all,” Common rhymed.67 This approach of imagining what life was like for previous generations of African Americans is something that Obama espoused when lecturing to young blacks.
Public intellectual Mark Anthony Neal has convincingly lambasted Common for his sexism and “hyper-masculine” worldview. Yet, the Chicago-born emcee did produce one of the most elaborate and widely played tributes to a black leader in the history of hip-hop.68 Unlike his male predecessors who at best have perhaps given “props” to Harriet Tubman, Common also venerated a black female leader.
Obama and his administration must have been aware of Common’s politicized rap. By inviting him to the White House, Obama was, in a sense, validating Common’s appreciation of Black Power era history and his commemoration of a prototypical black radical who was added to the FBI’s “New Most Wanted Terrorist” list at the beginning of Obama’s second term.
Dressed in “all black everything” (rocking ripped jeans, a tight long-sleeve shirt, and an unostentatious gold chain with a cross pendant) and sporting Allen Iversonesque cornrows, 2015 Grammy award-winning emcee and future Pulitzer Prize winner Kendrick Lamar visited Obama in the White House in January 2016. Prior to this
