claims Bill Stephney. ‘It’s almost like when you heard Chuck’s voice on record, you heard our version of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, even though he’s a rapper and it’s a rap group.’
However, once Chuck was on board, he then had to convince Def Jam that signing Flavor Flav, who had no clear role within the group, was an equally good move. Eventually, Flav recorded enough vocals on the Strong Island crew’s first album to be signed to a contract as a vocalist. But there was uncertainty about Flav at Def Jam. While some members of PE have spoken about how Russell and Rick in particular were unsure about what it was that Flavor actually did, Bill Stephney admits that he also objected. ‘I’m the one who actually thought Flavor didn’t make any sense,’ he says laughing. ‘I don’t know if Chuck or Hank speak to this, but I don’t recall Rick or Russell ever making any declaration that they didn’t want Flavor to be part of the group. I know I did. I remember having a meeting, and I’m thinking, well, “We want to do some serious political rap group, we wanna be like The Clash you know, we can’t have Flavor in the group! Are you out of your mind?”’ This point of view would dog Flav at various points of his career.
Bill Adler confirms there was considerable disquiet over Flavor’s membership in some quarters. ‘You kinda had to scratch your head even at that time and wonder, “What is he doing in this group? What does he have to do with this kind of righteous solidarity?” Political solidarity. He was a brother on the corner, you know?’ Hindsight, naturally, allows everyone to easily see how vital Flav was to proceedings. ‘And yet he was a key element in the group,’ Bill continues. ‘He was brought in by Chuck as a comic relief to Chuck himself. It was really brilliant and rather self-effacing of Chuck to do that. It demonstrated a lot of knowledge on his part. Chuck D had the sense to build a counterpart to himself and build some comic relief in the form of Flavor.’
Thankfully, it didn’t take long for the combined force of Chuck and Hank to bring Bill round. ‘Chuck explains to me, “You gotta have Flavor,” and then Hank explains it too: “You gotta have Flavor,’ cos Chuck might be too serious, so you need a balance there.” At a certain point I said, “Okay, why not, it makes sense to me, let’s just go with it.”’ Flav himself never suffered from these misgivings and was rightly confident from the jump. ‘They were getting ready to make a big mistake,’ he states on the subject. ‘But I did end up getting signed, and I became one of their biggest voices, their biggest entities. I became their most sampled voice.’
Simultaneously, with the birth of PE, Unity Force became the S1Ws. The S1s incorporated the discipline of the Nation of Islam with some of the influences of the Panther party, and sought to rid the world of the pejorative phrase ‘Third World’.
‘How can someone else define us, and call us third class?’ asks James Bomb. ‘We are the original people of this planet, so if we don’t see ourselves as First World people, then someone else is going to define us and we can’t let anyone else define who we are and what we mean to the planet earth. It’s our resources that’s fuelling the planet earth right now. You go to Africa, you’ll find the most gold, silver and diamonds. All the precious metals that make society work as it works.’
The last piece of the puzzle to slot into place was Norman Rogers, aka DJ Mellow D. Mellow D used to fill in for Spectrum gigs as and when he was needed. Keith was the original and seemingly natural choice for the group’s DJ, but quiet, dependable Norman was chosen by Chuck and Hank, probably because of those qualities.
Chuck and Hank were also responsible for creating Mellow D’s Terminator X persona. Eric Sadler describes Norman as ‘a big teddy bear, he’s really like Yogi Bear, the most lovable, naive, goofy kid that you could ever have.’ Such a personality would never fit in with PE. ‘They decided, “You know what?”’ Eric continues. ‘“Don’t speak. You’ll speak with your hands.” And that’s what he basically kinda stuck to.’ This marked the only time someone’s persona was significantly changed to fit the group. Of course, all performers perform. But this doesn’t mean they’re pretending.
Chuck and Flavor were the only people actually signed to contracts at Def Jam. Everybody else was a hired employee on a wage. Although it wasn’t a great situation, nobody was starving. And once they started gigging things gradually improved. Some years later, Terminator X got his own contract.
For his part Eric sorted a deal that was different from everyone else’s. When he was approached about working on the album he confirmed he was definitely interested but that he didn’t want to work for a pittance. But that didn’t change the fact that there wasn’t much money to go round. ‘I said, “Aiight it’s near Christmas time so I won’t charge that much, but I need to get a hundred dollars a jam,”’ he remembers telling Chuck and Hank. His work on PE’s debut album would amount to $1,200.
Once work on the album was properly underway in the second half of 1986, the group was focused. ‘You’re talking about a process where myself and Hank especially were involved 1,000 per cent in every second of the album,’ Chuck remembers.
Public Enemy’s debut album was called Yo! Bum Rush the Show because it was designed as the first installment of what was only meant to be a two-year programme. The first album’s purpose was to kick in and bum rush the industry’s door. No one ever thought the group’s fortunes would skyrocket in the way they subsequently did. ‘When Public Enemy happened, it was really beyond our wildest dreams,’ says Harry Allen. PE have managed to last more than ten times longer than their initially planned lifespan.
The recording process proceeded fairly quickly. INS studios in Lower Manhattan – which is not too far from where the World Trade Centre once stood – became their home for four to five weeks. Sports-mad Chuck recalls that they were right down the street from the New York Mets when they were winning the ’86 World Series.
For the first couple of weeks Eric, Chuck and Hank got together and laid down the basic backing tracks. Studio expert Eric used about five or six different drum machines. Once the skeletal backing tracks were down Chuck would rap over the beat so Eric could take it back and see how vocals would alter the soundbed, and what additional changes needed to be made. ‘Once Chuck liked something we’d get him on it, and then I could tell where the track should head,’ he says. ‘Now I can put the drum rolls where they’re supposed to go. I can take away stuff, add stuff.’
After that the next few days were devoted to Flavor. He went back and forth with Chuck about how and where he should contribute. Once that was decided he went in and did his thing. Flavor was already prepared for what he had to do with ‘Too Much Posse’, the first in a long line of classic Flavor Flav solo songs. Every PE album contains one or two Flavor songs. It would be easy to compile a respectable Flavor Flav Greatest Hits set.
Bill Stephney is credited as the album’s producer. In 1987, a producer was someone who oversaw a project and took care of its overall direction. These days, that’s the role of an executive producer. Nowadays, a producer is a person who comes up with the beats and the music. Eventually, Bill Stephney wasn’t required in any production capacity. ‘People ask me, “How come you stopped producing on Public Enemy?”’ reveals Bill, ‘and I say, well, “More than anything I thought Chuck and Hank did a fantastic job musically with getting everything together and they can handle it within the studio.”’ There were also practical reasons, extraneous to the group. When Def Jam’s sales started to go through
