Archive for February 25th, 2007

Al Sharpton’s ancestors were owned by Strom Thurmond’s ancestors.

By AUSTIN FENNER
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

The Rev. Al Sharpton, a descendant of slaves, stands in front of papers documenting his ancestors were owned by the family of Sen. Strom Thurmond.
In a revelation that will stun the nation, the Rev. Al Sharpton, one of America’s most powerful black leaders, has unearthed a shattering family secret - his ancestors were slaves owned by relatives of the late South Carolina Sen. Strom Thurmond.

Now in a way, I think there’s definitely a certain irony in that, although to be fair, anybody who’s descended from enslaved people is gonna have some commonalities with somebody. But Al Sharpton and Strom Thurmond, though? Wow. But that’s not really the big wow for me. The big wow is the reaction of Strom Thurmond’s family.

Relatives of the late Sen. Strom Thurmond greeted news of the family’s shocking connection to the Rev. Al Sharpton yesterday with some nervous chuckles and one outright denial.

“That’s a bunch of baloney,” said Barry Bishop, the son of one of Thurmond’s sisters.

Now I’m not about injecting race where it doesn’t belong, but this here is all about race. So I’m trying to figure out…what does the family think it has to gain by denying or even questioning whether their ancestors owned Sharpton’s ancestors? That’s the really ignorant part. You’d think they had said Al was their first cousin or something.

What this really makes me wonder is what I’m gonna find out when I continue my research about my own family. Right now, I’m trying to figure out what questions I need to ask and where I would go to get the answers. So if anybody has already done this type of research, I’d be grateful for any procedural information you could share.

But wow. Just goes to show, you never know.

In some ways, I think I’ve phased out of hip-hop. Not to say that I don’t ever listen to it, but it is to say that as I’ve frequently said, one of the key elements of hip-hop is its insistence on freshness. It’s always about the newest thing. Which was cool when I was younger. Now? I’m not so concerned about fresh. I’m more interested in vintage. For me personally, it doesn’t get too much more vintage than Raising Hell.

Back in the day, my own personal measure of how much I liked a tape was the amount of time it took before the writing came off the cassette. The two tapes that I blanked fastest were Raising Hell and Nation of Millions. I never really thought of it as a perfect album, but I like just about every song on here. The only exception is, ironically, Walk This Way, which is the song that propelled both the album and the group into the stratosphere. I never had a problem with heavy guitar work, I just wasn’t crazy about that song. But even then, it wasn’t like I would get up and fast-forward the tape. Walk This Way did typify, however, why side 2 >> side 1. Being more specific, I think it boils down to the fact that as much as I like Peter Piper (and have really come to appreciate it lyrically) and My Adidas, those two can’t even compete with Raising Hell and Proud To Be Black, which are my two favorite songs on side 2.

(That brings up an interesting aside. Since all the songs on a CD come in numerical order, you miss the whole idea of a side. I’m not sure my kids would even know what I meant if I got up there talkin about some ’side 2.’ On a double album? Side 4? Forget it. But to me, that was part of the fun of talking about an album with your friends, debating which side was better. I might hafta revisit No One Can Do It Better on this point, because I actually have mixed feelings about that one.)

As a group, I always appreciated Run-DMC. I think I liked DMC more, but I could never really put my finger on why. Then I read something Kool Moe Dee said. He was like, they were the perfect balance of fire and ice, with Run being energetic and fiery and DMC being ice cold. That’s about right, I think. I always thought that Run brought more energy and DMC brought better rhymes. Me being me, I take rhymes over persona and charisma. I guess that’s why for my money, Biggie > Tupac. (Actually, Biggie >>> Tupac, but this is not the place for that debate.)

But man, one of my all-time favorite music moments is that scratch Jam Master Jay does on Proud To Be Black, when the guys are spitting “You read about Malcolm X in the history text/ Jesse Owens broke records and we broke necks.” (2:39) Sickest scratch I know. If the technology had been there for me to listen to that part over and over, I know I would’ve done it. We ain’t even gon’ talk about those pause tapes I used to make.

Over all, I think Raising Hell was a very complete album. Not necessarily perfect, and probably not one of the ten I’d take to a remote island, but it’s up there. Definitely in my top 20. And the inspiration for this week’s banner.