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26th out of 71 books
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It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back (33⅓ #71)
Christopher R. Weingarten provides a thrilling account of how the Bomb Squad produced such a singular-sounding record: engineering, sampling, scratching, constructing, deconstructing, reconstructing even occasionally stomping
on vinyl that sounded too clean. Using production techniques that have never been duplicated, the Bomb Squad plundered
and reconfigured their own compo
Paperback, 152 pages
Published
January 2nd 2010
by Continuum
(first published 2010)
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A great read for anyone interested in hip hop's most historically important and culturally influential group, and their most important/influential album. The book is dedicated solely to breaking down Public Enemy's second album track by track, sample by sample, scratch by scratch, and provides some minor background details on Chuck D and the Bomb Squad (and, to a much lesser degree, Flav, Griff and Terminator X). As someone who has listened to the album thousands of times over the past 22 year...more
Weingarten does a great job tracing the samples PE used on this classic album to sources such as James Brown, P-Funk, Isaac Hayes, and the 1972 Wattstax concert. In the process he shows how the group built on and fed off the energy of those predecessors, updating their sound for the Reagan era and the age of samplers. Weingarten also contextualizes PE within the NY hip-hop scene and shows how contemporaries such as Run DMC influenced and played a role in the making of this album. I would have li...more
I really enjoy the 33 1/3 series of small books about records, and though I've tried a couple that did fail to entertain, for the most part they're really fun reads. This one is a good example. I love the album in question, and this book takes an interesting angle by discussing all of the samples used by the group. This basically makes the book a history of the music that came before Public Enemy and influenced them: James Brown, Funkadelic, Isaac Hayes and Stax Records, Kurtis Blow, Run-DMC, an...more
As a writing exercise, I will try to write my review as poorly as the author of this book because convoluted, as it may be, and history has a way of being confusing, which James Brown's drummer might know, but the Bomb Squad tried to use a different mix, but RFK was killed in the 60s, which history will affect... Ugh, I can't do it anymore. The writer doesn't interview any band members, provides barely any insight into the album. Rather, he focuses on the music which PE sampled. And even then, h...more
Noted internet message board user Christopher R. Weingarten gives us a dizzying take on one of Hip-Hop's most canonical albums, furnishing copious details not only on the album itself, but on some of the numerous songs sampled on it as well. This serves to contextualize P.E. within a larger framework of american pop music, and also has an interesting side-effect: while most 33 1/3 volumes will make you want to relisten to the album they're about, this book actually makes you want to explore *oth...more
This book talks about not only the making of the album and the world of P.E. at the time, but all the pieces of music that went into the album via the relatively new-at-the-time practice of sampling and the world out of which all those pieces of music came, drawing all kinds of interesting parallels between them and making an interesting case for the power of the well-placed sample. A great piece of work.
For some reason, it seems that Weingarten spends more of his time discussing the ascension of the sample, with his focus leaning towards the original artists, rather than that being the main topic in his book. He spends little time with Public Enemy, which sort of renders the book and its title as useless, but at least the writing is strong, so he's got that going for him.
An incredible sample by sample breakdown of the seminal Public Enemy album. Weingarten gives a wonderfully thorough history of the tracks that were used in the making of the album, often taking individual words and following them back in time to their source giving an amazing sense of history to the album. If you like the record you owe it to yourself to read this book.
Extremely well-researched book about one of hip-hop's seminal albums. Overstuffed with information, it's almost a scholarly approach to Public Enemy and rap music, which is usually interesting, if not always fun to read. It's best to try and read this in one or two sittings if possible, as the book jumps around in time periods frequently and makes connections in different parts of the book that require close attention. Overall, a high quality entry in the 33 1/3 series that could have benefitted...more
I had high hopes for this 33 1/3 and it certainly did NOT let me down! This book did what I always hope these 33 1/3 books will do- it made one of my very favorite albums ever sound new and exciting again. I can't believe all of the samples I didn't recognize! And the little stories about the samples... my favorite image from the book is Flav recording P.E. on the radio and grabbing "I guarantee you- no more music by these suckers" from the DJ. Oh! And Chuck creating the logo from ...more
The density of information we get here is impressive -- it's not unlike getting a concentrated dose of forty years' worth of musical history, which echoes the dense production of the album in question. And it reads neatly to boot. (Disclaimer: I'm not an entirely objective reviewer here.)
I came away from this book with so much information, but I'm most amazed by the fact that "She Watch Channel Zero?" almost sampled Bad Brains instead of Slayer. I wish someone would do a remix and make this happen.
Wish it came with an mp3 of all the samples discussed! Intoxicating read!
Never wanted this book to end. Definitely my favorite 33 1/3 book so far. One year, someone will get me the birthday present I really want: an hour with Chuck D.
Joshua Finnell
marked it as to-read
Butch
marked it as to-read
Alice
marked it as to-read
Tito
marked it as to-read
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