August 19-25, 2004

naked city

Web site of the week

by Brian Howard

It Takes a Nation of Millions

Hip-hop has wavered over the years from its Chuck D-applied tag as the "black CNN." But a revolutionary vein still courses through the genre that's delivered D's Public Enemy, The Coup and, most recently, P. Diddy's "Vote or Die" campaign.

The Web site www.slambush.net has recently entered the fray, calling on wordsmiths and slam poets to join in a national rhyme contest in response to the Bush administration's shortcomings. The site provides links to local events (a Philly slam is being organized, but details have yet to be finalized) and an "anti-Bush ammo" page with facts and figures on Iraq, race relations, economics and more.

The site's main attraction is a streaming video featuring Brooklyn rhymer Wordsworth dropping some science into superimposed debate footage with Dubya. The clip starts with Bush finishing a response in typically stumbling fashion and the moderator announcing, "Mr. Wordsworth, you have one minute to respond for the hip-hop generation."

Taking his cue, Wordsworth, appearing, thanks to a nice bit of editing, to be standing at the opposite lectern, launches into a screed:

"World peace is said to be the planet's plans, so you attack the Taliban in Afghanistan?" he chides. "Bin Laden you let escape and through the sand he ran. Now he's taping death threats on a Handycam."

The chiding is pointed and humorous, addressing the WMD fiasco as well as Bush's tendencies to golf during crises. The barbs are hardly new, but their presentation is fresh.

Wordsworth, with Chuck D, Medusa, Fahiym, Davey D and Supernatural, will judge the September main event in Miami that will cull winners of local and online slams and award the winner $5,000. Contestants can register online for either a live event or for the online contest.

Response to this contest will be telling, but it would appear that the hip-hop nation hasn't lost its fire to fight the powers that be.