Wonderful words by Balearic Mike.

This was released 35 years this week! What A fuckng album! I repeat – What a fucking album!

When this ludicrously great record first appeared on 28^th June 1988, when I was just completing my Art & Design Foundation Course. I got a distinction, plus a Student of the Year award, and had been accepted onto a Fine Art BA degree course at Brighton Poly. Most importantly, I was in love for the first time. I had my whole life ahead of me, and it was looking pretty exciting! Amidst all that, It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back blew up!

I was already a huge fan of Public Enemy. History seems to get re-written a lot more so than ever these days, and various documentaries and articles have  painted a picture of their debut album, Yo! Bum Rush The Show, as a disappointment. That was the total opposite to my experience of that record. Sure, it didn’t sell the same numbers as Beastie Boys or LL Cool J, but this was some seriously underground shit.* Everyone I knew worshipped PE, and when they released their second single, You’re Gonna Get Yours, in May ’87, the little bonus cut they snuck onto the B-side ensured their place as hip hop giants. That B-side was, of course, Rebel Without A Pause, which is still, to my mind, one of the greatest rap records ever released. Its sonic onslaught was like nothing heard before – an earth-shattering, ear-splitting cacophony of breakbeats and horns – yes, that siren /kettle sound is actually Fred Wesley’s trumpet!. It was a total anthem for the rest of the year.

I think some of the revisionism around that debut comes from the band themselves – expressing frustration that it took a such long time from completion to eventually seeing the light of day, so that by the time it hit the shops, PE had already moved on. The band seem particularly harsh about the record when comparing it to Eric B & Rakim’s rap masterpiece, which arrived that summer, Paid In Full. Indeed, looking at the best of 1987 records charts in The Face, PE are placed third in both the singles and album charts, with Yo! Bum Rush The Show behind Prince’s Sign ‘O’ The Times, and Paid In Full, while Rebel Without A Pause is topped by the same 2 artists, and titles.

PE were part of the 1987 UK Def Jam Tour later that year, and the incredible reception that they received probably went some way towards remedying how they felt – as well as providing inspiration for the next album. I’ve written before about catching that tour at Hammersmith Odeon in November 1987. It was a stunning gig, made even more memorable, since I snogged Balearic wife for the first time the following night… but I digress.

Public Enemy started that tour at the bottom of the bill, to Eric B & Rakim, and headliner LL Cool J. By the time I saw the tour for the second time, in at the Manchester Apollo, they`d moved up, and there wouldn’t have been a single member of the audience who would have complained if they’d taken over the headline slot! The UK’s reaction to them live was as explosive as the band themselves!

The towering twin blows of Rebel Without A Pause and Bring The Noise, which was released just before the tour began, were a taste of the direction the band were heading in, and fuelled by the insane reaction to these tracks live, PE made a conscious decision to make their second album faster, and a shit-tonne noisier! “Years of saved-up ideas,” noted Chuck D, “were compiled into one focused aural missile.”

While Chuck’s lyrics were an attempt to make the rap equivalent of Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On, The Bomb Squad production team of Eric “Vietnam” Sadler and Hank Shocklee developed their “Wall of Noise”!

“It wasn’t that we took records and rapped over them, we actually had an intricate way of developing sound, arranging the sound. We had musicians like Eric Sadler… Hank Shocklee, the Phil Spector of hip hop. You’ve got to give the credit as it’s due, if Phil Spector has the Wall of Sound Hank Shocklee has the Wall of Noise.” — Chuck D, The Quietus, 2008

That ‘Wall of Noise’ was dense, aggressive, and influenced by free jazz, atomic funk, and musique concrète. The effect was achieved by layering samples on top of samples, on top of samples. There might be 3 sets of breakbeats layered with added drum machines, 4 sets of horn stabs. In fact, on one of the albums standout tracks, Night Of The Living Baseheads, there are 19 different samples, including one of their own, and that awesome bridge where the song drops down to the opening bars of Fame by David Bowie.

This album kicks off with the intro from their debut show at the Hammersmith Odeon, with ‘Dangerous’ Dave Pearce just audible over the sound of whistles and air horns, before PE’s own air raid siren really starts the show – Professor Griff informing us all that “the revolution will not be televised”! Ironically the concert was being recorded by the BBC, so parts of it actually were televised, but never mind. What follows is one of the finest 60 minutes committed to wax, in any genre, and in 1988 it sounded like music from another planet. The opening salvo of Bring the Noise and Don’t Believe the Hype – 2 of the 5 singles lifted from the album – sets the quality control to way past 11, and the record just never relents for a second. Even the short instrumental cuts like Show “Em Whatcha Got – with its stunning use of the Lafayette Afro Rock Band’s Darkest Light – and Security Of The First World – which Madonna and Lenny Kravitz nicked for Justify My Love – keep the intensity insanely high! They even sample a Slayer track on She Watch Channel Zero?!, not a common source of sample material in hip hop music back then! All of this is interspersed with sound-clips from that legendary London gig!

Both the single, Don’t Believe The Hype, and the album itself charted in the UK, with the single peaking at #18, while the album reached #8. No doubt helped along by a solo UK headline tour that spring / summer. I was lucky enough to see them again on that tour at Manchester’s International 2. To say it was a little ‘on top’ would be an understatement! Public Enemy could probably have sold out the Apollo at this point, and so demand for tickets far outstripped supply, with some of the less fortunate resorting to ‘unconventional’ methods to get in.

I really felt for the support act, London rap star, Derek B. I really liked Derek B, and my brother Chris bought the album. However, due to his coming from that ‘down London’ place, the poor chap got a less than warm reception from many in the Manchester audience. 

The gig was mind-blowing! Seeing Public Enemy in such an intimate, rough and ready venue was really special, although I did loose several prized patches from my nice MA1 bomber jacket to some light-fingered audience members during the show. A pair of young ruffians also attempted to mug us after the gig, but realised the error of their ways after noticing there were 5 of us, and we weren’t really in the mood to be mugged. Fun times!

I’ve been listening to this album on a loop for the last few days, and it still has the power to make all that excitement and energy come flooding back. It still has that magical quality that makes you think music can change the world, and I think this album had a profound effect on a lot of people. There’s a great bit at the end of the BBC documentary, Public Enemy: Prophets Of Rage, where Professor Griff talks about how a nation of white kids who grew up with hip hop, and Public Enemy in particular, had their attitudes and outlook expanded to the point where a black president of the United States could become a reality – twice! Now that’s some legacy.

It’s been decades since I listened to It Takes A Nation Of Millions…, but today it instantly sends electricity up and down my spine. The album was designed with scientific and military precision, both sonically and lyrically, articulate and intelligent, railing against injustice and inequality, to act as a call to arms, to motivate the oppressed in a stand against the oppressor, and, boy, does it work. Now more than ever, we need music like this. – Rob)

For more from Balearic Mike you can find him on both Facebook and Instagram – @balearicmike. 

Mike has a Mixcloud page packed with magnificent, magical, music, and you can catch him live on 1BTN, from 12 noon until 2 (UK time) every 1st and 3rd Friday.

You can also check out the super silk screen prints of “Balearic Wife” over at @jo_lambert_print