Public Enemy was honored yesterday (Oct. 3) at the VH1 Hip-Hop Honors event in New York along with KRS-One, Kool Herc, Run DMC, DJ Hollywood, Tupac Shakur, Sugarhill Gang, The Rock Steady Crew and Graffiti culture.
Amid the praise, Chuck D took a moment to comment on his hypeman Flavor Flav’s newfound celebrity on VH1’s “The Surreal Life.”
“Well for one, y’all [the public] are experiencing what I’ve been going through for the last 18 years so looking at him [on “The Surreal Life”] is like looking at your life,” the Public Enemy front man laughed.
Being the star of the highly rated VH1 show, Flav was whisked past press on the red carpet without any interviews. The pair later performed with heavy metal act Anthrax with a force that rocked the Hammerstein Ballroom.
Despite the obvious good intentions of the event, which paid homage to pioneers, Chuck D said this sort of respect for Hi-Hop has been a long time coming.
“Well I think [the event] is a great beginning point we could build from this,” he continued. “Understand this much-Public Enemy have been traveling 52 countries for the last 18 years. And Americans only know what Americans know. So a place with 80 black folks [America] should visit and see how they view hip-hop and maybe you guys could learn something.
Never one to mince with his words, Chuck said that because major corporations have come to embrace the Hip-Hop, he hoped that didn’t mark its legitimacy to the masses.
Overall, the VH1 Hip-Hop Honors was packed full of respected old school appearances like Fab 5 Freddy, Sweet T, Salt-N-Pepa, Ta La Rock, Rev. Al Sharpton, Debbie Harry, , Dougie Fresh, MC Lyte, The Cold Crush Brothers, Remi Ma, Sekywa Shakur, Taye Diggs, Tracy Morgan, Busy Bee and many others from the 30 years of Hip-Hop.
The show also offered performances by the like of Nas & father Olu Dara, Beastie Boys, Fat Joe, Kid Rock, Public Enemy, Sugarhill Gang, Chic, MC Hammer And Grandmaster Flash. All of the performances were rousing, especially for Sekywa Shakur, who watched Nas perform “Keep Your Head Up,” the classic Tupac song.
“I think Viacom should share the world, not be the world (laughs) if Viacom doesn’t show it [Hip Hop being honored] through BET, VH1, MTV 1&2 then what? It’s not worthy?” he concluded.
VH1 Hip-Hop Honors airs on Tuesday October 12.
