Don't Believe the Hype; A counterpoint to the "secret meeting that changed rap" story.

    There is a story going around Facebook and Twitter like wildfire, an 8-paragraph anonymous letter under a picture of the late 1980’s hip hop group NWA (posted at the end of the article). The writer of the letter, claiming to be a former record executive, reveals the intimate details of a secret meeting in 1991 that changed the face of hip hop.

The short version is that this meeting consisted of about 30 of the most powerful record execs at the time, and then some unidentified serious dudes in suits. Everyone was made to sign Confidentiality Agreements, and then told that the big hitters in the room recently invested in the private-sector prison industry, and had a vested interest in filling those prisons. To ensure that business was good, they revealed a master plan to promote gangster rap, which would create gun violence, drug epidemics, and generally the breakdown of society among the African American population, and lead to unprecedented numbers of arrests and, therefore, filled prison cells. And profit.

It’s a neat, convenient, horrific story, and we are ravenous over internet-based conspiracy theories these days, but I don’t believe it.  

Don’t get me wrong – I’m not saying those mysterious, serious men in suits (I assume who were CIA or FBI), and those embedded in the nexus of power and ultra wealth in this country aren’t capable of such things, or have done worse. But this story has a lot of holes. Let’s take a look at it from a musical, and then a social perspective.

First off, the letter that this anonymous music exec wrote; he talks about the guilt he’s felt over the last twenty years for taking part in such a meeting, for steering rap towards the gangsta genre. But he was scared to talk about this meeting at the time because of the Confidentiality Agreement he signed, and even more so the repercussions he might face from the CIA or FBI (men in suits), who pulled guns at one point at the meeting. Now he’s decided to come forward, so he wrote this letter, excluded his name, and emailed this letter to a journalist.  

He's left a lot of breadcrumbs for someone who wanted to remain anonymous. How hidden is his identity if he’s told is that he was one of 30 major decision makers in the music industry working for one of the big firms in 1991, who came over from Europe in the 1980’s, and quit in 1993? Ummm…that’s about as anonymous as a fat guy hiding behind a skinny tree. I’m sure anyone in the music business at that time could label this guy (if he exists) or any teenager with 15 minutes and Google could compile a short list. 

And to speak to the fact that he was European. Europeans learn English in elementary and secondary school, where they are drilled in British English. Old habits die hard, which come out in their writing in subtle ways, like using ou instead of o in words like cataloug instead of catalog. I don’t see any signs that the person who wrote this letter was schooled in British English.  

Granted, that might be a reach, and I’m just enjoying playing junior detective. We’re talking about a secret agenda to promote violence among the black community and fill prisons for profit (unfortunately, that part is very believable), so would they really trust a couple dozen outsiders to sit on this information with only a Confidentiality Agreement? A mere piece of paper? According to his account, a gun was drawn at the meeting, but there hasn’t been one single documented conversation, slip-up, or leak to the media about this in the ensuing 20+ years? Shaky, at best.  

The story was supposedly emailed to someone named “Ivan” at the website Hip Hop is Read in 2012. I don’t know this person or this site and I’m sure they do a great job, but if you were a high-power music exec with a shaking confession that you’ve been holding on to for 20 years would you first go to….Hip Hop is Read.com? No offense to them, but I tend to believe an email to Rolling Stone, The Source, The LA Times, etc. would come to mind first. In fact, if you were in the industry that long you’d know just about every major music writer, and could disseminate this information with a lot more credibility, in a much less clumsy fashion, by picking up the phone and calling an old friend, off the record.  

But let’s say that the Suits and the shady civilians who orchestrated the meetings wanted to promote gangster rap. All they needed to do was influence record company CEO’s in private, who then would create legitimate mandates within their own companies. They wouldn’t need to disclose their malfeasance to a room full of strangers, and take on exorbitant liability. The bad guys are sneakier than that.  

Their logic fails in other regards. Supposedly they were going to promote gangsta rap in the music industry, which would grow like wildfire and create horrific societal problems and increased crime rates in the black community, and therefore fill their prisons. The only problem is that both of those conditions already existed in 1991, gansta rap and horrific societal problems in the inner cities and black communities.  

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This is where scrutiny of the music industry comes in:

I've been a hip hop head since 1986, and for those of us old schoolers, we know that the expression of political strife and inner city conditions was present in rap all the way back to KRS One with By All Means Necessary (RIP, Scott LaRock) in 1987, mirroring Malcolm X’s black power mantra.

Too Short was already firmly on the scene, and even if his music wasn’t political it definitely spouted the misogyny and anti-societal messages that later came to define the Gangsta Rap movement.

Ice-T was singing about killing cops, not playing one on NYPD Blue. His 1986 song “6 In The Morning” is often regarded as the first gangsta rap song, and it would be hard to argue.

Philadelphia’s Schooly D was rapping about shooting people and drug use four-albums deep by 1991, (I still love his song Saturday Night). I seem to remember Paris and Just-Ice and the Ghetto Boys as pretty damn hard.

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Who can forget Public Enemy, perhaps my favorite hip hop group of all time, the first group to bring psychological warfare to your radio. They disseminated edu-tainment to the masses with scores of militant, pro-black songs like Fight the Power, Black Steel and the Hour of Chaos, Can’t Truss It and Who Stole the Soul on their albums It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold us Back, and Fear of a Black Planet. They were smart, angry, and talented, producing bass-shattering music that was a decade ahead of its time.

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These pro-black, politically charged albums were more an outreach of the Black Panthers and Malcom X in the 1960’s and 70’s than they were the birth of gangsta rap. They expressed the ethos of revolution, musical speeches over beats that had everything to do with fists in the air at the 1968 Olympics and the teachings of Huey and Martin, not a gangsta lifestyle of alcohol and drugs, senseless violence, and turf wars. 

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So when did the Gangsta movement start? Someone who doesn’t know much about hip hop might say right around 1991, the time of this clandestine meeting. But all the way back in ’87 or ’88 NWA had taken hold as the first West Coast group that resonated on the east coast, (at least for me). But Niggaz Wit Attitudes was banned from most mainstream American radio stations, which goes against the theory that the music execs promoted them to fulfill their agenda.

Soon, NWA splintered as Doctor Dre and the DOC (who can forget “I am not illiterate no not even a little bit!” in It’s Funky Enough) left for Death Row Records, and an epic beef with Easy E ensued. 

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Let’s look at the charts back in those days to see what kind of rap groups were popping up, and if/when there is evidence of gangsta rap first taking hold in popular culture, to the outcome of creating societal problems and increasing incarcerations.

The anonymous internet story states, “As the months passed, rap music had definitely changed direction…gangster rap started dominating the airwaves. Only a few months had passed since the meeting but I suspect that the ideas presented that day had been successfully implemented.” 

To test this, I did a search for top 100 Billboard singles for each year from 1989-1995, to track the mainstream rise of gangsta’ rap:  

• 1989 - There were 0 singles within the top 15 that could even be called rap music. The closest thing was Bobby Brown and Paula Abdul. Damn, we were soft.

• 1990 - 0, though we did get a great song in Poison by Bel Biv Devoe.

• 1991 - Summertime by DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince could be called hip hop’s first modern-era mainstream hit (another reason for the Today Show to issue an apology to DJ Jazzy Jeff), along with MC Hammer’s U Can’t Touch This. Of course this excludes songs like Rappers Delight, and groups like the Beastie Boys and Run DMC, who defined a genre, but didn't bring it to the mainstream charts. The rest was Boys II Men, Whitney, and Janet (great) and Color Me Bad (Ouch).

• 1992 - The year rap exploded on the charts, with Kriss Kross, Sir Mix A lot, House of Pain, TLC, and Arrested Development, Das EFX, and Marky Mark. But nothing even close to gangsta rap.

• 1993 – We’re getting a lot closer, with Dr. Dre’s  Nothing But a G Thang at #11, his self-entitled single with Snoop, Dr. Dre, at #53, Cypress Hill’s Insane in the Membrane, Ice Cube with Check Yo Self and Today Was A Good Day, Onyx’s Slam, Naughty By Natures Hip Hop Horay, and then a bunch of fake Jamaicans like Snow, PaperBoy, and Wrecks in Effects.  
  

Ice Cube’s songs were definitely the hardest of that bunch so far, but I would argue that he was recounting the perils and pleasures of every day life in South Central LA, not going out of his way to promote his own personae as a violent gang-banger. The other songs were smoothed-out party ballads, even if they did intimately document inner city, West Side life.  

Perhaps the G Funk era hit the charts before Gangsta Rap? This was two years after the alleged meeting in 1991, so surely record execs with that much influence could have already steered popular music in that direction.  They were making money, for sure, but even those groups were considered incredibly risqué for the era. But I fail to see the rash of people joining the Crips and the Bloods and selling drugs and shooting each other because they listened to Nothing But a G Thang. Let’s keep looking at the charts:

• 1994 - The G Funk Era continued with Coolio, Snoop Dog’s Gin and Juice, Warren G, and the #61 single, Keep Ya Head Up, by a young, charismatic artist named Tupac.  That is exactly where we might ring the bell to signal the birth of mainstream Gangsta Rap.

• 1995 - Biggies Smalls blew up on the east coast, answering several years of west coast hip hop innovation and dominance, and soon after the east coast-west coast beef escalated violence and retaliation in rap.  
  

The years and decades to follow brought us a lot of “studio gangstas,” but also a legitimization of gangsta rap thanks in part to Suge Knight at Death Row Records. But he definitely wasn’t part of the music establishment, and the only “investment” he had in prisons was money in his own commissary.  

(Sorry Suge…I mean, Mr. Knight, I couldn’t resist.  Please don’t fuck me up.)

I see no musical evidence of a shift toward mainstream gangsta rap in 1991 and 1992 spearheaded by the establishment. 

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So let’s look at this internet story through a societal lens.  

For this account to have credibility, there would need to be a significant rise in incarceration rates, particularly among young African Americans, in the years following 1991.  

Anyone who can follow a red line can see that the tsunami of increased incarcerations started 10 years earlier, and the 1990’s only followed the established (although disturbingly meteoric) trend of throwing our own citizens in prison.

In fact, from 1980 to 2008, the number of people incarcerated in America quadrupled-from roughly 500,000 to 2.3 million people (today the US has only 5% of the world’s population but 25% of it’s prisoners). However, there is no evidence of a shifting cultural morality causing that, especially post 1991.

I think we can all agree that if radical rap music was going to influence anyone it would have been black (in those days) teenaged males. But a look at the percentage of black male high school dropouts per year actually shows a significant decrease in the years 1990-1996, when this gangsta-rap-to-prison plan was supposedly in place:

Percentage of Black Male High School Dropouts.

1972     22.3% 
1980     20.8% 
1985     16.1% 
1990     11.9% 
1995     11.1 

(Note:  Holy shit, dropout rates in the 20 %’s in the 1970’s and early 80’s?!)

Again, there is no credence to the myth of this secret meeting that changed rap and filled our prisons. We can write a whole volume of books on the sociological conditions of African Americans, the conscious construction of the permanent underclass in America, and our astronomical incarcerations rates. But those will be filled with statistics about profiling, police corruption, poverty, and the shift in criminal codes and sentencing that red-lined blacks into cells, not secret gatherings. 

Remember that the 1980’s and early 90’s were some desperate times for inner-city minorities in Los Angeles, the epicenter of both the music industry and gangsta rap. Neighborhoods were plagued with blight and hopelessness that one would expect to see in Third World countries. Crack cocaine was infesting the city, and gangs spilled blood over almost every street corner in the ‘hood with a new vengeance.  

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Arguably, the most dangerous gang wearing blue wasn’t the Crips, but the LAPD. Instead of protecting and serving, they terrorized the city with a well-document reign of corruption, lawlessness, vigilantism, embezzling, and orchestrated violence toward civilians.  

The tyranny of the LAPD and nightmarish conditions in the hood came to national consciousness on March 3, 1991, when the police were serreptitously videotaped beating Rodney King to a pulp after a car chase.    

The city held its collective breath as the LAPD police officers went to trial, and then on April, 29, 1992 the verdict came down: the officers were acquitted of the charges.

The people couldn’t take it anymore. The city went crazy. And it burned.

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By the time the US Army, Marines, and National Guard restored order 5 days later, the death toll was up to 53 people and more than 2,383 were injured, most of them civilians. A large portion of south central LA was in ashes, with more than 7,000 fires, damage to 3,100 businesses, and nearly $1 billion in financial losses.

If you want to read an insane account of the gangbanging conditions in LA and the riots, from someone who was there, check out Slipping into Darkness by M. Rutledge McCall.

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But does this have anything to do with music?  No.

Did songs create these conditions?  Hell, no. 

I find this kind of internet story extremely dangerous to the African American cause, which, by osmosis, is also the cause of human rights and the colored experience in America.  

It lays blame to the fact that we have the highest incarceration rates of any country in the history of the world on a musical form, gangsta rap, and by proxy the subset of young, black, males who embraced that music. So you’re telling me that if these record execs met and decided to promote Country Western music, instead, our jails would only be half-filled and these societal issues in the hood would be less enflamed? That’s ridiculous, and insulting to the plight of real people who struggle against the throat-lock of disenfranchisement every day. 

What this internet account has achieved, yet again, is to divide and conquer our attention from the root causes: endemic generational poverty, institutionalized racism, a rotten-to-the-core system of policing and incarcerations, our violent predilections in this country, and a culture of crime and violence that needs to be reprioritized toward education, family, and a new code of morality.

Instead, we’re revisiting the chicken-and-the-egg controversy: does society morph its norms to the messages portrayed in media and entertainment? Does music create behavior?

Again, that is another issue for another article, but to put that notion in proper perspective, this is your homework:

Go into the hood in any city and ask the first person you see hanging out on the corner wearing a red bandana if they are living that lifestyle because of the songs they hear on the radio. Judging by the look on their face, you’ll quickly realize how ridiculous that postulate is.  And then run. 

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As I was writing this, contemplating the themes of depravity and violence in media and its relationship with art, I recalled Pablo Picasso’s Guernica. It’s an ultra-violent depiction of the bombing of the village of Guernica, in Basque Spain, that he produced in 1937. Yet, I’m fairly certain that no one ever accused Picasso of creating a cultural shift toward violence and lawlessness with this mural.  Why not?  

Is it because our culture has become so intellectually lazy that we can’t even manufacture racist stories correctly anymore? 

Perhaps, music execs made far more money selling music than they did filling prisons. Perhaps, Gangsta Rap, with its violent, desperate, and impoverished musical predilections, was a reflection of what these young artists saw on the streets everyday, and that America has far bigger problems than censoring the musical account of that reality.  

Is it possible that things were fucked up to begin with, and then art imitated life?

-Norm Schriever
hi@NormSchriever.com

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The original internet story:

Hello, After more than 20 years, I've finally decided to tell the world what I witnessed in 1991, which I believe was one of the biggest turning point in popular music, and ultimately American society. I have struggled for a long time weighing the pros and cons of making this story public as I was reluctant to implicate the individuals who were present that day. So I've simply decided to leave out names and all the details that may risk my personal well-being and that of those who were, like me, dragged into something they weren't ready for.

Between the late 80's and early 90’s, I was what you may call a “decision maker” with one of the more established company in the music industry. I came from Europe in the early 80’s and quickly established myself in the business. The industry was different back then. Since technology and media weren’t accessible to people like they are today, the industry had more control over the public and had the means to influence them anyway it wanted. This may explain why in early 1991, I was invited to attend a closed door meeting with a small group of music business insiders to discuss rap music’s new direction. Little did I know that we would be asked to participate in one of the most unethical and destructive business practice I’ve ever seen.

The meeting was held at a private residence on the outskirts of Los Angeles. I remember about 25 to 30 people being there, most of them familiar faces. Speaking to those I knew, we joked about the theme of the meeting as many of us did not care for rap music and failed to see the purpose of being invited to a private gathering to discuss its future. Among the attendees was a small group of unfamiliar faces who stayed to themselves and made no attempt to socialize beyond their circle. Based on their behavior and formal appearances, they didn't seem to be in our industry. Our casual chatter was interrupted when we were asked to sign a confidentiality agreement preventing us from publicly discussing the information presented during the meeting. Needless to say, this intrigued and in some cases disturbed many of us. The agreement was only a page long but very clear on the matter and consequences which stated that violating the terms would result in job termination. We asked several people what this meeting was about and the reason for such secrecy but couldn't find anyone who had answers for us. A few people refused to sign and walked out. No one stopped them. I was tempted to follow but curiosity got the best of me. A man who was part of the “unfamiliar” group collected the agreements from us.

Quickly after the meeting began, one of my industry colleagues (who shall remain nameless like everyone else) thanked us for attending. He then gave the floor to a man who only introduced himself by first name and gave no further details about his personal background. I think he was the owner of the residence but it was never confirmed. He briefly praised all of us for the success we had achieved in our industry and congratulated us for being selected as part of this small group of “decision makers”. At this point I begin to feel slightly uncomfortable at the strangeness of this gathering. The subject quickly changed as the speaker went on to tell us that the respective companies we represented had invested in a very profitable industry which could become even more rewarding with our active involvement. He explained that the companies we work for had invested millions into the building of privately owned prisons and that our positions of influence in the music industry would actually impact the profitability of these investments. I remember many of us in the group immediately looking at each other in confusion. At the time, I didn’t know what a private prison was but I wasn't the only one. Sure enough, someone asked what these prisons were and what any of this had to do with us. We were told that these prisons were built by privately owned companies who received funding from the government based on the number of inmates. The more inmates, the more money the government would pay these prisons. It was also made clear to us that since these prisons are privately owned, as they become publicly traded, we’d be able to buy shares. Most of us were taken back by this. Again, a couple of people asked what this had to do with us. At this point, my industry colleague who had first opened the meeting took the floor again and answered our questions. He told us that since our employers had become silent investors in this prison business, it was now in their interest to make sure that these prisons remained filled. Our job would be to help make this happen by marketing music which promotes criminal behavior, rap being the music of choice. He assured us that this would be a great situation for us because rap music was becoming an increasingly profitable market for our companies, and as employee, we’d also be able to buy personal stocks in these prisons. Immediately, silence came over the room. You could have heard a pin drop. I remember looking around to make sure I wasn't dreaming and saw half of the people with dropped jaws. My daze was interrupted when someone shouted, “Is this a f****** joke?” At this point things became chaotic. Two of the men who were part of the “unfamiliar” group grabbed the man who shouted out and attempted to remove him from the house. A few of us, myself included, tried to intervene. One of them pulled out a gun and we all backed off. They separated us from the crowd and all four of us were escorted outside. My industry colleague who had opened the meeting earlier hurried out to meet us and reminded us that we had signed agreement and would suffer the consequences of speaking about this publicly or even with those who attended the meeting. I asked him why he was involved with something this corrupt and he replied that it was bigger than the music business and nothing we’d want to challenge without risking consequences. We all protested and as he walked back into the house I remember word for word the last thing he said, “It’s out of my hands now. Remember you signed an agreement.” He then closed the door behind him. The men rushed us to our cars and actually watched until we drove off.

A million things were going through my mind as I drove away and I eventually decided to pull over and park on a side street in order to collect my thoughts. I replayed everything in my mind repeatedly and it all seemed very surreal to me. I was angry with myself for not having taken a more active role in questioning what had been presented to us. I'd like to believe the shock of it all is what suspended my better nature. After what seemed like an eternity, I was able to calm myself enough to make it home. I didn't talk or call anyone that night. The next day back at the office, I was visibly out of it but blamed it on being under the weather. No one else in my department had been invited to the meeting and I felt a sense of guilt for not being able to share what I had witnessed. I thought about contacting the 3 others who wear kicked out of the house but I didn't remember their names and thought that tracking them down would probably bring unwanted attention. I considered speaking out publicly at the risk of losing my job but I realized I’d probably be jeopardizing more than my job and I wasn't willing to risk anything happening to my family. I thought about those men with guns and wondered who they were? I had been told that this was bigger than the music business and all I could do was let my imagination run free. There were no answers and no one to talk to. I tried to do a little bit of research on private prisons but didn’t uncover anything about the music business’ involvement. However, the information I did find confirmed how dangerous this prison business really was. Days turned into weeks and weeks into months. Eventually, it was as if the meeting had never taken place. It all seemed surreal. I became more reclusive and stopped going to any industry events unless professionally obligated to do so. On two occasions, I found myself attending the same function as my former colleague. Both times, our eyes met but nothing more was exchanged.

As the months passed, rap music had definitely changed direction. I was never a fan of it but even I could tell the difference. Rap acts that talked about politics or harmless fun were quickly fading away as gangster rap started dominating the airwaves. Only a few months had passed since the meeting but I suspect that the ideas presented that day had been successfully implemented. It was as if the order has been given to all major label executives. The music was climbing the charts and most companies when more than happy to capitalize on it. Each one was churning out their very own gangster rap acts on an assembly line. Everyone bought into it, consumers included. Violence and drug use became a central theme in most rap music. I spoke to a few of my peers in the industry to get their opinions on the new trend but was told repeatedly that it was all about supply and demand. Sadly many of them even expressed that the music reinforced their prejudice of minorities.

I officially quit the music business in 1993 but my heart had already left months before. I broke ties with the majority of my peers and removed myself from this thing I had once loved. I took some time off, returned to Europe for a few years, settled out of state, and lived a “quiet” life away from the world of entertainment. As the years passed, I managed to keep my secret, fearful of sharing it with the wrong person but also a little ashamed of not having had the balls to blow the whistle. But as rap got worse, my guilt grew. Fortunately, in the late 90’s, having the internet as a resource which wasn't at my disposal in the early days made it easier for me to investigate what is now labeled the prison industrial complex. Now that I have a greater understanding of how private prisons operate, things make much more sense than they ever have. I see how the criminalization of rap music played a big part in promoting racial stereotypes and misguided so many impressionable young minds into adopting these glorified criminal behaviors which often lead to incarceration. Twenty years of guilt is a heavy load to carry but the least I can do now is to share my story, hoping that fans of rap music realize how they’ve been used for the past 2 decades. Although I plan on remaining anonymous for obvious reasons, my goal now is to get this information out to as many people as possible. Please help me spread the word. Hopefully, others who attended the meeting back in 1991 will be inspired by this and tell their own stories. Most importantly, if only one life has been touched by my story, I pray it makes the weight of my guilt a little more tolerable.

Thank you

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If you want to read more by Norm Schriever:

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