Chuck DCritiques

All three volumes present facsimile reproductions of Chuck D's 8"x5" journals, which he filled primarily verso; ink bleed is faithfully reproduced on the obverse, though on occasion a detail of the right-hand verso leaf is given on the obverse of the left-hand leaf. (Seemingly this is done digitally, and appears on top of any bleed-through from the left-hand leaf's verso image.) The feeling is distinct: simultaneously a peek into thoughts under construction, including strike-outs, typos, even editorial commentary given on a later read-through. At the same time, this is not a primitive or unfinished product. These are thoughts in reaction: to current events, to prior thoughts, to historical events -- a mind is on display. It's a heady vision.

VOLUME 1 - THERE'S A POISON GOIN ON! | 2020-02 thru 2020-04 // read 2023-08-11
Ruminations on the effects of the organised effort to attract the mental attention of people; not merely their presence at a show and their attention on the spot, but the default attention paid to internet and smart phone. Evidently these diaries started as an effort to track PE's own experience of this global and contemporary phenomenon, but just as evidently more general events overtake this effort. The event of Chuck D's choosing: attempting to launch a new album, and the effort to grab attention for something that not only declines to use the tactics of online hype, but which in large part seems to attack it. How might this effort be successful and still be principled? As he and his colleagues work on this puzzle, the other event occurs and is very much of no-one's choosing: how to gain attention for public health efforts during the COVID-19 pandemic. These two events unspool and intertwine, his reflections providing insight on both separately, and end up together providing the central theme of this journal.

Not having followed PE at this time, I wasn't aware until this reading of the project Loud Is Not Enough and single "Food As A Machine Gun" from March 2020 under the name Enemy Radio. Initially the drama playing out publicly, together with the behind-the-scenes preparations, seemed to contradict one another and confused me as to the tensions and internecine strife. A visit to the official web page and some online articles helped clarify, especially the influence of Orson Welles's "War of the Worlds" radio broadcast hoax.

VOLUME 2 - 45 DAZE OF RE(A)D OCTOBOT | 2020-09 thru 2020-11 // read 2023-09-03
All lines in 45 DAZE are in rhyming couplets, the focus shifting from the first volume's overview of world events overtaking PE's intention to both launch an album and draw attention to social injustice. Here Chuck D concentrates on Trumpism's maladroit handling of the pandemic itself, though with abiding concern for how that affects (and is affected by) black Americans. "The 45 days up to the election might've paled in the 500 haze of days after the election. The insurrection of January 6, 2021 is there and we are still in a daze about it." The conceit of Cult 45 and 45 stylised as a Nazi swastika seem so obvious here, yet I don't recall anyone else thinking of it before or since.

VOLUME 3 - DATAMBER MINDPAPER: ATTACK ON THE SCREENAGERS | 2021-11 thru 2022-02 // read 2023-09-18
An illustrated poem, serving up a hip-hop montage reminiscent of use of samples in late 80s / early 90s in electronic industrial music -- those samples were thematically related (anti-fascist, anti-institutional religion), effectively creating a perspective or outlook bigger than any single instance. In doing so, they helped motivate listeners to figure out specific references that weren't immediately clear ("what film was this clip of dialogue taken from?" or "what's the context to that music sample?"). Chuck D has done something similar here, but inventing the samples and placing them in a graphical work rather than an audio work.

I honestly did not know Chuck D did any writing let alone "naphic" novels although I knew his Public Enemy work in the 80s and 90s as a kid and was a fan. PE have always taken a political stance in their music so I expected this book, which I received in the Early Reviewer program to be no different. These are his views and his views only. If you are looking for citations to back up his statements of differing opinions to round out his bias, you will not find it here. You may not agree with all he says or agree with him at all but treat this book as a piece of art because that is what it is and it doesn't mean you have to like it or agree with it but if it got you thinking or made you feel something it has done its job.

It is filled with poetry that goes many different places, giving you insight into how Chuck's brain works, into his different interests, and that he is an intelligent, curious man who matured over the span of his career. His drawings are rather stark but emotive--they gave me pause. This was notable to me because shooting have become so commonplace I simply do not pay attention to them anymore but seeing them documented in words and images changed that, at least for the moment. Certainly gun violence has had a much larger impact on inner city populations in a number of different ways. I appreciated the opportunity to get inside his mind a bit and I enjoyed some of the fun moments too, like when he rode a bike.

The message is clear and needs to be said over and over. Gun violence is the #1 killer of children and teens in the US. And legendary hip-hop artist Chuck D uniquely presents this message in this graphic novel. Very powerful. Very sad.

This is a terrific book.
Chuck D clearly kept journals in 1922 of events, and issues, and observations about life in America. This book compiles pages from those journals. Although there is a continuous thread of comments about guns, and gun violence- lending Chuck D to create the phrase "The Summer of H.A.M.N"- the man clearly has much wider interests. Politics, Drought, Celebrities, and anything else that was contemporary or of interest to Chuck D are all in here.
The journal pages combine pictures and words, so one could make a stretch and call this book a graphic novel. But it's not a novel, there is no storyline. The phrase Chuck D created for his observations is "naphic grovel". Pretty clever!
He is a talented artist well as writer. Some of his caricatures are right-on-the-money, such as his quick sketches of Brian Stelter, David Allen Grier, Herschel Walker, Brittany Griner, Ghislaine Maxwell, etc.
Each re-reading of the book reveals some interesting new insights. I am not into rap, and so I am not familiar with the actual music Chuck D made with Public Enemy, but based on this book, I can see how brilliant their poetry might be.
Recommended

Summer of Hamn by rapper Chuck D is an interesting diary of the events of 2022 depicted by personally drawn artwork and writings. The premise portrays the gun violence of 2022 from the writer's perspective. I, myself would not typically read a book like this, but enjoyed seeing what occurred in 2002 from a different perspective. For a person who likes rap, this is a good source for a historical perspective of the 2022 events.

This is a stunning collection. I was absolutely floored when I received it in the mail as I was not expecting the three volumes to come in its own hefty slipcase. Chuck D manages to cover so much ground in these novels that are a little bit more like graphic journals. I feel like every time I open a volume up I am seeing some thing new about our world and society at a very specific place in time. What doesn't Chuck D manage to examine? He takes a look at social media, basketball, politics, COVID, international news. It's unvarnished and wonderful.

I am not typically a fan of graphic novels. However, from the writing that brings similar comfort I felt when reading Tupac's 'The Rose That Grew From Concrete', mixed with the powerful imagery, I was a fan of this. I read it immediately, in the car, in one sitting. A great book to add to my collection and one I am glad to have won. An important message more need to read.

An emotionally driven, complete disregard of facts or logic, presented in an art style that is usually extremely amateur, and there is almost nothing poetic about the way the words are written. Speaking of the writing, it would have been worth adding the text separate from the images because there are a fair number of spelling mistakes (some of them are just written over making a difficult-to-read mess, while others are left entirely unedited). The political message is obvious. It offers no information to educate those with different views, or to equip those with the same views. It is the typical appeal to emotions, based on deception and distraction, devoid of any historical or factual accuracy that everyone is used to receiving. Considering I have no connection or interest in the author/artist, there really is nothing redeeming about this book. At least it can be read in a very short, single sitting, so while reading this will waste your time, it won't waste a lot of time.

A copy of this book was provided by the publisher through LibraryThing's Early Reviewers for this review.

Summer of Hamn details the events of summer 2022 with a major focus on the role guns and gun violence played in those events. That being said there are many topical events covered. What makes the book unique is that Chuck D chose to depict the events using art and his rhyming talent. The art style. The ball point sketch like artworks aren't this readers perferred style, but are detailed and couple with the rhymes to make the author's message. While the delivery is effective and unique it felt like it was missing a satisfying finish, but that could of very well been the point. Overall a not much substance in terms of written word interesting when focusing on the art.

Interesting book, not your normal format, instead drawings with text as Chuck D attempts to show how the United States is being held hostage by gun violence.

Hollowpointlessness Amid Mass Nihilism, aka HAMN. This is a poetic art diary of the summer of 2022 and the wild things that happened. Heavy on political happenings and gun violence. I like the art style, enjoyed overall.

Eh. I’m underwhelmed. The rhymes are clever enough — mostly. The drawings are okay. This is like an artist’s diary of Summer, 2022. Events universal and personal mingle:

“The James Webb Telescope shows its first deep pics . . Images billions of years back humbles us quick.”

“Spent the day driving through the streets and landmarks of Philly.”

Sometimes these juxtapositions are in one rhyme:

“ByeDon has COVID and the world concerns over his health/ Meanwhile giant ice breaks off the South Pole Shelf.”

Amidst a plethora of police shootings and violence, he mentions things few other year-end round- ups notice, revealing a sensitivity to the more vulnerable in our world & implicitly suggesting a link between murder by cop and self-annihilating despair:

“988 is the new help number in the USA for those contemplating suicide.”

Sometimes the rhymes are so trivial you hate yourself for having read them:

“Although 45 was never fit for the job of US president, rest in peace to one of his ladies / Ivana, who was a NYC icon in the 70s and 80s.”

That last rhyme, while not at all representative of the book, was representative of my experience reading it. There was no depth here. Serious issues (Breonna Taylor, homelessness, Palestine, NATO) were touched on without seriousness. Everything was on the surface; everything had the depth of the Ivana Trump rhyme. I expected a lot more from Chuck D. Is this fighting the power?

In this three volume series, Chuck D comments and draws on some defining moments in US history: corona virus, Trump, technology and more. In Volume 1, appropriately titled "There's a Poison Goin On!", Chuck D chronicles a couple of months of the corona virus. His comments and illustrations are honest and enlightening. Volume 2, also appropriately titled "45 Die of Read October" chronicles Trump's presidency and his 2020 campaign. His drawings and comments continue to be honest, bold, and enlightening. The last volume, "Dataamber Mindpaper. . ." focuses on technology, our attachment to our technology gadgets. On the back cover, Chuck D had this to say "I don't recall any service going down while everyone was locked down. Makes you wonder about all the 5G talk and how maybe they had to stop the world in order to get a new reboot. One thing we know is that humans are attached physically and emotionally to their gadgets and AI is never gonna get dumber. . .as humans will." Whether you like or dislike Chuck D, his statement about AI is true, his thoughts and comments about the corona virus and Trump are thought-provoking, and certainly worth reading. I loved this series and I was very glad that I received this set from the early Reviewers.

An interesting book outside of my norm. Still I'm glad I received it, since I would probably never have looked at it otherwise. My grade is just a personal grade of how much I enjoyed it.

I wasn't sure what to expect with this collection. I'm an avid reader of comics and graphic novels, and I've always respected Chuck D's politics and ways of making them heard. But I'm not otherwise a Public Enemy fan - I saw them once on a double-headliner bill with Sisters of Mercy in the early 90s and I was definitely there for Sisters of Mercy. But whew, this collection is really something. The book is reproduced just like the author's journal pages would've been - you can see the watercolor stains seeping into the backs of pages (so the collection is all single-sided), and you can see the notes he writes in his own hand. The first book starts with the emergence of COVID19, and proceeds from there, covering maybe 2 years over the entire collection. Parts of the narratives are clearly him saying his piece about a (maybe fake) split with Flavor Flav, and parts you can just see his sorrow and rage at a failed US state under a lousy president during a worldwide pandemic, as well as his memorializing a number of people who died over that timeframe. You can see his sorrow that rappers get publicity when they're shot and not when they're making incredible art and music, and you can see the wisdom of someone who has lived this life for many decades and not seen nearly enough change. Much of the collection is written in a rhyme scheme that enables you to practically hear him reading to you in your head. On another note, the publisher of this book absolutely put everything they had into it - the production is excellent. The pages are not only made to appear faithful reproductions in color and style, but the actual pages are heavy stock, like real watercolor paper would be. It's really a well-done piece of work all around!

This book is essentially a collection of three illustrated journals by rapper Chuck D that are set in 2020 and 2021. The first volume is all about the start of covid and some beef he had with Flavor Flav that I never could quite get a handle on. The second volume is all about the 2020 presidential election. The third volume is about stuff that was happening a few month into the Biden presidency. The art is okay. Chuck D is a rapper, not a professional artist, and I'd rank his drawing ability at talented amateur level. As far as the writing goes, the first two books were pretty good, as covid and the 2020 election were interesting bits of history, but volume 3 was kind of just a boring mishmash or random stuff. Overall, I'd say this is mostly going to be of interest to fans of Chuck D and hip hop in general.

STEWdio: The Naphic Grovel ARTrilogy is a 3 volume journal though the pandemic years 2020 - 2022, written and illustrated by Public Enemy front man and hip-hop legend, graphic artist, and activist Chuck D. As COVID-19 exploded, what began as an art and album release project morphed into seemingly real-time documentation of chaos, mis- and dis-information, fear, police brutality, protests, gun violence, divisiveness, biological and political toxicity, and the technology addiction of "screenagers," the themes permeating each volume like the heavy ink that soaks through to the back of a page. Personal, national and worldwide events are chronicled in simply and beautifully drawn sketches, captioned by rhyming verse. A renaissance man for the 21st century, Chuck D has lessons for us all about trust, belief, and renewal.

Public Enemy rapper Chuck D writes and illustrates a trio of books zine style. Diary like with quick, rough sketches, the first book starts as a chronicle of a new PE album but quick focuses on the COVID pandemic.

Volume two shifts to the 2020 election. Chuck D also starts using rhyming couplets as a narrative device. It brought back all sorts of memories of those crazy days. In the third volume, Chuck D turn his eye on the impact of devices, technology, and social media on our lives while still providing some insights on day-to-day matters.

While the art style won’t be for everyone, I thought it captured the diary feel of the text: get something down on paper. This isn’t meant to be a great work of art, but rather capturing a moment of time. I wasn’t sure if I was going to enjoy this after the first 20 pages, but it’s immediacy sucked me in.

For the life of me I will never understand why some people choose to write books. Perhaps success in one field causes them to think they will be a success in another field. Certainly there are people who are this way, but not all great football players are great baseball players. Rarely, in fact. Yet even a great football player who turns out to be a great baseball player: is he likely to become one of the world's best at playing a musical instrument or winning political debates too? Here we have a graphic art trilogy created by someone who was allegedly successful at something other than creating graphic art trilogies. Yet instead of sticking with whatever it was that he had success with, he decided to branch out. Perhaps in hopes of being the rare multi-faceted hero. Or perhaps just out of boredom. We will never know. One thing we can judge on its face, though, is the success, or lack thereof, of said graphic art trilogy. In regards to the graphic arts trilogy itself, I believe our elders said it best: becalming an ugly sailboat to die in silence is easier than, and preferable to, shredding it under a thunderstorm of complaints.

In STEWdio: The Naphic Grovel ARTrilogy of Chuck D, Public Enemy co-founder Chuck D. journals about his day-to-day events beginning in February 2020 through a combination of hand-drawn sketch and short description. Examining his art, Chuck D. uses a quick freehand style that captures motion and emotion with recognizable features of people even as he stylizes them. He uses color sparingly over his lines and shading, highlighting some features of each piece while adding meaning through his choice of what to color and what to leave in linework or heavy shadow. His words and captions move through the images, drawing the reader’s eye across the action and making the two work in tandem. Enemy Books and Akashic Books printed the pages to act as a facsimile of Chuck D.’s journal, complete with ink bleed-throughs from page-to-page and areas where new drawings partially transferred to the opposite pages either due to wet ink or pressure as he wrote and drew. Just as the text reveals his thoughts, these little details reveal the process of illustration.

In volume 1, There’s a Poison Goin On!: Dystopian Trauma in the Hours of Chaos, Chuck D. details the time from February through April 2, 2020, describing his thoughts on a lawsuit with Flavor Flav, the effect of Bernie Sanders using Public Enemy’s music at a campaign rally in Los Angeles, and the subsequent reveal that that lawsuit and public spat was a publicity stunt to show how the media negatively portrays rap and hip hop artists. Beyond these events, Chuck D. also describes growing anxiety and awareness of the coronavirus pandemic. As a primary source of the pandemic, this volume resembles Chris Riddell’s Five Years… A Sketchbook of Political Drawings, which similarly chronicled the events surrounding the early days of the pandemic. By the end of volume 1, Chuck D. and Flavor Flav’s publicity stunt has gotten out of hand due to clashing egos and the very real toll of the pandemic.

In volume 2, 45 Daze of Read OctoBot: Flies, Dyes, and the Lies of 45 as the World Cries, Chuck D. chronicles his perspective of the events from September through November 2020. Unlike volume 1, Chuck D. writes his captions in rhyming verse for volume 2. He moves chronologically through the months, but does not track each day individually as he did in volume 1. When dates do appear, they occasionally occur out-of-order; for example, October 8 follows October 30. This makes the second volume a great deal more artistic. Chuck D. still reveals his inner thoughts, but he does so free from the limiting literal perspective of volume 1. The title combines references to Thirteen Days and The Hunt for Red October and Chuck D.’s pacing feels like a political thriller. Chuck D. accurately portrays Trump’s buffoonery, but also captures what a crazy time it was all around. In alternating between post-election chaos and Trump retreating to golf after stirring up trouble, Chuck D. summarizes, “Nero had a fiddle, 45 – a 9 iron stroke. As he beats a fast retreat from a virus he can’t defeat and hides from anybody that’s work…” A solid rhyme that encapsulates so much of November 2020.

In volume 3, Datamber Mindpaper: Attack on the ScreenAgers, Chuck D. covers the period November 2021 – February 2022 and continues his style from volume 2 with rhyming captions for his drawings, creating a visual verse of thought. The title refers to the digital thirteenth month of “Datamber” that begins Chuck D. argues begins on December 20. In this, Chuck D. returns to the theme of technology in people’s lives that he touched upon in the previous two volumes, focusing on smartphones in particular. While there is no denying the ubiquity of such devices and their ability to limit some types of interactions, generic complaints against them miss the way the foster connections both among people and between people and ideas. Beyond phones, Chuck D. continues to describes the confluence of pandemic hysteria, conspiracy theories, election troubles, new political situations, climate change, gun violence, and racial reckonings in the U.S. The various obituaries of those he knew or admired remind people how it seemed like 2020 just kept taking its toll over and over again in people we looked up to and respected for their contributions to culture.

The effect of STEWdio: The Naphic Grovel ARTrilogy of Chuck D is a unique perspective of a year from the first warning signs of the coronavirus pandemic through the beginning of the Biden Presidency. Just like those living these events, Chuck D. balances between the omnipresent dread about current events and his own projects he hopes to accomplish as a sign of resilience in trying times. The art and chronicle will appeal to fans of Public Enemy as well as scholars of hip hop. A great addition to the bookshelves of many for its role as a pandemic record and a first-person account of hip hop in the second decade of the twenty-first century from one of its all-time greats.½

For both long time Public Enemy fans and for new initiates, [STEWdio] delivers
compelling, often riveting, words, poetry, and visuals,
from cartoon images to revealing portraits.

THERE'S A POISON GOIN' ON highlights:

ANA TIJOUX, Bernie from March 2, 2020, "NOWHERES THE WORK,"
"The Virus is rippin'" and "Phone a Toy or a Tool."

Chuck D effectively eviserates trump and the U.S responses to COVID,
yet is "F--- The Fear" brave (?) enough to head to New York City
where, every night and day, we watched family and friends being driven to morgues.

45 DAZE of READ OCTOBOT highlights:

"Cult 45," Fred Hampton Bar"(60s people from Chicago will never recover from that horror),
"45 Playing Sore Loser," and "Chicago."

Masked, the author continues to perform his weekly radio show and ZOOM interviews.
He offers an early mention of the infamous Proud Boys threat, deals with the millions
of new dead around the world, and covers the Election - thank the fates for Wisconsin voters!

DATAMBER MINDPAPER highlights:

"Biden's Mentality," "Climate Change" featuring Penguins and Elk/Deer
(I hope future books bring more attention to animals),
"Oxford School," (echo of "Oxford Town"?), horror of ongoing Rittenhouse.

Graphics become more intense as Chuck D moves to analysis of people now wired to tech.

We may well wish, if not for the bison and forest people to reclaim the land, at least for
those long ago days when computers were 60 feet high, we all had landline phones,
the Moon was safe from us, and there were no apps, passwords, AI, clones, tweets, FB,
Data drills...

Wish he had been able to cover January 6th in depth, George Floyd...

Welcome were his tributes to all the Rap Stars, Arch Bishop Desmond Tutu,
Sidney Poitier...and now, Harry Belafonte...

An absolutely incredible collection of artistic journals and fiction from the one and only Chuck D. Seeing someone's graphic journals offers a unique insight into their process. It also offers endless inspiration for fellow artists. The book was written during the pandemic and carries through that time and the past. An incredible collection and worth a look.½

Chuck D of Public Enemy fame takes us on a journey through musical time to show the political and socially conscious music of the African-American community. Each piece of music offers a complete history of the era and the thought process behind the lyrics, the instruments used and the history of the performer. There is a large span of music covered in the brief time. Music is covered from "Strange Fruit" by Billie Holiday and her history of her heroin use to Too $hort's song "The Ghetto" which holds the mayor of Oakland, California for raising money to return a football team to their area but not to help fight the crack pandemic that is plaguing the community.

I loved being able to hear the music that Chuck D felt defined the social movement behind the advancement of the African-American community and the work that needs to be done to advance that community further. I would have loved to have it be a bit longer as the hour and forty-four minutes and include more recent artists such as Kendrick Lamar. All in all, this is well worth the listen and I enjoyed every minute of it.

Songs That Shook the Planet

I Picked Up This Book Because: Seemed like it would be interesting.

Media Type: Audiobook
Source: AudiblePlus
Dates Read: 3/5/22
Stars: 4
Narrator(s): Chuck D

The Story:

I’m feeling like I need to get the most of AudiblePlus before I cancel it later this month so I picked this up to see what it was about and it was a good choice. Music is one of my favorite things on the planet but I must confess I do not put much thought into where it comes from, why it was written, what was going on in the world at the time of a song’s birth but I do enjoy learning these things. I like the format in which we would hear about the why’s then hear the song. I think that helped make the connections the author wanted us to make. Many of these songs were familiar and a few were not but as I’ve never really studied the lyrics they were all brought into a new light. The topics seemed well researched and personal to our author/narrator. Overall I greatly enjoyed it.

The Random Thoughts:

A Great Guide to Hip-Hop

Very informative history of Hip-Hop for an old school fan like me but also an essential chapter in Black culture for those who love Hip-Hop today. While I am not a fan of most of the hip-hop that came out after 2000 I support the art if it still can be used to awaken the social conscience of our society. Chuck D will always be a hero to me along with KRS1.