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Solange & Beyoncé

Solange & Beyoncé

Photo: Kevin Mazur/Getty Images

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Poll: What Is Your Favorite Black Power Anthem? poll-beyonc%C3%A9-solange-aretha-franklin-james-brown-kendrick-lamar-black-power-anthem

Poll: From Beyoncé & Solange To Aretha Franklin & James Brown, What Is Your Favorite Black Power Anthem?

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From Kendrick Lamar's triumphant "Alright" to Nina Simone's ground-breaking "To Be Young, Gifted and Black," these songs represent strength, resilience and the ongoing struggle for equality. Which is your favorite?
Ana Monroy Yglesias
GRAMMYs
Feb 1, 2021 - 1:07 pm

Feb. 1 marks the beginning of Black History Month. Countless Black artists—from Nina Simone and Aretha Franklin to Kendrick Lamar and Beyoncé—have celebrated Blackness through song and fueled the ongoing fight for equality in music. In commemoration of their contributions, we'd like to know what your favorite Black power anthem is.

Vote in our latest poll below, and scroll down to listen to the powerful tracks included in the poll.

Polls

What Is Your Favorite Black Power Anthem?

Related: Fight The Power: 11 Powerful Protest Songs Advocating For Racial Justice

From Aretha Franklin To Public Enemy, Here's How Artists Have Amplified Social Justice Movements Through Music

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11 Protest Songs Fighting For Racial Justice fight-power-11-powerful-protest-songs-advocating-racial-justice

Fight The Power: 11 Powerful Protest Songs Advocating For Racial Justice

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From Childish Gambino's "This Is America" to James Brown's "Say It Loud," these racial justice protest anthems demonstrate the ongoing—and still deeply relevant—sound of activism
Ashley M. Coleman
GRAMMYs
Jun 19, 2020 - 9:00 am

From the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma to the streets of Ferguson, activism certainly has a sound. Whether it’s the slow hum of Pete Seeger's "We Shall Overcome" or the energetic repetition of YG’s "FTP," when the chants of freedom slow, we often hear an emotional outcry about political issues through music. The current state of unrest in the United States surrounding the violent treatment of Black people and people of color at the hands of police has caused a resurgence of music addressing the current state of affairs directly in lyrics and tone.

As we celebrate Juneteenth (not to mention Black Music Month), a date that signifies liberation for African American people as Gordon Granger announced in Galveston, TX that the enslaved people there were free in 1865, we have to recognize the importance of music when it comes to freedom, protest, survival and celebration in Black culture. 

Music has always been deeply rooted in African culture. It only continued after men and women were captured and enslaved in the U.S through the Middle Passage. For slaves, it was a form of communication and later became so much more. That tradition of music has continued over centuries as each new movement—specifically involving the fight for self-love, equality, and fair treatment for Black Americans—creates its own soundtrack.

2020 will see its own host of songs that highlight the times, from Meek Mill’s "The Otherside of America" to H.E.R.'s "I Can’t Breathe," which she recently premiered in her performance for IHeartRadio’s Living Room Concert Series. But before this moment, there were a few of the songs that have been at the center of protest, revolution, and radical political change over the years.

"Say It Loud," James Brown (1968)

Being proud to be Black was almost a foreign concept commercially during this time and James Brown took the lead on empowering Black people all across the world. "Say it loud, I’m Black and I’m proud," became an affirmation recited far and wide specifically in such a turbulent year as 1968. This was at the height of the Civil Rights movement and the same year Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated.

 

"Comment #1," Gil Scott-Heron (1970)

A poem featured on his debut album Small Talk at 125th and Lenox, Heron was challenging the white left-wing student movement. In his estimation, there was no common ground based on what Black people had endured for centuries that college-educated students from the suburbs would understand. The song was later sampled by Kanye West in "Lost In The World" featuring Bon Iver.

 

"What’s Going On," Marvin Gaye (1971)

Based on the real-life experience of Gaye’s brother who returned from Vietnam with a much different outlook on life, this song asked what was happening in America. This was a turbulent time where Black soldiers were not receiving the same benefits as their white GI counterparts when returning home from the same fight. And much like Scott-Heron, Gaye was exploring the hippie era clash that, to many Black people, didn’t have a real grasp on poverty and systematic racism plaguing the community.

 

"F**k Tha Police," N.W.A. (1988)

A song met with much discourse including the arrest of N.W.A. members in Detroit during a 1989 tour stop. The group was apprehended following their show after being told by the DPD not to play the song in their set. Unfortunately, not much has changed and streams have skyrocketed amidst global protests for George Floyd and Breonna Taylor more than 20 years later

 

"Fight The Power," Public Enemy (1989)

The song originally appeared in Spike Lee's "Do The Right" thing, which explored racial tension in a Brooklyn neighborhood and would become Public Enemy’s most popular song to date. Later released on their album Fear of a Black Planet, the song was received with high acclaim including a GRAMMY nomination for Best Rap Performance.

 

"Changes," 2Pac featuring Talent (1998)

2Pac was seen as both an activist and a young man wise beyond his years, though his career was also marred by controversy and rap beefs. Songs like "Changes" are more representative of the former. Here, Pac was chronicling the fact that things have been the same in Black communities over the years. When listening back, you can hear how poignant his words were over 20 years later.

 

"Glory," John Legend and Common (2014)

The Oscar-winning song from the original motion picture soundtrack to "Selma" directed by Ava Duvernay came at the epicenter of the country’s most recent unrest. Two years after the death of Trayvon Martin, the song was the perfect bridge from the Civil Rights movement of the '60s depicted in the film into today's current fight for equality. 

 

"Alright," Kendrick Lamar (2015)

To Pimp a Butterfly, Lamar’s sophomore release, was a sharp contrast to the cinematic good kid, m.A.A.d. City but yielded the freedom song of a generation. Crowds at protests and university auditoriums across the country erupted into the song's potent lyrics, "But if God got us then we gon be alright!" The GRAMMY-winning song became the unofficial anthem to the Black Lives Matter movement after the deaths of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mich., and Sandra Bland in Waller County, TX at the hands of police.  

 

"F.U.B.U.," Solange (2016)

A nod to the 90s hip hop apparel company, the acronym stands for For Us, By Us. The song appeared on her third studio album A Seat at the Table, her most critically acclaimed and political album to date. Both the song and album highlight Black entrepreneurship, culture, and trauma.

 

"Freedom," Beyoncé ft. Kendrick Lamar (2016)

This hard-hitting track samples "Let Me Try" by Frank Tirado and comes as a reprieve in the album sequencing but packs a powerful message. The ending also features audio from Jay-Z’s grandmother Hattie White. At her 90th birthday party she explains, "I was served lemons, but I made lemonade"—apropos in the discussion of the American Black experience.

 

"This is America," Childish Gambino (2018)

Accompanied by a captivating visual directed by Hiro Murai that paired dancing with African influence, and violent yet thought-provoking imagery, Gambino's effort made everyone pay attention. The song garnered the multi-disciplined artist a GRAMMY for "Song Of The Year," and his first No. 1 single while leaving both critics and fans alike in deep conversations about its political symbolism.

Torae Talks Fighting For Change & Overhauling The Music Industry's Business Model

Kendrick Lamar performs at the 2018 GRAMMYs

Kendrick Lamar performs at the 2018 GRAMMYs

Photo: Theo Wargo/WireImage

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Streams For Kendrick Lamar, 2Pac & More Soar black-pride-anthems-kendrick-lamar-childish-gambino-2pac-james-brown-more-see-big

Black Pride Anthems From Kendrick Lamar, Childish Gambino, 2Pac, James Brown & More See Big Streaming Spikes

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Poignant songs from Beyoncé, YG, Killer Mike and N.W.A also saw major streaming increases, in part due to a new Spotify playlist
Ana Monroy Yglesias
GRAMMYs
Jun 6, 2020 - 6:46 am

On Tuesday (June 2), the music industry observed Black Out Tuesday to stand in solidarity with the Black community and protestors across the nation calling for racial equality and an end to police brutality. In response, Spotify launched its Black Lives Matter playlist, featuring powerful anthems from Black artists across the years, including James Brown's 1968 "Say It Loud – I'm Black And I'm Proud," 2Pac's 1993 "Keep Ya Head Up" and Childish Gambino's 2018 GRAMMY-winning hit "This Is America."

On Friday (June 5), Billboard reported huge spikes in the streaming numbers on June 2 for many of the poignant songs featured in the playlist. The opener, Brown's aforementioned empowering bop, saw the biggest increase at 15,740 percent. The numbers, calculated by Nielsen Music, count streams from across major music and video platforms and were compared to those for the prior Tuesday (May 26). For example, "Say It Loud" had just over 2,000 listens last Tuesday compared to 375,000 this Tuesday.

Read: Minnesota Artist Dua Saleh Demands Justice With Powerful "Body Cast"

The 58-song playlist continues with Kendrick Lamar's GRAMMY-winning 2015 popular protest anthem "Alright" and Childish Gambino's "This Is America." Both tracks saw over a million streams on Tuesday alone, due in part to their high placement on the playlist as well as their still timely critiques of racial injustice in America. The former song hit 1.16 million streams, for a 787 percent increase, and the latter earned 1.82 million streams, for a 570 percent increase.

Kendrick Lamar: "Alright" Put Faith In People's Hearts

Other songs on the playlist that also saw significant bumps in digital listenership include Killer Mike's "Don't Die" (2012), YG and Nipsey Hussle's "FDT" (2016), Beyoncé and Lamar's "Freedom" (2016) and Solange and Lil Wayne's "Mad" (2016).

Soul classics like "Wake Up Everybody" from Harold Melvin And The Blue Notes (1975) and "O-o-h Child" by The Five Stairsteps (1970) also saw increases, albeit somewhat smaller. Pivotal golden-age rap anthems "F**k tha Police" by N.W.A (1988) and "Fight The Power" by Public Enemy (1989) also had more streams this Tuesday compared to last week.

Back in 2016, ahead of the track's two GRAMMY wins, Lamar predicted the power of "Alright" in the moving GRAMMY.com interview (watch above).

"'Alright' did exactly what I would want it to do, and that's put so many people's hearts where they can actually live by and stand for, you know, put faith back in people's hearts … And not only them, but myself. I'm still saying to myself, 'Everything's going to be alright.'"

 
Songs Of Support: 11 Musicians Reveal The Music That Heals Them
GRAMMYs

Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper

Photo by VALERIE MACON/AFP/Getty Images

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Poll: What's Your Favorite Love Song? poll-whats-your-favorite-love-song

Poll: Are You Feeling The Love With Whitney Houston, Mariah Carey, Stevie Wonder Or Lady Gaga—What's Your Favorite Love Song?

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From Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell's "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" to Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper's "Shallow," what song gets you in the mood for Valentine's—or Galetine's—Day?
Ana Monroy Yglesias
GRAMMYs
Feb 12, 2021 - 12:20 pm

Valentine's Day is around the corner on Feb. 14, and we hope you're feeling the love in the air.

For GRAMMY.com's latest poll, we want to know what romantic jam you'll be playing to celebrate the love you feel for your partner, yourself, your furry friends or anyone else close to your heart.

Vote for your favorite love song now in our latest poll below, which includes timeless classics from Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder and Al Green, as well as lovely tracks from Adele, Rihanna and Lady Gaga.

Polls

What's Your Favorite Love Song?

The Supremes Were A Dream, And Mary Wilson Dreamt It

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Aretha Franklin in 1970

Aretha Franklin in 1970

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Artists Who've Amplified Social Justice Movements aretha-franklin-public-enemy-heres-how-artists-have-amplified-social-justice-movements

From Aretha Franklin To Public Enemy, Here's How Artists Have Amplified Social Justice Movements Through Music

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We also examine powerful protest songs from Mahalia Jackson, Harry Belafonte, Pete Seeger, Bob Dylan, James Brown and N.W.A
Ana Monroy Yglesias
GRAMMYs
Jul 2, 2020 - 10:39 am

The year 2020, as difficult (and deadly) as its been for so many, has become a moment of reckoning. The nation is facing the shutdown and health crisis of coronavirus, pervasive acts of racist violence against unarmed Black people, and countless injustices for people of color, LGBTQI individuals and women and those within the intersectionality of these identifies. Today, in this climate of social unrest, powerful protest music of the past resonates once again.

As we stand in this pivotal moment, let's look back on some of the songs and moments that defined the civil rights movement and beyond, as Black artists and allies reflected the dire need for justice and inclusive representation, and protestors took their music to new heights.

Mahalia Jackson

Known as the Queen of Gospel, Mahalia Jackson is credited as one of the first artists to take gospel music out of the church. She used her powerful voice to record a massive catalog of religious music during her career, choosing to never dip her toes in secular music. Jackson befriended Martin Luther King Jr. at the 1956 National Baptist Convention and later performed before many of his speeches, in Selma, Montgomery and, most famously, immediately before his famous "I Have A Dream" speech at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963, which she directly inspired.

She was the final musical guest during at the March, singing "How I Got Over," a powerful gospel song, popularized by the Famous Ward Sisters, about overcoming racial injustice. Not only did the song have deep resonance with the Black audience members, it was Jackson herself who moved King to improvise the most famous "dream" passage of his speech. According to King's adviser Clarence Jones, Jackson shouted out; "Tell them about the dream, Martin! Tell them about the dream!" King pushed his notes to the side and Jones told the person next to him, "These people out there, they don't know it, but they're about ready to go to church."

Given its power, Jackson sang the song many times during her career, earning a GRAMMY for Best Soul Gospel Performance at the 1977 GRAMMYs for it.

Did You Know That Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Won A GRAMMY?

Aretha Franklin

18-time GRAMMY winner Aretha Franklin was one of the many successful soul and gospel singers inspired by Jackson and the path she paved, even performing at her funeral in 1972. The Queen of Soul got her start in music singing in her minister father's church. It was there where Franklin was introduced to civil rights activism. While many of her most beloved hits were covers, she had a unique power to reimagine a song all her own and resonate with so many. "Respect," originally recorded by Otis Redding in 1965, is one of these, which became her first No. 1 hit when she released it in 1967. A powerful anthem asking the listener for "a little respect," it became a protest song for both the feminist and civil rights movements of the time. As Pacific Standard states, "it captured a cultural moment Franklin had herself been fighting to achieve."

The outlet also notes that "Chain Of Fools," an original song, followed in 1967 as another feminist anthem, but found new meaning among Black U.S. soldiers fighting "a white man's war" in Vietnam. In 1972, Franklin recorded a rousing rendition of Nina Simone's 1969 civil rights anthem "Young, Gifted and Black," giving her album the same name, a powerful symbol of Black pride. That same year, Franklin later released live gospel album, Amazing Grace, including renditions of "How I Got Over" and "Amazing Grace." "Respect," "Chain Of Fools, "Young, Gifted and Black" and "Amazing Grace" all earned Franklin GRAMMY wins, evident of how deeply they resonated with America.

'Black Gold' At 50: How Nina Simone Refracted The Black Experience Through Reinterpreted Songs

Harry Belafonte

At 93, Jamaican-American actor, singer and activist Harry Belafonte has been a powerful force and barrier-breaker in U.S. culture since the '50s. Inspired by the emerging social justice-minded folk music of the turn of the century, he made it his life mission to "sing the song of anti-racism," as he said in 2017, to use his voice to highlight the music of the oppressed. Seeing Woody Guthrie perform lit this fire within the Harlem-born artist, inspiring him to visit the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. to listen to Alan Lomax's field recordings.

His third album, 1956's Calypso, was led by one of his most beloved songs, "Banana Boat (Day-O)," a call-and-response Jamaican folk song sung by dock workers (he spent part of his childhood living with his grandmother there). His version took the U.S. by storm, hitting No. 5 and inspiring five other artists to cover it, who all earned Top 40 hits in 1957. The album, as its title suggests, was filled with upbeat calypso music, a genre with roots stemming from those enslaved by the 17th century Caribbean slave trade. At a time when Elvis Presley and other White rock artists ruled, Belafonte's Calypso outsold both of his records that year, spending thirty-one weeks on top of the Billboard 200.

Belafonte also became a pivotal member of the civil rights movement, as a close friend of King, performing at many of his events and offering financial support to fund voter-registration drives, Freedom Rides and even the March on Washington. "I was angry when I met [King]. Anger had helped protect me. Martin understood my anger and saw its value. But our cause showed me how to redirect it and to make it productive," Belafonte writes in his 2011 memoir.

Pete Seeger

"For Mr. Seeger, folk music and a sense of community were inseparable, and where he saw a community, he saw the possibility of political action," the New York Times wrote in Pete Seeger's obituary in 2014. "His agenda paralleled the concerns of the American left: He sang for the labor movement in the '40s and '50s, for civil rights marches and anti-Vietnam War rallies in the '60s, and for environmental and antiwar causes in the '70s and beyond."

In the '50s, the folk artist adapted "We Shall Overcome" with several other activist, including Zilphia Horton, who taught an updated version of the gospel spiritual "I'll Overcome" to union organizers. Seeger's version became an important rallying cry of the civil rights movement. Many other activist/artists of the time recorded and sang the powerful song at various events, including Jackson and folk acts Peter, Paul and Mary and Joan Baez, the latter who sang it during the March on Washington.

Seeger always used his music to speak up on the big issues of the time; in 1941 he wrote "Talking Union" with members of The Almanac Singers (both acts recorded it), "an almost literal guide to union-building," as Time put it. During Vietnam and the Cold War, respectively, he released anti-war anthems "Waist Deep in the Big Muddy" (1967) and "Where Have All The Flowers Gone" (1955). The latter has been covered many times over the years by Earth, Wind & Fire, Dolly Parton and more, with folk/pop act Kingston Trio's 1962 version first hitting the mainstream and reaching the Top 40.

Bob Dylan

"How many roads must a man walk down / Before you call him a man?" a 21-year-old Bob Dylan begins on his beloved 1963 song, "Blowin' In The Wind," another anthem of the civil rights movement. It is the opening track of his second album The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan, which also features "The Death of Emmitt Till," "Oxford Town," "Masters of War" and other explicitly political songs examining injustices of the time.

Like Belafonte, he was inspired by Guthrie's political brand of folk, but it was his then-girlfriend, Suze Rotolo (pictured on The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan album cover), who moved him towards activism and playing political rallies. He wrote "The Death of Emmitt Till" in 1962, about the Black teen that was brutally murdered by White men for alleged whistling at a White woman, shortly before singing it at a fundraiser for the Congress of Racial Equality, which Rotolo was involved with.

During the March on Washington the next year, Dylan performed several songs, including "Only a Pawn in Their Game," which he had recently written about the civil rights activist Medgar Evers killed just months earlier. He also performed the heart-breaking song at a voter registration rally for Black farmers in Mississippi later that year. In January 1964 he would release the track on his next album, another socially conscious project, this one earning a GRAMMY nomination, The Times They Are A-Changin'.

Bob Dylan Announces New Double Album 'Rough And Rowdy Ways,' Releases New Single "False Prophet"

James Brown

In August 1968, a year before Simone released "Young, Gifted & Black" and just four months after King was assassinated, the Godfather of Soul James Brown delivered the funky Black pride anthem "Say It Loud – I'm Black And I'm Proud." As UDiscoverMusic notes, "The tone of the civil-rights movement had so far been one of a request for equality. Brown, however, came out defiant and proud: he isn't asking politely for acceptance; he's totally comfortable in his own skin. The song went to No. 10 on the Billboard [Hot 100] chart and set the blueprint for funk. Like later Stevie Wonder classics of the '70s, it was a political song that also burned up the dancefloor; an unapologetic stormer that would influence generations."

In 2018, on 50 years after the song's release, Randall Kennedy, a Black law professor at Harvard, explained the power of the song in that moment, and today: "It was precisely because of widespread colorism that James Brown's anthem 'Say It Loud, I'm Black and I'm Proud' posed a challenge, felt so exhilarating, and resonated so powerfully. It still does. Much has changed over the past half century. But, alas, the need to defend blackness against derision continues."

The iconic song recently saw a massive boost in streaming numbers as part of Spotify's Black Lives Matter playlist.

Black Pride Anthems From Kendrick Lamar, Childish Gambino, 2Pac, James Brown & More See Big Streaming Spikes

N.W.A, Ice Cube & Dr. Dre

When N.W.A released "F*** Tha Police" in 1988, their hometown of Compton, in South Los Angeles, was rife with police brutality and racial profiling. One of the hardcore rap group's most controversial songs, it struck a chord with in their community, as well as with other Black people living in over-policed inner-cities around the country and frustrated youth of all colors. Directly denouncing the police's abuse of power, the song was largely condemned by the mainstream, causing the group to receive a cease-and-desist letter from FBI and to be arrested for playing it at a Detroit show in 1989, as shown in the Straight Outta Compton biopic.

"We had lyrics. That's what we used to combat all the forces that were pushing us from all angles: Whether it was money, gang-banging, crack, LAPD. Everything in the world came after this group," Ice Cube said in an interview. "We changed pop culture on all levels. Not just music. We changed it on TV. In movies. On radio. Everything. Everybody could be themselves. Before N.W.A … you had to pretend to be a good guy."

In 1992, Rodney King was brutally beaten by LAPD officers who were later acquitted, sparking the 1992 Los Angeles uprising. This not only highlighted the truth and urgency of N.W.A's lyrics, it further solidified it as a rallying cry against the daily violence and racism Black people across the country faced. That year, Ice Cube released his third solo album Predator, along with its biggest hit, the laidback "It Was A Good Day." As HuffPost notes, "he raps about how to cherish moments like chilling with your homies to enjoying your mom's food to NOT get harassed by the police." Dr. Dre followed with his 1debut solo album The Chronic in 1994, and on "Lil' Ghetto Boy" he and Snoop Dogg rap about the dark challenges faced by a formerly incarcerated Black man on parole, powerfully sampling Donny Hathaway's 1972 classic "Little Ghetto Boy."

"Fight The Power": 7 Facts Behind Public Enemy's Anthem | GRAMMY Hall Of Fame

Public Enemy

New York political hip-hop outfit Public Enemy originally recorded "Fight The Power" at the request of then-emerging filmmaker Spike Lee, for his 1989 film Do The Right Thing. It plays a prominent role in the poignant film that explores racial tensions in Brooklyn's Bedford-Sty neighborhood, as the only song character Radio Raheem plays from the boombox he proudly carries at all times. As HipHopDX writes, the song is "indisputably a call to action, [as] Chuck [D] commanded people to stand up against systematic oppression." "Elvis was a hero to most / But he never meant sh*t to me you see / Straight up racist that sucker was / Simple and plain. / Mother f*** him and John Wayne / 'Cause I'm Black and I'm proud," Chuck D raps with authority, both calling out White heroes and nodding to a Black hero, the Godfather Of Soul.

The powerful track finds inspiration from both Brown and the Isley Brothers, who released a song called "Fight The Power" in 1975, it also takes direct influence from them. According to Genius, it features around 20 samples, including Brown's "Say It Loud" and "Funky President (People It's Bad)," and interpolates The Isley Brothers' song. "I wanted to have sorta the same theme as the original 'Fight the Power' by the Isley Brothers and fill it in with some kind of modernist views of what our surroundings were at that particular time," Chuck D explained. The music video (watch above) begins with news footage from the March on Washington, followed by Public Enemy organizing their own march and rally in Brooklyn.

The song was released on the film soundtrack and on their 1990 album, Fear Of A Black Planet, on which they also called out racism in Hollywood and in the police on "Burn Hollywood Burn" (featuring Cube and Big Daddy Kane) and "911 Is A Joke," respectively. This summer, Public Enemy returned with the fiery "State Of The Union (STFU)," calling out the rampant racism of the current White House administration.

How Black Trans Artists Are Fighting To Achieve Racial Justice & Amplify Queer Voices

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Some of the content on this site expresses viewpoints and opinions that are not those of the Recording Academy and its Affiliates. Responsibility for the accuracy of information provided in stories not written by or specifically prepared for the Academy and its Affiliates lies with the story's original source or writer. Content on this site does not reflect an endorsement or recommendation of any artist or music by the Recording Academy and its Affiliates.