Let's Get Free

''Let's Get Free'' is the debut studio album by hip-hop duo dead prez. It was released on February 8, 2000, on Loud Records. The album is mainly produced by dead prez, along with additional production from Lord Jamar of Brand Nubian, Hedrush, and Kanye West. The album is supported by its five singles: "Police State", "Hip-Hop", "It's Bigger Than Hip-Hop", "I'm a African", and "Mind Sex". The album peaked at number 73 on the U.S. ''Billboard'' 200 and number 22 on the U.S. Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums (Billboard).

The album dives deep into topics such as the public education system, racism, freedom of speech and police brutality. ''Let's Get Free'' would be followed up with their second studio album, '' RBG: Revolutionary But Gangsta'' in 2004, but after the duo would start to release independent work and strayed away from the mainstream.

Background

During Stic.man attendance at Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University in the mid-90s, he met M-1. Once relocating to Brooklyn after FAMU, due to their mutual love for music and similar political ideology (leftist), they both formed a rap duo in 1996.

In the same year that dead prez was formed, they signed a record deal with label Loud Records.

In a 2010 interview with HipHopDX, M-1 goes in depth about the beginning of the process of recording ''Let's Get Free''.

Concept

The album goes deep into topics and issues that affect the hip hop community through the duo's political view, such as the public education system, racism, freedom of speech and police brutality. ''Let's Get Free'' exposes stories such as Fred Hampton Jr having the possibility of being framed and both members relationship with Christianity.

Recording and production

''Let's Get Free'' is mainly produced by dead prez, along with the help of producers Hedrush, Lord Jamar, and Kanye West.

Singles

The opening track of ''Let's Get Free'', "Wolves", is centered around an metaphor by Uhuru Movement’s Chairman Omali Yeshitela related to white people distributing crack in the black community to hunters in the Arctic fooling wolves into cutting themselves and, subsequently, bleeding themselves to death. This metaphor explains how life under capitalism and white supremacy has engulfed the Black community in self-destructive cycles, and asks us to turn our attention to our true adversary, "the oppressor."

The second track, "I'm a African", embraces a clear truth that should be apparent, but through American conditioning, it is often lost in the mind of Black folks whose family lines have resided in America for generations. M-1's verse starts with, "No, I wasn't born in Ghana, but Africa is my momma," and the rest of the song is a tribute to enslaved Africans of the past and freedom fighters such as South African anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko.

Following "I'm a African", "They Schools" discusses the ways in which schools "reify the status quo, perpetuating social, state, and governmental control" and "ultimately providing lackluster education to inner city youth." The song is appropriately named to signal that public schools "belong to the government and not the people." This track encourages Black people to take control of their communities and schools as a step towards achieving true freedom.

The fourth and most well-known track, "Hip-Hop", served as the opening music for ''Chappelle's Show'' (the instrumental version was used). The next track, "Police State", peeks into the situation of mass incarceration of Black men partly due to social and economic disadvantages.

"Be Healthy", a mellow Spanish-guitar-driven song which is centered around the morals of veganism and the consequences of industrialized diets.

One of the duo's most recognizable songs, "It's Bigger Than Hip-Hop", provides a critical view of the commodification of hip hop artists and music. The song exposes the government for its treatment of working-class people while at the same time, critiquing the way that the hip hop music industry "respect money over talent" and that "real music scares people."

Artwork

The cover art of the album depicts an open call for armed revolution by aligning "contemporary, capitalist, repressive America with colonial-era Africa in the form of an armed village preparing to strike," as stated by The Guardian. Consequently, the cover was censored in many outlets across the United States.

Critical reception

Although the production was derided by some critics as a "dull musical backdrop" (such as Dave Heaton from PopMatters), '' Pound'' wrote that ''Let's Get Free'' was called a "return to politically conscious rap." ''Rolling Stone'' gave the album four stars and lauded its equation of "classrooms with jail cells, the projects with killing fields and everything from water to television with conduits for brainwashing by the system". Rawiya Kameir from ''Pitchfork'' wrote that "''Let’s Get Free'' wasn't built around the aesthetics of consciousness—like some of their incense-lighting, kufi-wearing peers in the late-'90s "conscious-rap" boom ..but around the politics of liberation."

Cassie Balfour for ''The Michigan Daily'' was impressed by the album, quoting "the group's militancy, unapologetic anger and complete rejection of the commercialism — not just of hip hop (which is just a symptom of something deeper) but of American culture in general." Balfour would go on to state that "Dead Prez still isn’t to a lot of people’s tastes, and many would accuse the group of advocating violence. But I would argue that’s a superficial take on Let’s Get Free." Some reviewers were notably critical of the album, such as Andy Capper for ''NME'' stating that the album "sometimes eta little too po-faced for its own good." and tracks "like 'Mind Sex' and 'Be Healthy', while worthy in sentiment, lack the musical invention or lyrical dexterity to match the message."

Legacy

During an interview with the ''Juan EP Is Dead'' podcast, Stic.man revealed that Nipsey Hussle told him that he "wanted to redo Let’s Get Free and wanted ead prez'spermission" one year before he was murdered.

Track listing

Personnel

Charts

Album

Singles

See also

* 2000 in hip-hop
* Dead Prez discography
* The Ecstatic

References

Work cited

;Secondary sources
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External links

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{{Authority control

Dead Prez albums
Loud Records albums
2000 debut albums
Albums produced by Kanye West
Albums produced by Lord Jamar
Political hip-hop albums