Musick that Needed Work: U - Umar Bin Hassan

 

Made it through Musick that Needed Work: T so far. Hitting the U’s this month. Let’s go. 

 

Umar Bin Hassan was born in Akron, Ohio, into a poor black factoryworker's family. Already as a youngster he dreamed of escaping his family's lot & getting more out of life than slaving for the white man at the local rubber mill. So he sold his little sister's record player to buy himself a bus ticket for New York City, where he joined The Last Poets, a group of black poets spreading a militant political message akin to that of the Black Panthers / Malcom X. 

New York very nearly became Umar Bin Hassan's death. Of course, there was poetry, the passionate performances of The Last Poets. There was bebop, the music of Miles Davis & Charlie Parker, whom he revered, who influenced his poems. But the 'demons' of drug abuse, as he called them, got him into their power. They drove him out into the streets. He wandered from crackhouse to crackhouse, hustling, dealing, shooting up, until his sister finally came to his rescue. She took him into her Connecticut home.

He succeeded in kicking his crack habit, in regaining his zest for life. One day his little nephew played a tape recording of a hiphop band named Tribe Called Quest, who had, without his knowledge, set one of his own poems to music. The new gansta-rap was trying to link up with The Last Poets. Such rappers as Ice Cube & Chuck D. of Public Enemy sought inspiration with them. Umar now felt he should return to New York. There he continued his work with The Last Poets, whose message was still a relevant one. He resumed his writing & performing with the group.

Umar appeared at the Poetry International Festival 2002 in Rotterdam with a guitarist, to perform jazzy, associative narratives such as “The Drums” & “Grace”, evoking dark, infernal journeys through modern-day America, yet also counting his blessings with bebop music & love. With his strongly rhythmic, spectacular presentation, he impressed, bewitching many. 

This is the first solo effort from Bin Hassan.  Here Umar is joined by many of the Usual Suspects: Bootsy Collins; Bernie Worrell; Bill Laswell; Anton Fier; Buddy Miles; on & on. 

 

Umar Bin Hassan - Be Bop or Be Dead, Axiom 314518048-2, 1993.
decryption code in comments

(Niggers are) Scared of Revolution    
Am    
Bum Rush    
This is Madness    
Malcolm    
Pop    
Love    
40 Deuce Street    
Personal Things    
This is Madness (Metal mix)

 

 

Enjoy,
NØ