Death Certificate: Oct 29 1991
(An album of the times)
It seemed like everyone was coming to Islam. The AUC was overflowing with brothers and sisters either getting life or processing. We were becoming more conscious all across the country. Joining Auser/Ast, becoming members of the Shrine of the Madonna, AND Islam was strong? How strong was it? It was so strong that Ice Cube cut his curl and made the thought provoking Death Certificate.
First off, there’s NO WAY that Death Certificate could be released in this social media ridden, pseudo-PC, can’t-say-nothing world that we live in today. There would be boycotts. There would be think-pieces. There would be no kinder, gentler Ice Cube that you see today. He would have been rendered bitter.
But things were different then.
Ice Cube, like many people, was able to reinvent himself. And he had already. It was a shock to see Ice Cube as a solo artist…recording with the Bomb Squad (which immediately made Sayyed Munajj a fan, he was about all things Bomb Squad). This was another reinvention.
I was late to the party.
Then I heard that Cube was going to be making a “conscious album.” I had to hear it to believe it.
Let me back up a bit.
Unlike NYC, the Five Percent in Atlanta help rallies every Sunday. Whether you were waiting on the 13 or on your way to Club Woody, it was impossible to not notice that large circle of men and women in the parking lot of the AUC Catholic Center.
I missed the first two in October on the sixth and thirteenth. My first rally was October 20th. That was the rally where this brother Omar got his Math and I tried to convince him to make a copy for me. My brothers, Daoud and Esseen were at that rally. And this was the first appearance of Self Allah from the Head of Medina who was “looking for other 120 gods to build with.”
The rally on the 27th, I was a little late for…well, a lot late. It was almost over when I got there. But it was the one where Wakeel Allah told me to come back to campus the next day and I could get my Math…only to be impossible to find that Monday.
Wakeel was no where to be found that Tuesday the 29th either. So before going back to my apartment near the Lindbergh Station, I took the train one stop further, went to Lenox, walked to Tower, copped Death Certificate.
Mind absolutely blown. Death Side, “where we are today,” Life Side, “where we need to go?” What? Ice Cube standing over a toe tagged Uncle Sam? The back cover (see: above)? “Stop giving juice to the Raiders, cuz Al Davis never paid us?” Word? “My Summer Vacation” is about St. Louis but it might as well be the story of Denver. Not gonna give a blow by blow — the Death Side was exactly what is to be expected of an Ice Cube project. It could have been an album unto itself at eleven songs.
But you can tell towards the end of that side, “A Bird in the Hand,” for example, that it’s not that. Ice Cube is a master storyteller. He goes from explaining why he’s selling drugs, carrying a gun, and dying in the ER. With a eulogy given by Dr. Khalid Muhammad. That’s how you end a side.
Then you open with Dr. Khalid Muhammad, telling us that we older than Alpha and here after Omega? Shiiiiiiiiiiit.
Didn’t go to campus on the 30th. Went the next day, Thursday October 31st. Got Mathematics. Studied and memorized them, word. That’s what I was doing on Marta. But when I was walking through the mall on the way to Rich’s, I was listening to Death Certificate.
Ice Cube’s expression is the voice of the angry Black man and woman who came to Islam in that era. Contrast that with One for All and Pure Poverty and Let The Rhythm Hit Em and 2Pacalypse Now, you can get a good image of the early 90s atmosphere. Ice Cube made music afterwards but Death Certificate is the shit that I return to.
