The Gift of Music: Public Enemy’s “Welcome To The Terrordome”

Posted by Myrna the Minx on January 7, 2007 | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)

Don’t ask me how it came up, but during a recent conversation about something completely unrelated I remembered that I was in the Virginia Beach riots of 1989–a song immortalized in Public Enemy’s “Welcome To The Terrordome” a fiery, angry, protest song that creatively samples “Jungle Boogie” among other songs. Listen to the driving rhythm that pushes and pushes and pushes….

Staying at the Comfort Inn during the 1989 Greekfest riots (as they are known) was one of my Zelig moments–one minute I was dancing on the sidewalk to Salt-n-Pepa’s “Push It” with a bunch of people I just met, and the next the riot police are chasing us around the parking lot with billy clubs blazing. Have you ever been in the middle of a riot? Just before it begins, there is this incredible silence bursting with determination, fear, anxiety, and anger all boiling up together into an explosive mess begging for a catalyst. You really can’t believe what is about to happen actually happens, but you know it will with a certainty that is surprising. That night, as the police marched down Atlantic Avenue and formed their line in front of my hotel, the crowd of mostly dancing college kids changed completely into a watchful mass of disbelief first, and then, very quickly into a cluster of very quiet resolution. Everybody was frozen and silent for what seemed like minutes and then the air slowly filled with whispers of “don’t throw anything,” “all they need is a reason,” “what’d we do?” and “move closer and stick together” as both sides waited for the inevitable to happen. Someone’s got to flinch in a game of chicken. All it took for the police to uncoil and spring into the crowd was a piece of trash thrown from a balcony above the street by some moron (at least that’s how I remember it). I was able to pull a couple of girls into the hotel lobby as the streets and parking lots filled with kids running from the flashing shields and clubs of the police who seemed to be striking at anything that moved–just as scared as anyone else I imagine.

The Greekfest riots over that Labor Day weekend resulted in over 500 arrests and citations and millions of dollars in property damage. My favorite music store was looted, so I never got my hands on the life-size Bob Marley poster I’d been eyeing since my last trip to to the beach. The city instated a curfew, making a walk to the shore impossible unless you wanted to tangle with the National Guard and their M-16s. Only Public Enemy (perhaps Rage Against The Machine) could to write the soundtrack for that night–an incendiary mixture of funk, hip-hop, and rock influences thrown in for good measure. (Chuck was a fan of The Clash.) “Welcome to The Terrordome” isn’t their best song, but it evokes my memories of that surreal night like nothing else.

“The Greek weekend speech I speak/From a lesson learned in Virginia (beach)
I dont smile in the line of fire/I go wildin/But its on bass and drums even violins
Watcha do gitcha head ready/Instead of gettin physically sweat
When I get mad/I put it down on a pad”

For a good laugh, check out the Reno version of “Welcome to the Terrordome” filmed at Wingfield Park. Those white folks sure know how to get down. And looky here. Chuck D has a blog .