In this time, we incorporate money and media, and it's split up like apartheid, where when you say "hip-hop," you think just rap records. People might have forgot about all the other elements in hip-hop. Now we're back out there again, trying to get people back to the fifth element, the knowledge. To know to respect the whole culture, especially to you radio stations that claim to be hip-hop and you're not, because if you was a hip-hop radio station, why do you just play one aspect of hip-hop and rap, which is gangsta rap?
Afrika BambaataaSince the pharmaceuticals don't make any money and they control the doctors. If the doctors don't make any money then all hell breaks loose. In communities like LA and New York they are using a lot of the youth for a test sight.
Afrika BambaataaI'm interested in anything that deals with our planet, in our planet, outside our planet, the universe, universes, galactic, dimensional, subterranean. That's deep stuff that everybody needs to focus on: What is your niche on this planet? Why are we here? Why are there roaches and water-bugs and all that type of stuff?
Afrika BambaataaThere's a lot of people over time who have brought out all these funky records that everybody has started jumping on like a catch phrase... When Planet Rock came out, then you had all of the electro funk records.
Afrika BambaataaThere are so many millions of records out there, you should always be playing old and new together. This way, people can respect what the early elders of certain musical tastes have given to what we are now, and where we're going in the future. I don't care if it's rap, metal, whatever. You still should play Beatles records mixed with Limp Bizkit mixed with Foghat mixed with Creedence Clearwater Revival, stuff like that.
Afrika BambaataaThat's definitely my goal, and always has been through the Universal Zulu Nation, is to show that music breaks down all that foolishness and can bring all types of people together, especially when you can mix it and shape it. That's the beauty of sampling: taking the old sound and recreating it and making something new, or bringing back the old sounds, mixed with some heavy grooves and beats, so people can remember. "Oh, I remember that, back in the day."
Afrika Bambaataa