Radical Music Videos: Lupe Fiasco

Lupe Fiasco is a breath of fresh air to the ever disgusting, misogynistic, homophobic, bling-bling corporate bulls**t that passes for hip hop today. His first album, the critically acclaimmed Food and Liquor, not only took on corrupted rap, but also HIV/AIDS, immigration and the War on Terror. His new album, The Cool, does the same social commentary. I bought it yesterday and highly recommend it.

From Foreign Policy in Focus - Top Ten Foreign Policy Tunes

The most explosive track on the album is the brilliant, “Little Weapon,” which shows how the U.S. government recruits people from communities under attack at home to go fight in wars that the United States has started abroad. Every counter-recruitment activist in this country should use this song:

I killed another man today,
Shot him in his back as he ran away,
Then I blew up his hut with a hang grenade
Cut his wife’s throat as she put her hands to pray…
Then there is the soft, subtle ballad, "Intruder Alert" that articulately conveys what is at the heart of the immigration issue and places the immigrant as the victim and not the United States,

Famine stricken his home, land and no social standing,
In the economic pecking order, emergency relief,
Distribution systems is in disorder, he's checking water, making sure,
It's safe enough for his daughter to float across in,
The boat he built, hopefully strong enough to support,
Praying border patrols don't catch her,
And process and deport her, before she reach the shore,
Of the land of the free, where they feed you,
Treat you like equals, deceive you, stamp you,
And call you illegal.

Check out "I Gotcha" from the last album