Outside the Lines With Rap Genius – Dante Ross Excerpt #3: PE and the Beasties Lyrics

Dante Ross: When I first met Chuck D...I had their demo before it came out. I always listened to it -- I had the album before it came out

SameOldShawn: The first one?

DR: Yeah. Cause Flavor was in jail, and he was waiting for him to come out, so they delayed the album a couple of months. So we used to listen to it, me and the Beasties. That's when I was really into skating. It was real aggressive. I'd always skate to it, that was my shit. We would just play Public Enemy's demo, me and my skater friends, and love it

What people don't realize is that Public Enemy already had this cult of skateboarders that loved them. They already had those formerly punk rock white boys loving them, largely because the Beastie Boys would play that tape for all their friends. It was the record we all looked up to

So I met Chuck D, I thought he was going to be six foot six! When he was five foot seven or eight, I was like, you're not Chuck D. He's like, [booming voice] "Yes I am." I was like, yeah, with that voice, you are Chuck D. I just told him I knew all his music. And me and Chuck started a friendship back then. It was real cool. But I couldn't believe that Chuck D was a regular guy. To me, he was like a mythical figure