Paris Raps in Big Apple

By Errol Nazareth, The Toronto Sun

Notes from New York: While in the Big Apple to check out a rare club appearance by Public Enemy, Ice-T (minus Body Count), House of Pain, Boss and Onyx, I hooked up with Paris, popularly known as the Black Panther of Rap.

TIle hip-hop nation - indeed, the entire music community - best brace itself for a controversy.

It centres around a rap on Paris' exceptional effort, Sleeping With The Enemy. The song is "Bush Killa." Here's a sampling:

"So don't be tellin' me to get the non-violent spirit,

'Cause when I'm violent is the only time you devils hear it.

Rat-a-tat goes the gat to his devil face,

I hope he thinks of how he's done us when he's laid to waste."

Not surprisingly, Warner (home of Ice-T) and PolyGram declined to release Enemy, so the Oakland-based rapper released it on his newly formed Scarface Records.

At an invitation-only press briefing Tuesday, Marjorie Heins, director or the American Civil Liberties Union Arts Censorship project, threw the ACLU's support behind Paris.

"Under our legal system, we hold criminals responsible tor their acts; we don't blame songs or other forms of artistic expression," Heins said.