The Last Poets

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The Last Poets
The Last Poets on their debut album
The Last Poets on their debut album
Background information
Origin New York, NY
Genre(s) Spoken Word, Poetry
Years active 1969-Present
Members
Jalal Mansur Nuriddin
Abiodun Oyewole
Umar Bin Hassan
See history for description of group fissures and activities
Former members
Suliaman el Hadi
Nilaja

The Last Poets is a group of poets and musicians who arose from the late 1960s African American civil rights movement's black nationalist thread. Their name is taken from a poem by the South African revolutionary poet Keorapetse Kgositsile, who believed he was in the last era of poetry before guns would take over.

Contents

[edit] History

The original Last Poets formed on May 19, 1968 (Malcolm X's birthday), at Marcus Garvey Park (formerly Mount Morris Park, at 124th Street and Fifth Avenue) in the East Harlem neighborhood of New York City. The original members were Felipe Luciano, Gylan Kain, and David Nelson.

The group continued to evolve via a 1969 Harlem writers' workshop known as "East Wind." Jalal Mansur Nuriddin, Umar Bin Hassan, and Abiodun Oyewole, along with percussionist Nilaja, are generally considered the primary and core members of the group, as they appeared on the group's 1970 self-titled debut (contracted by noted Jimi Hendrix producer Alan Douglas) and, in various combinations, on subsequent releases. Other early East Wind alumni, however -- Luciano, Kain, and Nelson -- recorded separately as "The Original Last Poets," gaining some renown as the soundtrack artists for the 1971 film "Right On!". See also Performance (1970 film) soundtrack: song "Wake Up Niggers."

Having reached top-10 charts success with their debut album, the Last Poets went on to release the follow-up, This Is Madness, without then-incarcerated Abiodun Oyewole, an album which featured more politically charged poetry and which resulted in the group being listed under the counter-intelligence program (founded by then-President Richard Nixon). Hassan left the group following This Is Madness, to be replaced by Sulieman El-Hadi in time for Chastisement (1972). The album introduced a sound the group called "jazzoetry", leaving behind the spare percussion of the previous albums in favor of a blending of jazz and funk instrumentation with poetry.

The remainder of the 1970s saw a decline in the group's popularity. In the 1980s and beyond, however, the group gained renewed renown with the rise of rap, often being name-checked as grandfathers and founders of the new music movement, and themselves collaborated with Bristol based British post punk band The Pop Group, among others. Nuriddin and El-Hadi (El-Hadi is now deceased) worked on several projects under the Last Poets name, including 1984's Oh My People and 1988's Freedom Express, after which Oyewole and Hassan began recording separately under the same name, releasing Holy Terror in 1995 (re-released on Innerhythmic in 2004) and The Time Has Come in 1997.

[edit] Recent developments

More recently The Last Poets found their fame again refreshed through a collaboration with rap artist Common on the song "The Corner," as well as with the Wu-Tang Clan-affiliated political rap group "Black Market Militia" on the song "The Final Call."

Jalal Mansur Nuriddin aka Lightning Rod (The Hustlers Convention 1972) recently collaborated with UK based up and coming poet Mark T Watson (aka Malik Al Nasir) writing the foreword to Mark's debut poetry collection Ordinary Guy published in December 2004 by Liverpool based publisher Fore-Word Press Ltd link title. Jalal's foreword was written in rhyme and has now been recorded for release in 2007 in a collaborative album by Mark T Watson's band Malik & The OG's featuring Gil Scott-Heron, Percussionist Larry Mc Donald, drummers Rod Youngs & Kenny Powell, poet Benjamin Zephaniah and a host of young rappers from Washington DC. Produced by Robbie Gordon (Secretary of Entertainment Productions) the albums "Rhythms of the Diaspora; Part 1 & 2" are the 1st albums of thier kind to unite these pioneers of poetry RAP with each other, as well as the youth of this Rap generation. To be released by Fore-Word Press in 2007 [1]

[edit] Select discography

(Poets: Abiodun Oyewole, Alafia Pudim (a.k.a. Jalal Mansur Nuriddin), & Omar Bin Hassan)
(Poets: Alafia Pudim (a.k.a. Jalal Mansur Nuriddin) & Omar Bin Hassan)
  • Chastisement (1973)
(Poets: Jalal Mansur Nuriddin & Sulieman El-Hadi)
  • The Hustlers Convention (1973)
(Poets: Lightnin Rod aka Jalal Mansur Nuriddin)
  • At Last (1974)
(Poets: Jalaluddin Mansur Nuriddin, Sulieman El-Hadi, & Omar Bin Hassan)
  • Delights of the Garden (1976)
(Poets: Jalaluddin Mansur Nuriddin & Sulieman El-Hadi)
  • Oh, My People (1984)
(Poets: Sulieman El-Hadi & Jalaluddin Mansur Nuriddin)
  • Freedom Express (1988)
(Poets: Sulienman El-Hadi & Jalaluddin Mansur Nuriddin)
  • Scatterap / Home (1994)
(Poets: Sulieman El-Hadi & Jalaluddin Mansur Nuriddin)
  • Holy Terror (1995)
(Poets: Abiodun Oyewole & Umar Bin Hassan)
  • Science Friction (2004)
(Poets: Jalaluddin Mansur Nuriddin aka Jalal)

[edit] Books

Vibes from the scribes - Pluto Press 1985

Foreword to "Ordinary Guy" by Mark T. Watson (a.k.a. Malik Al Nasir) - Fore-Word Press Ltd. 2004

[edit] Films

  • 1971 - Right On!: Poetry on Film (Original Last Poets). Directed by Herbert Danska.

[edit] External links

[edit] See also

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