In 1993, Watts rapper Kam released his “Peace Treaty” song under Ice Cube’s “Street Knowledge” label which celebrated the gang truce between Blood and Crips in the aftermath of the infamous Los Angeles riots. Fast forward to the year 2014, Kam is out to unite once again but this time its two groups divided by race and color that occupy a large portion of Los Angeles urban neighborhoods: African-Americans and Hispanics. In the wake of the recent racist comments by Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling which involves both blacks and Hispanics,
Kam feels it’s the right time to release his new song “Wouldn’t Be L.A.” which also features rappers Young We$t and Omar Cruz. “The first part of the hook uses 2Pac’s line from To Live and Die in L.A. where he states, “It wouldn’t be L.A. without Mexicans, black love, brown pride and the sets again” and the second part is from Donald Sterling’s phone conversation where he’s being himself. To me, the timing is right because the girl that he was speaking to is black and Hispanic. Just like with the “Peace Treaty” song, the gang-truce opened up a door for us to have a dialogue, and we can have one about this too. We don’t have to agree on everything but we can have a universal dialogue go on and that’s right up my alley,” says Kam about the new song.
Speak On It!