East Coast for Life...Where HipHop and Libertarianism Meet takes on the Guardian for shoddy journalism.

Ice T is not a hip hop superstar by any stretch, but I can see how that could be confused. Now stating that PE is from LA is a joke.

Ice T, in hip-hop terms, is unquestionably the real deal. Now 44, he released his first rap record in 1983, becoming one of the first musicians outside of the genre's New York birthplace to gain favour within the nascent hip-hop community. By the end of the decade he and the bands Public Enemy and NWA had succeeded between them in establishing Los Angeles as hip hop's second, western, centre of gravity. Literate, politicised and angry, they didn't share the preoccupation of New York's early, cheerful hip-hop crews with clubs and parties; they rapped instead about car chases and corrupt police officers, niggaz and triggaz, pimps and hos - outraging feminists and terrifying conservative America in the process.


I dont't think you can include Public Enemy in any manner in establishing LA as "the western center of gravity" of hip-hop. I think this can pretty clearly be taken as proof of shoddy journalism.