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Let's Get Free

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Let's Get Free
The cover art of the album depicts an open call for armed revolution by African revolutionists
Studio album by
dead prez
ReleasedFebruary 8, 2000 (2000-02-08)
Recorded1998–2000
GenrePolitical hip hop
Length69:30
LabelLoud
Producer
Dead prez chronology
Let's Get Free
(2000) 		RBG: Revolutionary But Gangsta
(2004)
Singles from Let's Get Free
  1. "Police State"
    Released: October 27, 1998
  2. "Hip-Hop"
    Released: March 30, 1999
  3. "It's Bigger Than Hip-Hop"
    Released: December 7, 1999
  4. "I'm a African"
    Released: 2000
  5. "Mind Sex"
    Released: August 15, 2000

Let's Get Free is the debut studio album by hip-hop duo dead prez. It was released on February 8, 2000, on Loud Records.[1][2]

Background

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During Stic.man attendance at Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University in the mid-90s, he met M-1.[3][4] Once relocating to Brooklyn after FAMU, due to their mutual love for music and similar political ideology (leftist), they both formed a rap duo in 1996.[4][5]

In the same year that dead prez was formed, they signed a record deal with label Loud Records.[6]

In a 2010 interview with HipHopDX, M-1 goes in depth about the beginning of the process of recording Let's Get Free.

According to me, it started when I met [stic.man]. The reason I always put it in that context is because we were soon to be revolutionaries. On the mission to make sense of what was happening inside the world, I met stic and I'd just moved to Florida to start a new chapter in my life. My family was being destroyed by crack cocaine just like [he] was and so many families were around us. We started to put together our analysis of the world which then came to include the analysis of a revolutionary party called the Uhuru Movement and from there, I was able to put on a new set of glasses that would inform me of how I would need to move in the future in order to change these circumstances and so on and so fourth. So all of this growth is what you hear on Let's Get Free. The actually recording of the album didn't happen until six years after we met.[6]

Concept

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The album goes deep into topics and issues that affect the hip hop community through the duo's political view,[7] such as the public education system, racism, freedom of speech and police brutality.[6] Let's Get Free exposes stories such as Fred Hampton Jr having the possibility of being framed and both members relationship with Christianity.[8]

Recording and production

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Lord Jamar and Kanye West contributed to the production of the album

Singles

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The opening track of Let's Get Free, "Wolves", is centered around an metaphor by Uhuru Movement’s Chairman Omali Yeshitela related to white people distributing crack in the black community to hunters in the Arctic fooling wolves into cutting themselves and, subsequently, bleeding themselves to death. This metaphor explains how life under capitalism and white supremacy has engulfed the Black community in self-destructive cycles, and asks us to turn our attention to our true adversary, "the oppressor."[9]

Artwork

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The cover art of the album depicts an open call for armed revolution by aligning "contemporary, capitalist, repressive America with colonial-era Africa in the form of an armed village preparing to strike," as stated by The Guardian. Consequently, the cover was censored in many outlets across the United States.[10]

Critical reception

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Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[11]
Chicago Sun-Times[12]
Entertainment WeeklyB[13]
NME7/10[14]
Pitchfork8.2/10[15]
Rolling Stone[16]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide[17]
The Source[18]

Although the production was derided by some critics as a "dull musical backdrop" (such as Dave Heaton from PopMatters),[19] Pound wrote that Let's Get Free was called a "return to politically conscious rap."[20] Rolling Stone gave the album four stars and lauded its equation of "classrooms with jail cells, the projects with killing fields and everything from water to television with conduits for brainwashing by the system".[21] Rawiya Kameir from Pitchfork wrote that "Let’s Get Free wasn't built around the aesthetics of consciousness—like some of their incense-lighting, kufi-wearing peers in the late-'90s "conscious-rap" boom [...] but around the politics of liberation."[15]

Cassie Balfour for The Michigan Daily was impressed by the album, quoting "the group's militancy, unapologetic anger and complete rejection of the commercialism — not just of hip hop (which is just a symptom of something deeper) but of American culture in general." Balfour would go on to state that "Dead Prez still isn’t to a lot of people’s tastes, and many would accuse the group of advocating violence. But I would argue that’s a superficial take on Let’s Get Free."[22] Some reviewers were notably critical of the album, such as Andy Capper for NME stating that the album "sometimes [get] a little too po-faced for its own good." and tracks "like 'Mind Sex' and 'Be Healthy', while worthy in sentiment, lack the musical invention or lyrical dexterity to match the message."

Legacy

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Track listing

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No.TitleProducer(s)Length
1."Wolves" (Chairman Omali Yeshitela)dead prez2:16
2."I'm a African" (additional vocals by Indo and Abu)Hedrush & dead prez3:19
3."'They' Schools" (chorus vocals by Keanna Henson)Hedrush & dead prez5:06
4."Hip-Hop"Hedrush & dead prez3:33
5."Police State" (opening vocals by Chairman Omali Yeshitela)Hedrush & dead prez3:40
6."Behind Enemy Lines" (phone calls by Ness, Toya and Divine)Hedrush & dead prez3:03
7."Assassination"Lord Jamar & dead prez2:01
8."Mind Sex" (additional vocals by Umi, Becca Byram, poem by Abiodun Oyewole)dead prez4:51
9."We Want Freedom" (additional vocals from "The Spook Who Sat by the Door")Hedrush & dead prez4:33
10."Be Healthy" (additional vocals by Prodigy)Hedrush & dead prez2:34
11."Discipline" (phone call by Dedan and Nimrod)dead prez1:37
12."Psychology" (additional vocals by True Image, poem read by Umi)Lord Jamar & dead prez5:56
13."Happiness"Lord Jamar & dead prez3:48
14."Animal in Man"dead prez4:31
15."You'll Find a Way"dead prez3:13
16."It's Bigger Than Hip-Hop" (featuring Tahir and People's Army)Kanye West & dead prez3:55
17."Propaganda" (additional vocals by Becca Byram, ending vocals by Huey Newton)Lord Jamar & dead prez5:14
18."The Pistol" (featuring Maintain of Illegal Tendencies)Lord Jamar & dead prez4:27

Personnel

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  • stic.man – lead vocals, production, executive producer, art direction
  • M-1 – lead vocals, production, executive producer, art direction
  • Hedrush – production, drum programming
  • Lord Jamar – production
  • Kanye West – production
  • Tahir (of Hedrush) – vocals
  • Maintain (of Illegal Tendencies) – vocals
  • Indo (of People's Army) – additional vocals
  • Abu (of People's Army) – additional vocals
  • Keanna Henson – additional vocals
  • Ness (of A-Alikes) – additional vocals
  • Toya (of People's Army) – additional vocals
  • Divine (of People's Army) – additional vocals
  • Umi – additional vocals
  • Becca Byram – additional vocals, keyboards
  • Abiodun Oyewole (of The Last Poets) – additional vocals
  • Prodigy (of Mobb Deep) – additional vocals
  • Dedan (of Illegal Tendencies) – additional vocals
  • Nimrod (of Illegal Tendencies) – additional vocals
  • True Image – additional vocals
  • Mark Batson – keyboards
  • Christos Tsantilios – recording, mixing
  • Blair Wells – recording
  • Nastee – recording
  • Doug Wilson – mixing
  • Bernard Grubman – guitar
  • Pressure of Fambase – keyboards
  • Melvin Gibbs – bass
  • Laura J. Seaton-Finn – strings
  • Joshua – horns
  • Mista Sinista (of The X-Ecutioners) – scratching
  • Sean Cane – drums, executive producer
  • Matt Life – executive producer
  • Schott Free – executive producer
  • Stuart "Kamau" Lyle – cover concept
  • Kerry DeBruce – art direction, design
  • Lorraine West – illustration
  • Anthony Cutajar – album photography
  • Saba – road photography
  • Corbis – archival images

Charts

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Album

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Chart (2000) Peak
position
US Billboard 200[23] 73
US Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums (Billboard)[24] 22

Singles

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Title Year Chart positions
US
Rap
"Hip-Hop" 1999 49
"It's Bigger Than Hip-Hop" 2000 43

References

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  1. ^ Jahmal, Karlton (November 23, 2022). "Top 10 Afrocentric Hip-Hop Albums". HotNewHipHop. Retrieved March 14, 2025.
  2. ^ Allah, Sha Be (February 8, 2023). "dead prez Dropped Their Debut Album 'Let's Get Free' 23 Years Ago". The Source. Retrieved March 14, 2025.
  3. ^ Grove, Rashad (August 23, 2023). "Stic.man of dead prez on Legacy, Wellness in Hip Hop, and Partnering with eBay & Kirpa Auction House for Hip Hop 50". BET. Retrieved April 26, 2025.
  4. ^ a b Burney 2025, para. 2.
  5. ^ Belle 2014, p. 296.
  6. ^ a b c Caputo, Matt (July 29, 2010). "dead prez: Let's Get Free 10th Anniversary Feature". HipHopDX. Retrieved April 26, 2025.
  7. ^ Burney 2025, para. 3.
  8. ^ Burney 2025, para. 8.
  9. ^ Aku, Timmhotep (November 1, 2019). "dead prez was right about everything". Afropunk. Retrieved April 27, 2025.
  10. ^ Clark, Ashley (March 11, 2015). "Kendrick Lamar's To Pimp a Butterfly album cover: an incendiary classic". The Guardian. sec. Dead Prez – Let's Get Free (2000). Retrieved 22 April 2025.
  11. ^ Conaway, Matt. "Let's Get Free – Dead Prez". AllMusic. Retrieved November 6, 2016.
  12. ^ Kyles, Kyra (June 11, 2000). "dead prez, 'Let's Get Free' (Loud Records)". Chicago Sun-Times. Archived from the original on November 18, 2018. Retrieved November 6, 2016.
  13. ^ Takahashi, Corey (March 17, 2000). "Let's Get Free". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved November 6, 2016.
  14. ^ Capper, Andy (March 4, 2000). "Dead Prez – Let's Get Free". NME. Archived from the original on April 12, 2000. Retrieved November 6, 2016.
  15. ^ a b Kameir, Rawiya (November 3, 2019). "dead prez: Let's Get Free Album Review". Pitchfork. Retrieved November 3, 2019.
  16. ^ Ex, Kris (May 11, 2000). "Dead Prez: Let's Get Free". Rolling Stone. Archived from the original on November 19, 2008. Retrieved November 6, 2016.
  17. ^ Caramanica, Jon (2004). "Dead Prez". In Brackett, Nathan; Hoard, Christian (eds.). The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (4th ed.). Simon & Schuster. p. 221. ISBN 0-7432-0169-8.
  18. ^ Davis, André LeRoy (March 2000). "Dead Prez: Let's Get Free". The Source. No. 126. p. 246.
  19. ^ "Dead Prez: Let's Get Free – PopMatters Music Review". Archived from the original on 2004-06-18.
  20. ^ "Pound Magazine Review: dead prez – Let's Get Free". Archived from the original on 2004-12-08.
  21. ^ Ex, K. "RollingStone.com: Let's Get Free : dead prez : Review". Rolling Stone. Archived from the original on 2005-02-18.
  22. ^ Balfour, Cassie (November 16, 2011). "From the vault: 'Let's Get Free' inspires a revolution". The Michigan Daily. Retrieved April 27, 2025.
  23. ^ "Dead Prez Chart History (Billboard 200)". Billboard. Retrieved November 3, 2019.
  24. ^ "Dead Prez Chart History (Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums)". Billboard. Retrieved November 3, 2019.

Work Cited

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Secondary sources
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