Collegiate Times

The Unfortunate Reality Behind Flavor Flav

They say you should always strike while the iron?s hot. Unfortunately it?s not easy to know when you?ve gone from striking a hot iron to flogging a horse that, if not at this point dead, is in mortal danger of expiring. Cue Flavor Flav.
Flavor Flav first came to us by way as jester for Public Enemy. With Chuck D sending strong and serious messages, Public Enemy needed someone to lighten things up a little, and Flavor Flav fit the bill.

Of course, all good things must come to an end, and when Public Enemy ran out of steam, Flavor Flav fizzled into limbo. But thanks to the marketing genius of VH1, the American public was given one more opportunity to see the entertainer. Flavor Flav made the most of his appearance on the ?Surreal Life? and fortunately for him, the public gobbled him up, and he was able to spin off two series, ?Strange Love,? and the highly popular and successful ?Flavor of Love.?

This brings us up to date and now, after two seasons of ?Flavor of Love,? the former Public Enemy emcee has decided to release what he?s dubbed his ?first and only? solo album. Consider ourselves lucky.

Flavor Flav?s self-titled album is made up of a whopping 20 tracks and is well over an hour long. A lot of work was put into this album, but sadly, at the end of the day, it?s still a lousy collection of music. The album has just about every type of track imaginable, whether it?s comedy like ?The Jookz,? R&B in ?Baby Baby Baby? or the rap that made him famous in the first place in ?Guess Whooz Back.? No matter the track, the album has a rushed feel to it. The sound isn?t crisp, and there is no fluidity as a whole. It?s a hatchet job. How could something like this happen to a former great?

When an album like this gets released, it?s usually just about trying to make some money while you can. But when it comes to Flavor Flav, there is a certain degrading tone. If you want a peek in the good ol? days of bigoted America, then look no further than VH1 and the American public?s treatment of Flavor Flav. It?s clear that a management job like this has racial undertones that demonstrate that the sambo of 1920s film hasn?t necessarily disappeared. People have come to expect Flavor Flav to tap dance and entertain.

This very unfortunate circumstance haunts Flavor Flav to this day. Is he being laughed with or laughed at? Many within the black community have labeled Flav?s behavior as a relic of the 19th century vaudevillian minstrel show. Jason Whitlock called him ?Mantan? from Spike Lee?s film, ?Bamboozeled.? Others have labeled him as ?Bojangler.?

It?s the age long dilemma that?s always plagued black artists in this country. Whether it?s Richard Pryor, Dave Chappelle or Flavor Flav, the issue remains: Am I dancing, and if so, who am I dancing for? Pryor and Chappelle both lost sleep, lost money and lost fans because they decided that doing a jig on screen was a means of oppression in order to achieve fame. However, it seems unlikely that Flavor Flav will follow the Pryors and Chappelles of the world. He seems content with his current situation.

Flavor Flav had the opportunity to release an epic album but squandered the opportunity. Just think about it. Flavor Flav?s real name is William Dreyton. It?s much more likely that an album about the Flavor Flav persona given by Dreyton would trump any of his previous work, but because we are so consumed with Flav two-steppin? along the stage, the true saga of Dreyton will never be told.

I hope the sacrifice is worth it to Dreyton, but more importantly, I hope his audience really enjoys what they?re getting because it?s coming to them at an incredible cost: human dignity.