Jewish Hegemony in the Music World
The
Jews who dominated Tin Pan Alley and the turn-of-the century vaudeville
world were also central in the popularization and propagation of
profoundly demeaning African-American stereotypes. Pamela Brown Lavitt
notes Tin Pan Alley and the many onstage Jewish "coon callers":
"Jewish
women vaudevillians at the turn of the century popularized what is now a
little-discussed and misunderstood performance venue, known as "coon
shouting" ... Trying to break into the entertainment business, [Tin Pan
Alley entrepreneurs'] aesthetics were circumscribed in a vehemently
antiblack and xenophobic milieu. By the mid-1880-s they had formed a
tight-knit Tin Pan Alley industry that came to dominate vaudeville and
early black musicals ... Intended as comedy, coon song ranged from
jocular and dismissive to cruel and sadistic ... Coon song sheet music
and illustrated covers proliferated defamatory images of blacks in
barely coded slanderous lyrics. For example, the 'N' word and associated
inferences were dispatched in words like 'mammy,' 'honey boy,'
'pickinniny,' 'chocolate,' 'watermelon,' 'possum,' and the most
prevalent 'coon.'" [LAVITT, P., 2000, p. 253-258]
Especially
well known Jewish "coon callers" included Sophie Tucker, Stella Mayhew,
Fanny Brice, Anna Held, Eddie Cantor, and Al Jolson.
Jews
have long gravitated to an entrepreneurial exploitation of the Black
cultural scene and jazz music. As Burton Peretti notes:
"Aside
from the hazards of the mob [organized crime] environment, the
exploitation faced by jazz players was rather typical for this era
[1930s and 1940s]. Jazz, like minstrels and ragtime before it, came
under the control of professional promoters who sought to make music
profitable. [They adapted] the technique of advertising, song plugging,
and vaudeville ... Some promoters, like Joe Glaser (who managed Louis
Armstrong in the thirties) were associates of organized crime who left
the underworld when prohibition was repealed. Glaser apparently had
overseen Al Capone's profits from the Sunset Cafe and a prostitution
ring before he became Armstrong's manager in 1935. Many more promoters,
however, were veterans of Tin Pan Alley, Manhattan's song-publishing
industry, including Irving Mills, a former singer and songwriter who
managed Duke Ellington's and other black bands in the thirties."
[PERETTI, p. 147]
Glaser
ran the Associated Booking Corporation, often "the exclusive agent for
many of the top Black performers. He became a close associate of many of
the top underworld figures in Chicago and New York, whom he met through
his band-booking agency." [MOLDEA, p. 14] Glaser had been an early
partner in the company with eventual MCA chief Jules Stein. In 1962,
mob-linked attorney Sidney Korshak, also Jewish, gained control of the
ABC company. [MCDOUGAL, p. 141] Mills and Paddy Harmon, owner of
Chicago's Dreamland Cafe, "sought and gained spurious renown, as Mills
took partial credit for many Ellington compositions and Harmon patented
and gave his name to a trumpet mute that had long been popular among Joe
Oliver and other black players." [PERETTI, p. 148]
The
rip-off of Black artists was a norm for the era. As Al Silverman notes
in the case of Fats Waller: "In his time Fats wrote the melodies to over
360 songs. Not that many bear his name today, unfortunately, because
when money was needed he'd write the music and sell all rights to
unscrupulous Tin Pan Alley characters." [SILVERMAN, p. 129-130] "That
practice of show business share-cropping ... in the 1920s and 1930s,"
notes the director of Harlem's Apollo Amateur Night, Ralph Cooper,
"existed right on through the fifties and sixties. Its bitterness still
exists among many performers to this day -- a bitterness from the theft
of their songs, their sound, their talent." [COOPER, p. 199]
Jewish
singers "Sophie Tucker, Eddie Cantor and Al Jolson," notes Donald
Fischer, "performed in blackface at the beginning of their careers,
singing black songs. They later built on their successes in this medium
to develop national statures and professional sucesses with other music.
However, their early songs were for the most part borrowed or
plagiarized from African-American sources, with little or no public
recognition -- or monetary reward -- for the creative talents that
produced them." [FISCHER, D., 6-30-2000, p. 21A]
Jews
were also prominent in the overseeing of the Black community's jazz
life, including the control of musical clubs in Black neighborhoods in a
variety of American cities. "The invasion of the Black community by
organized crime lords with connections to downtown money," notes Ted
Vincent, "was certainly the most sensational contribution to the loss of
Black oversight of neighborhood dance halls and theatres." [VINCENT, p.
176] "Slumming resorts" served a largely non-Black audience and "were
noted for their riverboat decor, fake magnolia plants, and nearly nude
dancers ... Perhaps the nationwide pioneer in the resorts was Isadore
Shor's Entertainment Cafe." [VINCENT, p. 78] In Harlem, such clubs
included Connie's Inn (owned by Connie Innerman) and the famed Apollo
Theatre. "From the opening of the [Apollo] building in 1912 until 1934,"
notes Vincent, "the theatre was a showcase for white [i.e., largely
Jewish] vaudeville burlesque shows, with white strippers coming to be
the main attraction." [VINCENT, p. 189] The Apollo was eventually sold
by "Burlesque Kings Hurtig and Seaman" to Sid Cohen and Morris Sussman,
and then to Frank Schiffman and Leo Brecher. Brecher also owned the
Douglas, the Roosevelt, the Lafayette Theatre ("the prime showcase for
black talent in America") [COOPER, p. 44], and the Harlem Opera House
located a block from the Apollo. [VINCENT, p. 189-192] Jay Fagan, and
Moses and Charles Gale (Galewski), founded the popular Savoy Ballroom in
1926.
Mel Watkins notes the reputation in the Black community of dominant mogul Frank Schiffman:
"Schiffman
was a controversial figure in black entertainment. Admired and
respected by some, scorned and excoriated by others, he was rarely
viewed neutrally. His Machiavellian approach to business is a matter of
record, and most would admit that he was an unrepentant shark in
business matters. He quickly eliminated his competitors and for decades
eradicated all serious competition, which earned him the grudging esteem
of other showmen. Among performers, however, the estimate was not
glowing. Of his knowledge of black acts, John Bubbles [an
African-American performer of the era] said, 'Only thing he knew was how
to get people cheap as he could, and work them as long as he could.'
And John Hammond, a record producer and friend, flatly declared 'Frank
had no artistic taste at all.'" [WATKINS, M., 1994, p. 386]
Samuel Charters and Leonard Kunstad note the situation of another famous nightclub:
"The
Cotton Club had opened at 142nd St. and Lexington Ave. in 1922 with a
strict policy of white only. The owner, Bernard Levy, had pressed his
policy, despite loud protests from the Harlem community. He used Negro
orchestras and a Negro revue and ran it as a tourist attraction for
society people who wanted to see a little of 'Harlem life' ... The club
was forced to admit colored patrons during the next winter, but the
prices he kept high and it remained predominantly a tourist attraction
until the Depression." [CHARTERS, p. 217] New York's Latin Quarter club
(with eventual branches in other cities) was also owned by a Jew, Lou
Walters, father of famous newscaster Barbara Walters; Monte Kay was the
founder of the famous Birdland jazz club. He too was Jewish. Mobster
Morris Levy later controlled the place. As Israeli scholar Robert
Rockaway notes about a common undercurrent in such night life: "Jewish
Gangsters frequented nightclubs ... In fact, Jewish underworld figures
owned many nightspots and speakeasies. In New York, Dutch Schultz owned
the Embassy Club. Charley 'King' Solomon owned Boston's Coconut Grove.
In Newark, Longy Zwillman owned the Blue Mirror and the Casablanca Club.
Boo Boo Hoff owned the Picadilly Cafe in Philadelphia. Detroit's
[Jewish] Purple Gang owned Luigi's Cafe, one of the city's more opulent
clubs. Jewish singers and comedians, such as Al Jolson, Eddie Cantor,
Fanny Brice and Sophie Tucker played in the mob clubs." [ROCKAWAY, R.,
1993, p. 205]
Upset
with outsider exploitation and degradation of the Black community
(where many night clubs were located), there was an effort by the Marcus
Garvey African-American movement as early as the 1920s to institute
Black-owned Liberty Halls "where the musical offerings would be part of
an overall effort at community uplift and not just a profit-oriented
business." [VINCENT, p. 114] (From France, even the international
jet-set luxury playground/resort of "Club Med" was founded by Gerard
Blitz, and built to power by Gilbert Trigano. Both are also Jewish. By
1999 the firm had 116 sites in 36 countries, now headed by Gilbert's son
Serge. [REGULY, E., 4-25-88, pl. 24; MCDONELL, E., 5-1-99, p. D10]
Hollywood's Roxy nightclub was founded by the Jewish managerial trio of
David Geffen, Loud Adler, and Bill Graham. [KING, T., 2000, p. 187]
Jews
have of course been prominent over the years as musical performers.
These included three of the most influential band leaders of the 1930s
-- Benny Goodman ("the King of Swing"), Harry James, and Artie Shaw
(Arthur Arshansky). More recent popular names include Leonard Bernstein,
Andre Previn, Arthur Fiedler, Stephen Sondheim, and many others.
As
noted earlier too, by the 1930s MCA (Music Corporation of America) was a
powerful talent agency, founded by Jules Stein and built later to power
by Sidney Sheinbein and Lew Wasserman, who ultimately became one of the
most powerful men in Hollywood. Ronald Brownstein observes that: "By
the mid-1930s, MCA controlled many of the country's most popular bands,
from Tommy Dorsey to Artie Shaw." [BROWNSTEIN, p. 181] For years, MCA's
Jules Stein, adds Michale Pye, "ran the music business so toughly that
no dance hall would stand against him." [PYE, p. 18-19] In a 1946
antitrust trial that MCA lost, a Los Angeles federal judge "declared
that MCA held a virtual monopoly over the entertainment business." The
presiding judge also stated that MCA was "the Octopus ... with tentacles
reaching out into all phases and grasping everything in show business."
[MOLDEA, p. 2, 3] "The one man," notes non-Jewish band leader Guy
Lombardo, "who probably more than any other solidified the business and
hastened the era of the Big Bands was Jules Stein. He had started his
Music Corporation of America in Chicago and to that city gravitated
bands from all over the country, seeking the buildup and engagements
they would get if MCA took them in the fold." Lombardo was also under
contract to Stein. [LOMBARDO, G., 1975, p. 153] Stein even wrote an
introduction to Lombardo's autobiography.
For
years MCA increasingly interfaced with Chicago's Mafia and other
underworld personalities. Seemingly omnipresent in Hollywood was lawyer
Sidney Korshak. "A close friend of Stein's and Wasserman's," says Dan
Moldea, "Korshak quickly became one of the most powerful influences in
the entertainment industry and in California politics ... [MOLDEA, p. 5]
... Korshak ... has been described by federal investigators as the
principle link between the [Hollywood] legitimate business world and
organized crime." [MOLDEA, p. 2]
And
rock and roll? The Jewish foundation continued. "The most famous and
important [rhythm and blues disc jockey]," note Steve Chapple and Reebee
Garofalo, "was ... Alan Freed, the father of Rock 'n' Roll ... Freed
was credited with co-writing fifteen rock and rock hits including Chuck
Berry's 'Maybelline,' but he did little more than promote any of them."
[CHAPPLE, p. 56-57] A biography of Freed notes that "by 1956, there was
no bigger name in rock and roll than Freed, except Elvis Presley."
[JACKSON, p. ix] (Another of America's best known early disc jockeys was
also Jewish, Murray the K, aka Murray Kaufman). In 1960, Freed was
indicted for accepting $30,000 in bribes to play songs at his radio
station. "[Freed] grabbed the kids and led them to the great rock candy
mountain," says Albert Goldman, "He named their music, coined its
us-against-them rhetoric, created rock show biz, including the package
tour ... Alan Freed is really one of the principal exhibits in the Rock
'n' Roll Hall of Ill Fame ... [He] was not only a crook but a
self-righteous hypocrite. Even [Freed's manager] Morris Levy [with deep
ties to the criminal underworld, particular the Mafioso Gigante family]
had to concede that the 'Father of Rock 'n' Roll' was not a nice man.
Speaking as one Jew to another Jew about a third Jew, Levy said simply:
'He could have been another Hitler.'" [GOLDMAN, p. 519-520]
In
a book about the Atlantic Records empire (later swallowed by Warners),
Dorothy Wade and Justine Picardie noted Morris Levy and the kinds of
people that populated the rock and roll industry: "The truth is, with or
without mob connections, Morris Levy was much more typical of the new
music moguls than either [non-Jewish] Ahmet Ertegun or [Jewish] Jerry
Wexler ... The world in which Atlantic had to survive was populated
largely by hoodlums and hustlers." [WADE, p. 57] As Syd Nathan, the
owner of King Records, once said, "You want to be in the record
business? The first thing you learn is that everyone is a liar." [WADE,
p. 60] "The early rhythm and blues companies were run by a fraternity of
Jews ... They were tough and they were shrewd -- some say unscrupulous
-- and they were alternately loved, despised, respected, and feared. The
deep bond of these cultural outsiders prompted one gentile, mild rebuke
in his voice, to comment that 'Yiddish was the second language of the
record business." [COHODAS, N., p. 3-4, 2000]
"To
the general public," notes Steve Chapple and Reebee Garofalo, "the
music business seems to have a tremendous amount of corruption."
[CHAPPLE, p. 226] "I think in Hollywood," media psychologist Stuart
Fischel of California State University at Los Angeles told the Los
Angeles Times in 1993, "people get into a kind of mind meld. You can
come in as a relatively moral and ethical person, but eventually
[Hollywood] produces a re-socializing of a subculture with different
norms and ethics based on hedonism and materialism. It's hard to know
what's going to breach the bounds of acceptable criminality in
Hollywood." [ELLER, p. B8, B11] Aside from drugs, prostitution, and all
the other extracurricular norms of the interrelated music, film, and
television worlds of Hollywood, just at the most basic business level,
"payola [bribery] has been a key factor in the establishment of major
artists," says Roger Karshner, "the evolution of publishing dynasties
and the creation of recording empires. Payola, layola, and taking care
of business are the ABC's of the music industry past and present. It has
taken many forms, and many publishers, artists, managers, and record
people at all levels have participated in payola practices." [KARSHNER,
p. 39]
Probably
the most important early rhythm and blues recording company was Chess
Records, founded by Leonard and Phillip Chess, Jewish immigrants from
Poland. They started out with a scrap metal business in the ghetto, then
moved into the liquor business, eventually owning several bars in the
Black neighborhoods of South Chicago, including the large Macamba Club,
which was "reputedly a prime center for prostitution and heavy drug
dealing." [DIXON, p. 78] The Chess brothers soon recognized a profitable
opportunity open to them with the many Black musical acts that played
at their nightclubs; the entrepreneurs soon embarked upon a recording
business, eventually producing blues, gospel, and rock and rock music.
Seminal Black artists who signed on to the Chess label included Bo
Diddley, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Etta James, Chuck
Berry, and many others. Berry's songs were among the most influential in
rock and roll history. "Some people have called Leonard and Phillip
Chess visionaries who recognized the potential in the visceral blues of
post-World War II Chicago, "says Don Snowden, who co-wrote the
auto-biography of bluesman Willie Dixon, "A far greater number have
branded the Chess brothers as exploiters who systematically took
advantage of the artists who created that music." [DIXON, p. 78] The
Rolling Stones even found seminal bluesman Muddy Waters still painting
the Chess's home when they came to record in Chicago. [WADE, p. 71]
Frank
Schiffman, owner of a number of musical venues in New York's Harlem
area, "was a ruthless competitor who would do anything, including take
advantage of his black employees and exploit the great black artists who
worked for him, in order to increase his profits and beat down the
opposition." [COOPER, p. 44]
"Remember
[Black singer] Little Eva Boyd?" asks Ralph Cooper, "She worked as a
babysitter for two Tin Pan Alley [Jewish] rock and roll writers, Carole
King and Gerry Goffen. They wrote a song called 'Loco-Motion' and they
asked her to sing it ... Now [1990] she lives in North Carolina, where
her people are from. She's a working mother on welfare. She works in a
barbeque kitchen as a cook." [COOPER, p. 196]
In
1997, Black singer Darlene Love won a lawsuit for back royalties
against famous Jewish musical producer Phil Spector. (Originally awarded
$263,000, it was later dropped down to $130,000.) Love was the
anonymous lead singer on a number of 1960s-era Spector productions,
including He's a Rebel, Da Do Ron Ron, He's Sure the Boy I Love, and
other hits. In the early 1980s Ms. Love found herself cleaning toilets
for a living, but her singing career later flourished anew. [WILLMAN,
C., 10-15-88, CALENDAR, p. 10; WARRICK, P., 11-2-98]
"I
didn't know anything about the record business," said early rock and
roll sensation Little Richard (of "Tutti Frutti" fame) about his rock
and roll career. " I was very dumb ... I was just like a sheep among a
bunch of wolves that would devour me at any moment. I think I was taken
advantage of because I was uneducated. I think I was treated inhumane
... I think I was treated wrong and many people got rich out of the
style of music I created. They are all millionaires, writ many times,
and nobody offered me nothing." [WADE, p. 74] Dorothy Wade and Justine
Picardie note Little Richard's lamentation, then add: "To which many, if
not most, of his black musical contemporaries would add: Amen." [WADE,
p. 74] Among others, Richard had in mind the Jewish owner of Specialty
Records, Art Rupe, who many years ago bought the rights to his songs for
a paltry $10,000.
Chuck Berry
remembers being cheated by the Chess brothers: "[Phil Chess finally
acknowledged] in writing that no songwriter royalties had been paid for
three years on my Chess Records product ... [And in a review of Chess
documents] I was surprised to learn that I had been paid the same
songwriter royalties for an LP as I was receiving for a single record.
Chess claimed to be unaware of this 'mistake,' as if they had never
noticed that LPs had between eight and ten songs on them." [BERRY, C.,
p. 246-247]
"In 1974 Howlin' Wolf
filed a lawsuit against Arc Music [the publishing wing of Chess Records,
it was co-owned by the Chess brothers and two brothers of Jewish band
leader Benny Goodman] [COHODAS, N., 2000, p. 37] asking for $2.5 million
for unpaid royalties from his songs ... In 1976 Muddy Waters and Willie
Dixon filed identical lawsuits against the publishing company, alleging
fraud and conspiracy and asking to paid money damages and to have their
publishing contracts voided." [COHODAS, N., 2000, p. 308]
In
1972, Martin Otelsberg became the manager of African-American musician
Bo Diddley. Suspecting in later years that he had been swindled, Diddley
filed suit against Otelsberg's estate in 1994 and recovered $400,000.
As Diddley's lawyer (also Jewish) John Rosenberg noted, "This is a
typical story that's happened time and again to musicians like Bo."
[MORSE, S., 6-18-94, p. 28] Diddley complained of being cheated by the
Chess brothers as well. "To me every nationality has a reason for bein'
here," said Diddley, "an' mostly all the Jewish people own everything.
They got all the money. Give him a thousand dollars, he'll turn it into
ten million. How the heck they do it, I don't know." [COHODAS, N., 2000,
p. 110]
The
Jewish agent-producer exploitation of Black recording artists in the
early rhythm and blues era of the 1940s and 1950s (and later) was
predominant and widespread, entrenching a Black hostility among many to
their Jewish financial controllers to the present day. The following
Jewish entrepreneurs were among those who founded record labels
featuring mainly Black talent: Herman Lubinsky (Savoy Records); the
Braun family (DeLuxe Records); Hy Siegal, Sam Schneider and Ike Berman
(Apollo Records); Saul, Joe, and Jules Bihari (Modern Records); Art Rupe
(Specialty Records-- its biggest hits were those of Little Richard);
Lev, Edward, and Ida Messner (Philo/Aladdin Records); Al Silver and Fred
Mendelsohn (Herald/Ember Records); Paul and Lilian Rainer (Black and
White Records); Sam and Hy Weiss (Old Towne Records; Sol Rabinowitz
(Baton Records -- Rabinowitz eventually became vice president of CBS
International); and Danny Kessler (head of OKeh Records, a "cheap"
branch of Columbia Records). Sydney Nathan controlled both the King and
Federal record labels and Florence Greenberg owned the Mafia-influenced
Scepter Records (featuring the Shirelles and Dionne Warwick). "Those
illiterates," Hy Weiss of Olde Towne once said about his recording
artists, "they would have ended up eating from pails in Delancey Street
if it weren't for us." [WADE, p. 70]
"The
record producers were white," says Nadine Cohodas in her book about the
Chess brothers, "their talent for the most part black, many from
impoverished backgrounds and few with much formal education, living in a
society that regarded them as second-class citizens. The deals between
the two parties were not the negotiations of peers. The relationship
coluld be paternalistic, even condescending. At Chess it sometimes
looked as though Leonard and Phil gave their musicians an allowance
rather than a salary." [COHODAS, N., 2000, p. 4]
The
history of rock and roll is, of course," notes Rich Cohen, "riddled
with pioneering white record men who built careers recording, and
sometimes, exploiting black artists: Morris Levy, that burly,
cigar-smoking product of the Brill Building, allegedly stealing writing
credits from Frankie Lyman; Herman Lubinsky, the founder of Savoy
Records in Newark, New Jersey, throwing around nickels as if they were
manhole covers." [COHEN, R., 6-21-01]
In
Philadelphia, in 1984 lawsuits were swirling around WMOT, a company
that "developed a reputation as an aggressive independent record
producer specializing in the 'Philly sound.'" Formerly owned by Steve
Bernstein, Alan Rubens, and David Chacker, it was acquired by Michael
Goldberg, Allen Cohen, and Jeff and Mark Salvarian. Lawsuits even named
Israel's Bank Leumi among defendants in a scheme to use the record
company to launder drug money. The central player in this accusation was
Larry Lavin, who was indicted as the "kingpin of a 13-member [drug]
ring that allegedly sold $5 million of cocaine a month." [DAUGHEN, 1984]
By
1978 president Oscar Cohen of the Associate Booking Corporation
presided over "the country's biggest black talent booking agency."
[SHAW, A, p. 419, p. 133] Recurrent, "mobbed-up" Morris Levy even
eventually owned Birdland in its heyday, the famous jazz club. [WEXLER,
p. 130] Levy also controlled the Roulette Record label. Nat "the Rat"
Tarnopol headed the Brunswick label (Jackie Wilson was one of its most
prominent African-American stars). Tarnopol was indicted twice in the
1970s "for using payola, drugola, and strong-arm goons to get radio
airplay for Brunswick recording artists." [MCDOUGAL, p. 366]
An
early and important supporter of disc jockey Alan Freed and his own
empire was Leo Mintz, who owned a large record store near Cleveland's
Black ghetto. Even earlier, Eli Oberstein founded Varsity records in the
1930s, Joe Davis launched Beach records in 1942, and "Jake Friedman had
Southland, one of the biggest distributing outfits in the South."
[SHAW, A., Honkers, p. 236] "The whole history of rock 'n' roll," noted
the London Guardian in a review of Jewish author Michael Billig's book
about the subject, "has been portrayed as white artists 'ripping off'
black music. Only now [with Billig's volume] has the major Jewish
contribution been acknowledged." [ARNOT, C., 10-4-2000, p. 6]
Atlanta-based Mark Shimmel, for instance, is the CEO of LaFace Records,
which headlines TLC, Usher, Tonik Braxton, GoodiMob, "and a raft of hot
hip-hop artists ... He built his own company, managing talents as varied
as John Denver and Broadway composer Frank Wildhorn ... He doesn't
worry much about what he calls 'the white guy in the black music
business.'" He has also worked with Huey Lewis, Harry Belafonte, Ray
Charles, and former Eagle Don Henley. [POLLAK, S., 1-7-00]
**********
Joseph
Heller, formerly of Heller-Fischel, booked acts like Styx, the Electric
Light Orchestra, Boz Scaggs, and a variety of others. "He represented
top-drawer rock talent like Van Morrison, the Guess Who, Marvin Gaye,
War, Elton John and Pink Floyd." [SNYDER, N., 2-19-01] Stretching out as
dangerously as possible to make a buck, Heller eventually gravitated
towards a relative goldmine in the Black ghetto-based "gangsta rap." He
cofounded Ruthless Records and managed the pioneer rap group NWA (Niggaz
With Attitude) from early in their careers. The musical genre of
gangsta rap, notes Jory Farr, "thrives on misogyny, as well as
homophobic and race-baiting rage ... [It] was the perfect music for [a]
lifestyle loaded down ... with warnings of betrayal, murder, revenge,
and a short life." [FARR, p. 70] "I believed that rap would become the
most important music of the nineties," said Heller, "... [But] you can't
sell two million rap records to kids in the inner city. That's a way to
sell 200,000. You have to market it to the white kids." [FARR, p. 68,
71]
Heller
hired Ira Selsky as his corporate attorney and an Israeli-born security
chief named Michael Klein to ward off angry, exploited Blacks who quite
literally walked into his office threatening to kill him. Rap star Ice
Cube even threatened Heller in one of his recorded songs, prompting the
Anti-Defamation League to flag it as anti-Semitic. Ruthless Records
released a Jewish rap duo called Blood of Abraham. As Chuck D, the lead
vocalist for the Black rap group Public Enemy, noted, "There's no way to
get trained on the seamier elements of the music business being on the
street -- that element is reserved for boardrooms." [D, CHUCK, p. 85]
Those in Chuck D's reminiscences about "boardroom" behavior include Lyor
Cohen (manager of Rush Productions, and an Israeli); Al Teller, an
executive at MCA whose parents died in the Holocaust; Steve Ralbovsky of
CBS; Bill Adler (a publicist); and Rick Rubin of Def Jam Records.
(Jewish diamond dealer Jacob Arabo has made the news as a favored
jewelry merchant to the Black rap crowd that seeks to symbolize wealth
and power, or, as the New York Times put it, "the jeweler who gives most
of today's leading rappers their shine." [CENTURY, p. 1]
In
2001, Heller was named the "Godfather of Latin Rap" by the Los Angeles
Business Journal; he was joining in attempting to build a rap movement
in the Latino market via Hit a Lick records. As the Journal noted:
"If
Heller is convinced that Latin rap will emerge as the next big thing,
it probably will be, said other music industry veterans ... Indeed,
Heller is widely acknowledged as one of the key forces behind gangsta
rap's crossover into the music mainstream ... While Heller has the
second-tier title of chief operating officer, he acknowledges that the
other partners 'generally run everything by me because of my experience
and expertise.'" [SNYDER, N., 2-19-01]
By
2001 too, the aforementioned Lyor Cohen had catapulted to power in the
Rap world. Rolling Stone even magazine featured an article about him,
sub-titled How Lyor Cohen -- the White, Jewish Israeli-Raised President
of Island Def Jam Records -- Became One of the Most Important Men in
Hip-Hop, and Why He May Now Become One of the Most Important Men in Rock
& Roll." Cohen started out promoting punk rock acts like the Circle
Jerks, Social Distortion, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. He then became
president of the rap music label Def Jam in 1988 and soon had become
"perhaps the most powerful white executive in an African-American
business." (Def Jam was bought out by the Jewish-owned Polygram company
in 1999). Irv Gott, a Black record producer, notes that Cohen is
"a
white Jewish guy, but I think everybody respects him like he's black.
He knows how to carry it too. He knows how to get gangster, how to fall
back, when to shut the fuck up, whento say something. That's why other
white executives are scared of him. He knows how to deal with the hoods,
the criminal element."
Cohen,
continued Rolling Stone, has broadened his musical base and "oversees
an empire that includes hundreds of artists performing in dozens of
genres, a roster that features PJ Harvey, American Hi-Fi, Shelby Lynne,
Lionel Richie, Bon Jovi, Melissa Etheridge, Saliva, Ludacris, Kelly
Price and Sisquo." Cohen's nickname is "Little Lansky" (after famed
Jewish mobster Meyer Lansky). He was born in New York City "where his
father, an Israeli, worked in the consulate." He was later raised on an
avocado farm near Tel Aviv. [COHEN, R., 6-21-01]
Cohen
has also been active in trying to readjust Black consciousness of
Jewish exploitation of the African-American community. "In the late
Eighties," notes reporter Rich Cohen,
"when
[Public Enemy's] album It Takes a Nation of Milions to Hold Us Back was
topping the charts, the group's minister of information, Professor
Griff, made several anti-Semitic statements. As a Jewish exec working
with the band, Cohen found himself in the middle of a rough, formative
experience. 'When Professor Griff from Public Enemy said what he said,
and it caused this whirlwind, the whole industry asked me, 'What the
fuck are you doing?' says Cohen. 'Every president of every record
company called and said, 'Drop them: But I believe part of being Jewish
is education. And I believe I was instrumental in changing Public
Enemy's views. I said, "Your voice is being muted because you say Jews
are this or that. You can't make blanket statements. If you want your
message out there" -- and it was profound, I think -- "stop
generalizing." And I was the only Jew in their lives. What if I
resigned? They would only be more alienated. I hadn't quite being a Jew.
I can't quit being a Jew. Instead, I tried to have an impact. I felt
like I was doing the right thing. Not just as a Jew, as a person. They
had a big voice da nation of millions, to quote their album I had the
Holocaust Museum [the Simon Wiesenthal Center] shut down, and we had a
private tour. The first thing you see is a Jewish skull plus a black
person's skull equals a baboon. The last thing is a monkey with enormous
lips dressed with a Star of Daivd holding a trumpet and a sign saying,
'It's these Jews that are bringing in this music call jazz.'" [COHEN,
R., 6-21-01]
Then
there is former tax attorney Joe Weinberger who drives a Jaguar S-200,
wears a diamond-studded Rolex watch and "fat gold rings," and carries a
"9mm automatic pistol tucked in his pocket." As the Miami New Times
notes about his rise to power in the African-American rap music world,
"In
the early Nineties, Miami's reigning booty-rapper, Luther Campbell,
hired Weinberger away from the carpeted hallways of a swash Brickell Key
law firm to help manage a growing musical empire and its attendant
lawsuits. Within five years Campbell was bankrupt and Weinberger had
purchased the rights to his music. Rather than return to the comfortable
confines of his former life, the 42-year old lawyer, who is single and
childless, opted to launch his own label, Lil' Joe ... In a post
bankruptcy fire sale overseen by Richard Wolfe [Weinberger's
lawyer/partner, also Jewish], Weinberger bought the rights to 2 Live
Crew music for about $800,000, plus the outstanding money he claims
Campbell owed him." [KORTEN, T., 8-10-2000]
Weinberger has even been accused of ordering a car bombing and directing death threats against an employee.
Then
there is Canada-born Bryan Turner, who founded Priority Records in
1985; he is also Jewish. [JEWHOO, 2000] By 1998, Priority had yearly
sales of $250 million. As the Los Angeles Times notes:
"When
the pioneering gangster rap group N.W.A. was looking for its first
record deal, it found a distributor in Priority Records, which released
an album so obscene it prompted a letter of complaint from the F.B.I.
When Ice-T left Warner Brothers Records after police groups and the
company's shareholders objected to his song 'Cop Killer,' he found a new
home at Priority. When Suge Knight, the imprisoned head of Death Row
Records, who is known for his pugnacious business tactics, was looking
for his first deal, Priority gave it to him. Through all the violence
and controversy of hardcore rap music -- from its roots in N.W.A to its
current resurrection with Master P -- the Los Angeles label Priority
Records has been a major player." [STRAUSS, N., 9-3- 98, sec. E, p. 1]
And
as the Times noted on another occasion: "When Time Warner first parted
ways with rapper Ice-T after the 'Cop Killer' flap and then with rapper
Paris over a song that portrayed an assassination fantasy of President
Bush, Turner wasted little time signing deals with both artists."
[HOCHMAN, S., 7-30-95, CALENDAR, p. 82]
Jewish
entrepreneur Steve Rifkind has also become very successful in the rap
music field. In 1993, Rifkind founded and still heads Loud Records (its
president is Rich Isaacson). Earlier, Rifkind began the Steven Rifkind
Company, "a consulting firm specializing in Rap and R&B." Loud acts
include Wu-Tang Clan, Mobb Deep, Yvette Michelle, Funkmaster Flex,
Alkaholics, Raekwon, and Xzibit. The company's value is estimated at
about $100 million. [collegemusic.com/1-11-00] "Rifkind," notes the
online magazine Entrepreneur,
"who
trademarked the term 'Street Teams,' takes marketing to the street --
literally -- by hiring youths to tell their communities about his
artists' music. 'My philosophy has always been 'You can't stop
word-of-mouth, explains Rifkind, who has street teams across cities,
distributing free singles to teenagers at housing projects and schools,
and scrawling the names of his albums in the dust on parked trucks,
which then serve as mobile billboards." [entrepreneur.com]
Yet
another major Jewish rap entrepreneur is the aforementioned Rick Rubin,
who, says Jory Farr, found his "biggest stars were former gangsters who
used beats and rhymes to glamorize wealth, dope, and violence. Deciding
who to sign could be a moral quagmire ... but Rubin wasn't one to be
bothered by the trivia of social responsibility." [FARR, p. 126] "I
could do anything I wanted," Rubin once said about his own family life
in New York, "We were always upper middle class. We were wealthy for the
community we lived in. In a sense I was spoiled." [FARR, p. 119]
Rubin's
record company Def American is now called American Recording; at one
time Geffen Records distributed Rubin's material. Earlier in his career
he had signed bands like Slayer (whose lyrics exhorted "everything from
virgin sacrifice and satanism to sadistic mutilations and the atrocities
of Auschwitz" [FARR, p. 109]) and the Geto Boys, who "pushed misogyny
and sadism to new depths." [FARR, p. 108] Rubin's own star rose so high
that he eventually produced albums for Mick Jagger and the Red Hot Chili
Peppers. Troubles, however, came from a lawsuit against him by Adam
Horowitz of the Beastie Boys and threats from the Meir Kahane-founded
Jewish Defense League. Outraged by Rubin's promotion of violently
anti-Jewish lyrics by Black ghetto groups, the Jewish group reportedly
came looking to beat him up. Rubin couldn't understand their anger. He
told an interviewer that
"They
should've talked to me and found out what I felt before coming to
attack me, because I was a JDO [Jewish Defense Organization] supporter.
When I was at NYU I saw [right wing rabbi] Meir Kahane speak and he blew
me away -- he was amazing ... After hearing him speak, I wanted to pack
my bags and go to Israel ... I called the JDO several times, wanted to
join, but they never returned my calls." [FARR, p. 123]
Among
the most controversial "gangsta rap" labels was Death Row Records
(including Tupac Shakur, Dr. Dre, and Snoopy Doggy Dog). A noted
earlier, Death Row products were distributed by the Jewish-dominated
Time-Warner company until "pressure from stockholders after an outcry
over the flagrantly violent and misogynist lyrics" of its stars.
Time-Warner dropped the label, but eighteen months later it was picked
up (for $200 million) by the Universal Music Group, a subsidiary of the
Jewish Bronfman family's Seagram company. Universal too eventually
abandoned the controversial label, only after "pressure from
stockholders and regulators." [HELMORE, E., 8-29-97, p. 10]
Still
another Jewish push -- more recently -- into the rap world is Koch
Entertainment's In The Paint record label. Koch, one of the largest
"independent music distribution companies," is headed by founder and CEO
Michael Koch and President Bob Frank. [kochentertainment.com]
And
lastly for the music scene, the president and CEO of the Recording
Industry of America -- a lobbying group (with a staff of 72) for the big
record companies -- is also Jewish, Hilary Rosen, who was described in
1997 by the Washington Post as "a powerful woman in an industry
dominated by men. One of the most influential yet least known players in
the U.S. entertainment behemoth." [WEEKS, p. C1] Rosen became the CEO
when another executive, Jason Berman, stepped down from the position.