https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/public-enemy-flavor-flav-bernie-sanders-960272/

Public Enemy Fire Flavor Flav After Bernie Sanders Rally Spat
“Public Enemy and Public Enemy Radio will be moving forward without Flavor Flav,” group says. “We thank him for his years of service and wish him well”
By DANIEL KREPS

Public Enemy announced they are permanently “moving forward” without Flavor Flav, firing one of hip-hop’s most memorable hypemen after more than 35 years. The abrupt dismissal comes just two days after the rapper sent a cease-and-desist letter to Bernie Sanders over Chuck D’s concert at the campaign’s Los Angeles rally Sunday.
“Public Enemy and Public Enemy Radio will be moving forward without Flavor Flav,” the hip-hop legends said in a brief statement Sunday. “We thank him for his years of service and wish him well.”
The group reiterated that Public Enemy Radio — a Chuck D-led offshoot featuring DJ Lord, Jahi, and the S1Ws — would still perform at the free, livestreamed Sanders rally gig at 6 p.m. PST at the Los Angeles Convention Center.
The cease-and-desist letter, sent to Sanders Friday by Flavor Flav’s lawyer Matthew Friedman, accused the campaign of using the hypeman’s “unauthorized likeness, image, and trademarked clock” to promote the rally, even though Flavor Flav “has not endorsed any political candidate.”

“While Chuck is certainly free to express his political view as he sees fit — his voice alone does not speak for Public Enemy,” the letter states. “The planned performance will only be Chuck D of Public Enemy, it will not be a performance by Public Enemy. Those who truly know what Public Enemy stands for know what time it is. There is no Public Enemy without Flavor Flav.


“Flav … has not endorsed any political candidate in this election cycle.… The continued publicizing of this grossly misleading narrative is, at a minimum, careless and irresponsible if not intentionally misleading,” Friedman added in the letter. “It is unfortunate that a political campaign would be so careless with the artistic integrity of such iconoclastic figures in American culture.”
In a handwritten note at the bottom of the cease-and-desist, Flavor Flav wrote to Sanders, “Hey Bernie, don’t do this.”
Prior to Flavor Flav’s firing — and after the hypeman accused Sanders of using his “unauthorized likeness, image, and trademarked clock” to promote the rally — Chuck D said of his bandmate of more than three decades, “Flavor chooses to dance for his money and not do benevolent work like this. He has a year to get his act together and get himself straight or he’s out.”
A lawyer for Chuck D added, “From a legal standpoint, Chuck could perform as Public Enemy if he ever wanted to; he is the sole owner of the Public Enemy trademark. He originally drew the logo himself in the mid-80s, is also the creative visionary and the group’s primary songwriter, having written Flavor’s most memorable lines.”
Taking to Twitter Sunday afternoon, Chuck D clarified that the Sanders issue was not the only reason the group fired the hypeman. “My last straw was long ago,” he wrote. “It’s not about BERNIE with Flav … he don’t know the difference between Barry Sanders or Bernie Sanders. He don’t know either. FLAV refused to support Sankofa after Harry Belafonte inducted us. He don’t do that.” Sankofa, a grassroots organization founded by Belafonte, aims to, as they note on their site, “focus on issues of injustice that disproportionately affect the disenfranchised, the oppressed, and the underserved, which left unaddressed will continue to impact the lives of too many individuals and remain a scar on our nation’s moral character.”

Following the Sanders rally, Chuck D further addressed the split. “If there was a $bag, Flav would’ve been there front & center. He will NOT do free benefit shows,” he wrote. “I built so it does benefits & fundraisers.… He said he never gonna do them. So his refusal to do Harry Belafonte’s in Atlanta 2016 was my last time. I built Enemy Radio to get far away from that ridiculousness.”
Legal issues had been simmering between Flavor Flav and his fellow Public Enemy bandmates for years, when Flavor Flav sued Chuck D and the group’s business management firm in 2017 over unpaid profits. “This action involves the usurpation of money and property rights from Plaintiff William J. Drayton, known as ‘Flavor Flav,’” the suit stated. “Despite Drayton’s position in Public Enemy, the group’s management and related companies have for years attempted to minimize his role in the Public Enemy business, while continuing to rely upon Drayton’s fame and persona to market the brand.”
In the lawsuit, Flavor Flav claimed that he and Chuck D had a long-established agreement that profits from their music, merchandise, and concerts would be split between them. Despite that alleged arrangement, Flavor Flav claimed that Public Enemy’s business management firm Eastlink had not been sending the earnings he is owed, which have “diminished to almost nothing, and Drayton has been refused accountings, even on the items bearing his likeness,” according to the lawsuit.
“Flav will be OK. TMZ Drama is beneath me considering our age,” Chuck D tweeted at the time, blaming Flavor Flav’s “new management” for the lawsuit. “It’s low entertainment, but I definitely like to find those 50 songs he wrote.”
Per court records, the suit against Chuck D was dismissed in January 2019. A judge dismissed Flavor Flav’s case against Eastlink in April 2019 after the rapper’s legal team missed a filing deadline, though the hypeman appealed the judgment. (The case is currently working its way through the United States Court of Appeals – Ninth Circuit, per court records.)
Public Enemy’s statement added that Public Enemy Radio would release a new album in April; last December, Chuck D’s previous project Prophets of Rage dissolved following news of Rage Against the Machine’s reunion.

And he can’t do nothin for you man.

Are we doomed to just repeat Marx against Bakunin over and over and over and over and over again?

"Get ready....for your blessing....."
"Bury me by my Grand-Grand and when you can come follow me"

Chuck D must be a fucking saint to put up with Flav's shit all these years.

he was booted from PE

https://tenor.com/view/no-gif-10041199

I plan to vote for Bernie but that's a pretty legit gripe, a week ago I saw a post on FB hyping up this show with a picture of the band that HAD to be at least 20+ years old (Terminator X was in the pic)

if Flav doesn't actually support that candidate I can't be mad at him being mad his image is being used and he's expected to go perform at a rally for free

>I plan to vote for Bernie but that's a pretty legit gripe, a
>week ago I saw a post on FB hyping up this show with a picture
>of the band that HAD to be at least 20+ years old (Terminator
>X was in the pic)
>
>if Flav doesn't actually support that candidate I can't be mad
>at him being mad his image is being used and he's expected to
>go perform at a rally for free

for including him.

It was only a matter of time before Flav burned the last thread of rope holding up that bridge.

of several riffs between Flav and crew. Flav used this situation to score points off the attention the rally would bring.

-->

And he told us the story that Chuck D gave him one job, keep Flav as far away from him as possible as long as possible.


**********
"Everyone has a plan until you punch them in the face. Then they don't have a plan anymore." (c) Mike Tyson

"what's a leader if he isn't reluctant"

for a concert with the Amazon white woman back stage and he flipped a table over...

I knew they weren’t really a fan of his trajectory at the time.

ole gal up onstage and she was dancing crazy as hell lol...chuck the the other guys were giving here the side eye because of her moves...that shit was hilarious

I remember live posting on THIS board when that shit aired on VH1

Flav showed up late, did like 10 mins of that, then joined the rest of the normal show.

That 10 minutes was bad.,

...

Public Enemy
52 mins ·

Public Enemy did not part ways with Flavor Flav over his political views.

Flavor Flav has been on suspension since 2016 when he was MIA from the Harry Belafonte benefit in Atlanta, Georgia. That was the last straw for the group. He had previously missed numerous live gigs from Glastonbury to Canada, album recording sessions and photo shoots. He always chose to party over work.

Public Enemy Radio toured Europe and co-headlined with the Wu-Tang Clan in May 2019 without Flavor. They have also done numerous benefit shows without Flavor.

While Public Enemy Radio was moving forward, Flavor Flav was starring on the reality show "Growing up Hip-Hop New York,” where an episode featured his children discussing an intervention and putting him into rehab.

It’s time to move on and everyone wishes Flavor well.

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2020/apr/01/chuck-d-flavor-flav-public-enemy-split-hoax-bernie-sanders-rally-rappers


"Chuck D has now described the entire episode as a hoax: “Does it take doing crazy sht or catastrophe to wake people up? Obviously so, even when paying attention is the cheapest price to pay,” he wrote on his website.

He continued: “I had watched Orson Welles’ War of the Worlds from 1938 when he pulled the wool over the public’s eyes as they put 100% belief in the technology of radio. Most people followed like a Pavlovic dog just like they do now … Hearing the confused mush of political talk while under the bowels of Trumpotus made me use a presidential stage as my platform. Out of this storm came a plan between Flav and me to remind people that what’s important should have as much, if not more, value than just what’s popular. Thus came the HOAX, our War of the Worlds.”

He added: “Flav doesn’t do benefits and stays away from political events – we been cool and always agreed about that.” He detailed the difference between Public Enemy – a group featuring him and Flav – with Enemy Radio, an “auxiliary unit” that features all the members except Flav, and which performed at the Bernie Sanders rally, in Los Angeles on 1 March.


Blame it on Bernie: did Public Enemy really split over politics?
Read more
The announcement came alongside a new single, billed as Enemy Radio featuring Public Enemy, that reunites Chuck D and Flavor Flav on a track. Food Is a Machine Gun castigates the US food industry, inspired by Kristin Lawless’s book Formerly Known As Food. The lyrics attack the US Food and Drug Administration, sugar intake, and the use of pesticides and chemicals in food production. An Enemy Radio album, Loud Is Not Enough, was also announced.

In a 70-minute interview with Tim Einenkel, Chuck D elaborated further about the situation. He said he wanted to “help bring stock up”, as negative stories were dominating over positive ones: “I didn’t like that he was getting hammered in the media.”

He admitted there had been a cease and desist letter from Flav’s lawyers, after the Sanders concert was billed as Public Enemy Radio rather than Enemy Radio. “I know that hit a sore spot ... and then came the cease and desist letter, and I counteracted ... The bottom line was a plan to turn this into a teachable moment.”

He argued that only negative news stories get traction – “The news you read about hip-hop is about another dead rapper” – and that this was proved by the news of him firing Flav, that “actually proves the fact the gadgets are ruling the game”.

Flavor Flav has not commented on the announcement or the interview.

they just dropped