Aside from his keynote address and concert at Canadian Music Week, legendary MC KRS-ONE has three album projects on deck for 2008 and is currently in the process of reviving the Stop the Violence movement he began 20 years ago. EYE WEEKLY spoke with him on his way to New Jersey.

Can you tell me little bit about the 2008 version of the Stop the Violence movement?
What I want to do is create a model. I’m shooting for a zero crime rate in an urban area. I met with the mayor of Newark, New Jersey, Mayor Cory Booker. In Newark there is high crime because there are no jobs, people are walking around buggin’. The idea is to deliver our records to the public domain. We have several records so some will be sold and some will be public domain. So everybody with CD burners, all the DJs selling mixtapes, everybody if they get on your grind — let’s say you want to sell this one record for $10. If you get on your grind and you sell 500 of them just in your neighbourhood, you make five grand out of the blue. We’re also asking that artists donate eight bars and you know I’m coming to Canada with a bull’s eye on Kardinal Offishall, so please print that. We’re asking artists to come together. Eight bars, Canada, what’s up?

Speaking of models, the music industry is definitely in transition. Obviously sales are not what they used to be, and a lot of people want music for free. One of the reasons we’re going with the record in public domain… is this reason. Here’s the new model. Smirnoff, Red Bull, you name it — these beverage and car companies are the new record companies. They don’t want you to say “drink Smirnoff,” they just want you to make a record that they can put on their website and say they’re cool because they made this record with you. Goddamn, do you know this is so dope for us today? The dudes that are railing against corporate America... corporate America is on our jock right now.

ONCE, THIS WOULD HAVE been blasphemous. There was a lot of negative feedback to your Nike commercial FEATURING Gil Scott-Heron’s “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised.”

When I did the Nike commercial, I was called a sellout. Nike came and not only did they come with Gil Scott-Heron himself, the people producing the track were the Bomb Squad with Chuck D. Now this is one revolutionary throwing another revolutionary a bone. Chuck knew what my situation was at the time. I was broke! I was broke! But I wasn’t jumping at no money. I was broke because I was passing up movie deals, alcohol commercials, collaborations with artists that I don’t agree with.

We come out saying “Basketball is the revolution.” Dudes were like, “No, it’s not. KRS is a sellout. How dare you say basketball is the revolution, working with Nike sweatshops?” It was crazy. But I stood by the truth. The truth is that basketball is the revolution. Cats don’t even know what revolution is. They gotta know if from the time that you are born to the time that you’re, say, 26, if you ain’t been down with no revolutionary cause, if you ain’t railed against the system, you ain’t got no heart. But if after 26, if you ain’t part of that system you ain’t got no brain.

There comes a time where you have to become the president that you are protesting against if you want to make some change. And my time has come. The revolution only works for those who participate in it.

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