DISGRACELAND - Ice-T: Crip Rhymes, a Cop Killer, Thieving Jewels and Inventing Gangsta Rap

Episode Date: September 15, 2020

Ice-T stoked the wrath of the President of the United States, led the life of a successful jewel thief, ran with one of LA’s most notorious street gangs, the Crips, and was a soldier in the US Army. Along the way, he invented gangsta rap. But it wouldn’t be rap music that would threaten his career—it would be hardcore music, particularly the song “Cop Killer” from his punk band, Body Count.To view the full list of contributors, see the show notes at www.disgracelandpod.com.This episode was originally published on September 15, 2020.To listen to Disgraceland ad free and get access to a monthly exclusive episode, weekly bonus content and more, become a Disgraceland All Access member at disgracelandpod.com/membership.Sign up for our newsletter and get the inside dirt on events, merch and other awesomeness - GET THE NEWSLETTERFollow Jake and DISGRACELAND:InstagramYouTubeX (formerly Twitter) Facebook Fan GroupTikTok To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoicesSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is exactly right. Double Elvis. This season on Dear Chelsea, with me, Chelsea Handler, we have some fantastic guests like Amelia Clark. When like young people come up to me and they want to be an actor or whatever. My first thing is always, can you think of anything else that you can do? Rather be disappointed in. Do that.

David O'Yello. I love this podcast, whether it's therapy or relationships or religion or sex or addiction or you just go straight for the guts. Dennis Leary, Gaten Moderato from Stranger Things, Tana Monsu, Camilla Morone, Carrie Kenny Silver, and more. Listen to these episodes of Dear Chelsea on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. Movies can make you feel, make you dream. Sometimes they even make you appreciate architecture. Is there anybody who's been hotter in a doorway then Elizabeth Taylor. That's the kind of analysis you'll find every week on Dear Movies I Love You, the new podcast from the Exactly Right Network. Every Tuesday, we break down the films we're crushing on,

from blockbusters to deep cuts. Listen to Dear Movies I Love You on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Sometimes a suspect is found guilty before a verdict is ever read in court. On the Wicked Words podcast, I talk with the writers who dig deep into the cases that changed history, including Marsha Clark, who went from prosecuting one of the most famous murder cases to writing crime fiction. It doesn't matter that you didn't take part in the murder.

If you were at the scene at all, you're guilty of murder. Every week, the real story is revealed. Join us every Monday for new episodes of Wicked Words. Listen to Wicked Words on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Disgrace Land is a production of Double Elvis. The stories about iced tea are insane. He was orphaned at a young age, became a Cripped Street Gang affiliate in high school. Then, a soldier in the U.S. Army, where he learned the skills necessary to lead an L.A.-based crew of jewel thieves.

As an MC, he literally invented gangster rap, and as a hardcore frontman, he earned the scorn of the President of the United States. And for the past 20 years, he's been known as Fin Ttolla to most Americans. Okay, most Americans your parents age, on television's longest-running action series, order a special victims unit. But back in the day, Ice-T made great music. Unlike that music I played for you at the top of the show, that wasn't great music. That was a preset loop from my Melotron called Streetwalk in Hita, MK2. I played you that loop because I can't afford the rights to be with you by Mr. Big. And why would I play you that specific slice of soft rock cheddar cheese could I afford it? Because that was the number one song in America on March 10, 1992.

And that was the day that Ice T's band, Body Count, released their self-titled debut featuring the song Cop Killer, a song that would bring down the wrath of the United States government onto the rapper-turned rocker and nearly derail his career. On this episode, Crip Rhymes, Jewel Heist, Cop Killers, and the OG original gangster Ice T. I'm Jake Brennan, and this is Disgraceland. George H.W. Bush, the 41st president of the United States, was sitting in the Oval Office, distracted and confused.

Distracted by his reelection bid, which was being challenged by a surprisingly formative opponent, a pudgy southern Democratic governor from a state few voters could even find on the map, and who would seemingly say anything to win. The tactic proved an effective defense to his own campaign operative. who were fast becoming notorious for their willingness to do anything to win. And the president was confused by the topic, music. His chief of staff, Samuel Skinner, was trying to explain it to him. He's a rapper.

But he's a criminal? The president asked. We think so. I don't understand. Why are we even talking about this? Because he wants to kill cops. Then the president's man read him the lyrics. Lyrics about sought off 12 gauges and cop killers.

The president seemed shocked by the lyrics and by what he learned about the band, and in particular the singer's popularity. We can't have this, the president said, especially in a re-election year his chief of staff thought. What are we doing about it the president wanted to know? The insincerity of his concern went ignored by everyone in the room, and they were too smart to see it as anything but opportunistic. But nonetheless, they knew its value.

Necessary red meat to throw to the base, cook up some family values drama, throw a little scare into suburban voters, and motivate them to get to the polls and unrock the vote. The president's chief of staff explained what had been authorized thus far. A four bureau check. The FBI, Secret Service, IRS, and NSA

had all begun independent probes into the musician. His real name was Tracy Marrow. His stage name was Ice-T. The name further confused the president. His chief of staff explained that, no, this was a different rapper than the one they had previously told him about, the one who said fuck the police. The chief of staff ignored the president's confusion and focused on the opportunity. A four-bure check was no joke.

It meant a substantial amount of the federal government's weight had been deployed to dig into Ice-T's background. All because of some lyrics he wrote from the perspective of the character he created, who was fighting back against police brutality. Ice-T had witnessed it firsthand coming up on the streets of drug and crimes through in south central Los Angeles, where the racist at the time, LAPD, ruled through a hard mix of violence and intimidation. So what do we know about him, the president asked. His chief of staff had good news. He's a thug.

He's committed numerous crimes, larceny, grand theft auto, pandering, possibly distribution of controlled substances, probably worse. Worse, the president wanted to know? Was he an agitator? A revolutionary? Was this a potential Black Panther mess like the one Nixon had to deal with? Nothing like that, the president was reassured. He was caught up in the gangs of South Central Los Angeles, one of those gangbangers. Not exactly.

He's what they call an affiliate. The president was losing patience. An affiliate, it was explained, wasn't quite a member, but he wasn't just some geek off the street either. He was, as the Italian mafioso put it, connected, but not a maid man. Ice tea from his days in high school. lived among and hung around with the notorious Crips street gang. As he grew older, he didn't rep collars or kill on-site rival gang members, the Bloods, who might mistakenly show up in Crip territory,

but he did socialize and live with the protection of the Crips. It was a subtle distinction, but an important one, because in the context he was now being discussed, it meant he was unlikely to be an actual killer as the lyrics to Cop Killer from his hardcore band Body Count suggested. But he's a criminal, the president asked again. Yes, did I have him arrested and let's move on? By this point, the president had lost most of his patience,

and what little he had left was about to be completely drained by what his chief of staff told him next. We can't. The president just stared. His anger was brimming. After a beat. Why not? I thought you said we had him on larceny, maybe worse.

Well, not exactly. We're aware of the crimes he committed, but we don't have any real evidence. How exactly are you aware? Because he's admitted to the crimes on his records. The president was now utterly confused. Just who the hell is this guy? His chief of staff leaned back in his chair

and started to tell the 41st president of the United States a story, a story about an original gangster. This season on Dear Chelsea, with me, Chelsea Handler, we have some fantastic guests, like Amelia Clark. When like young people come up to me and they want to be an act or whatever my first thing is always

can you think of anything else that you can do. Rather be disappointed in. Do that. Dennis Leary. I wake up and I'm hitting him in the head with a water bomb. And Bruce Jenner is on the aisle

in a karate stance like he's about to attack me. Like making karate noises. And his entire the Kardashian family over there, everybody's going, and the air marshal is trying to grab my arms and screaming. I immediately know that I've been at sleepwalk.

David O'Yellowo. I love this podcast, whether it's therapy or relationships or religion or sex or addiction or you just go straight for the guts. Guy Branham. So anyway, Nicole Kimman broke up with Keith Thurban. Being half of a country couple was always a hat she was going to wear, not like a life she was going to lead. Oh, interesting. I like that. Did you practice that on your way over?

Gaten Madarazzo from Stranger Things. Tena Monsu. Camilla Marone, Carrie Kenny Silver, and more. Listen to these episodes of Dear Chelsea on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Just like great shoes,

great books take you places. Through unforgettable love stories and into conversations with characters you'll never forget. I think any good. romance. It gives me this feeling of like butterflies. I'm Danielle Robay and this is bookmarked by Reese's Book Club from Hello Sunshine and IHeart Podcast, where we dive into the stories that shape us on the page and off. Each week I'm joined by authors, celebs, book talk stars,

and more for conversations that will make you laugh, cry, and add way too many books to your TBR pile. Listen to bookmarked by Reese's Book Club on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Brought to you by Cotton, the fabric of our lives. I'm Kate Winkler Dawson, host of the Wicked Words podcast. Each week I sit down with the true crime writers behind some of the most compelling true crime stories and discuss their years spent investigating and why it still matters. He sees his father coming out of the woods with his hands over his face, and he knows

something happened. His father just grabs him and says, she's gone, she's gone. These are the cases that leave survivors, families, and the journalists who cover them changed forever. Working in national television, it'll push you to your limits, and you'll end up doing things you never thought you'd do. You know, you look back at it and you're like, I can't believe that really happened. Join me and step inside the investigation. New episodes drop every Monday on the Exactly Right Network. Listen to Wicked Words on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. Six in the morning, a B-side to one of Ice T's earliest singles, could be heard everywhere on South Central Los Angeles during the summer of 1986. Those lyrics, they were familiar to locals and completely alien to the white kids who made their way on weekends to the club called The Radio to hear the DJ spin it.

To locals, the melody, the cadence, and the subject matter, utterly real words depicting life on the streets as lived by gangsters and hustlers. It was just another Crip rhyme. A type of rhyme Crip gang members and affiliates would make up to pass the time. The only difference was, six in the morning, was accompanied by music

and wasn't just being spit out acapella on the street corner or at a party. Young Tracy Morrow fucked with Crip rhymes like these, just like other kids his age, did back at Crenshaw High. His secret weapon, though, was his inspiration. Iceberg Slim, the former pimp, turned author, selling barely fictionalized accounts of his life in the pimping game to a largely

black audience. Iceberg Slim was real. He didn't mince shit. He told it like it was. Slim spoke to what life was like out there with no snitching but absolute rawness and street knowledge. Tracy Marrow took the same approach, choosing not to boast about the make-believe, but to instead rap about what was real. His friends loved it. Tracy was notoriously anti-drugs and alcohol from an early age. So at parties, when everyone else was getting wasted, Tracy would entertain himself and others with his Iceberg Slim-inspired Crip rhymes. His friends couldn't get enough. Yo, kick some more of that ice, tea. Ice for Iceberg Slim, tea for Tracy, and Ice tea was born. And so too was quote-unquote gangster rap, a term that wouldn't come to

prominence for a couple years, but make no doubt about it. Ice tea had originated the form when he launched his recording career. Inspired by the flow of Philly Rapper School E.D., who hinted at his crew's crimes in PSK, Ice-T took it a step further and explicitly documented the antics and crimes he and his Crip affiliates were getting up to as teenagers and young adults.

Banging, dealing, rhyming, stealing. As familiar as these rhymes were to locals, they were completely alien to the white kids who populated the radio every Friday night. Rhymes like these, this can't be overstated, were completely new at the time. There was a level of realness, of hardness, a hard reality that had never been heard in music before. Tracy Morrow, aka IST, South Central Resident Cripp Street Gang affiliate,

had invented gangster rap just by being himself, rapping about what he knew, who he knew, and what he saw around him. The reality he took from the environment he lived in, an environment consumed by the crack epidemic of the 1980. 80s and overrun by violent gangsters who would just as soon cut you down with an AK-47 or Uzi submachine gun for walking down the wrong street wearing the wrong colored sneakers as they would smile at you menacingly from the back seats of their chopped lowriders. Streets that were controlled by vicious, racist, racist, abusive cops who batter-ramed first and asked questions later.

In the mid-to-late 80s, South Central Los Angeles, where iced tea had grown up and lived, was nothing short of a war zone. And Ice-T was prepared for war. He'd done his time in the U.S. Army. After getting his girlfriend pregnant and with a new daughter and zero career opportunities that didn't involve robbing, dealing or banging, Ice-T joined up. And the Army changed him. First and foremost, it taught him out to strategize and how to lead men.

Second, it humiliated him. A particularly cruel superior officer had it out for him and told him in no uncertain terms that the only reason he was in the army was because he was too much of a failure to make it on the outside, to provide for his family. He was a little bitch who ran into the arms of uncle because he was too weak a sister to cut it out on the outside.

This, more than anything in his life to this point, motivated him to succeed, to win, on his terms, to do it his way. So when he got out, he turned to the one thing he felt naturally suited for. Crime, robbing, Jules, furs, high-end wares, but mainly jewels. Jobs he could put crews together to pull that didn't involve guns.

Smash and grab stuff, no murder. Ice could lead his crew, calculate the risks, make his scores without leaving a trail of bodies. Fence is good, support his daughter, stack that cash, buy that Porsche, peacock those icebergs, slim threads, fly as a motherfucker, fuck that B-boy cangle, Ice-T, rocked Nieman Marcus, Fendi, and any other high-end designer garb he could get his hands. on from his smash and grabs. He was being his true self. He was beyond street. He was upwardly mobile. His crimes made him so. Ice Tees boys Vic and Shawnee Sean had a spot in Englewood, a stash house, minks, other fur, shoeboxes, hat boxes, racks of expensive suits and dresses, bags of jewels, and literally pounds of marijuana tightly packaged in duct-tape plastic lining

the walls of the back rooms from floor to ceiling. The dope was Vic and Shawnee John's, Ice didn't truck with drugs. His game was contraband. To wit, in the driveway under the carport, covered in a canvas tarp, and stuffed with expensive furs, a stolen ghost rider. They'd fenced the threads and ditch the whip after the next job's getaway. Easy come, easy come, easy go. Ice was leaning over the dining room table, his arms outstretched, palms down on the upper corners of a large map of Greater Los Angeles. They were going far out this time. Norris. Nor, northeast, almost to San Bernardino County. They'd hit too many spots near L.A. and and ice could feel the heat coming. After this job, they'd need to expand further north or perhaps

further east, maybe as far as Arizona to put in work. The getaway was possibly more important than the robbery itself. Ice learned in the army that once the job was done, there needed to be a clear exit strategy. No man left behind. On the street, The exit strategy all but guaranteed success, and this was the element that ICE knew most fly-by-night street criminals never thought of. All they cared about was the smash and grab. But once they'd stolen what they'd come to steal, they were rendered vulnerable without a real escape plan, arrested and left pondering their laziness over a slow 25 years in the pen. Ice-T was not lazy.

He laid out the getaway plan first, then working in reverse chronological order, explaining the job. Robbing all the diamonds, gold knots, and Rolex as they could from the suburban mall's high-end jewelry store, delegating to his crew in the process. He laid it out for them. The clerk in these places was almost always a woman, and there was usually never anyone else in the store, not working, not in the back, and it of course not enter the store if there were already customers milling about. This was before CCTV and before armed security guards in high-end merchandising shops. Usually the only security they had to deal with was mall security, and part of their plan was to hit their mark when they knew the mall guard was in a totally separate part of the mall. Even if an alarm

trip, they would still have at least four minutes to grab as much merch as they could before any security would be anywhere remotely close to them. They entered as planned, with the security guard fucked off in search of a food court donut or something. ICE's accomplice, Tanya, got into a quick conversation with the woman behind the counter about one of the jewelry pieces. Nat the cat played a cool, pretending to be Tanya's semi-interested husband. Nat the cat's brother, Bebop, Ice's other accomplice, was the second set of eyes. Ice was the first. Two sets of eyes were needed to kick off the plan, and there needed to be firm confirmation that there were indeed no cameras, no other store staff, no customers, and no donut eaters milling about outside. Ice was also the basher. The code was

an affirmative answer from Bebop that it was quote unquote a bet. While Ice and Bebop browsed the jewelry in its cases and Tanya kept the shop worker behind the counter occupied, Ice would ask Bebop in code if the coast was clear. He would ask, is it a bet? And if it was safe, Bebop would reply with, Okay, Holmes. And with that, Ice Teab would whip the tiny sledgehammer from his pocket and smashed the glass jewelry case open. And the two would begin looting as much hardware as they could. Usually the female shopkeeper, even without a gun trained on her, was scared in the paralysis. But if she split for the back room or got cute and activated an alarm, or if the broken glass triggered an alarm, it didn't matter. They had time.

Four minutes, tops. Ice would meticulously grab as many jewels and watches as he could while Nat the cat kept time on his watch, shouting out the amount of time left as the seconds ticked away. Usually with at least a minute to spare, Ice and his crew were, Out of there, on foot, through the back of the store, into the catacombs of the mall, out to the garage, into the jacked ghost rider with stolen plates, and off before security even made it to the scene of the crime. The cops weren't even part of the equation.

Such was the beauty of the mall robbery. It worked because Ice-T put in the work, planning, strategy. It was who he was. And when he wasn't robbing, he was planning rhymes in his head and stepping up to the mic to MC at the radio. This post-work ritual was a little different than his smash-and-grab post-work ritual. There was no stash house and no stolen getaway car. Ice was in his Porsche 914, tiny car but tight and fast.

Ice loved that car. He earned it. Just as he earned the sleep he was looking forward to that night. For that morning, rather. It was late. The gig that night was incredible. The radio was packed. Madonna showed up.

Yes, that Madonna. She loved Ice's set, as did the crowd. He was starting to really feel this rap game, but man, running robberies and rhymes had him bone tired, especially on that night. He pulled up to the light at West Boulevard and Slosson. He let his eyes rest for a second. His foot slipped off of the break and before he even realized it.

When Ice-T awoke, he didn't know where he was or who he was, and neither did anyone else. His wallet wasn't recovered from the crash. The car was broadsided by a truck, flipped, rolled, and steering wheel broke off. The driver's side of the car was totally demolished, and the small Porsche was folded completely in half. A two-door roadster turned accordion rag. With the ambulance came to trailing L.A. newspaper reporter. He took one look at the wreck, and his experience told him he needn't check with cops on the scene.

He knew the fate of the driver, sitting, lifeless, blood burbling from his mouth, crammed into the passenger side door from impact. And so he reported the wreck as he sought with his own two eyes as a fatality. We'll be right back after this word, word, word. This season on Dear Chelsea, with me, Chelsea Handler, we have some fantastic guests like Amelia Clark. When like young people come up to me and they want to be an actor or whatever, and my first thing is always, can you think of anything else that you can do?

You'd rather be. Who's disappointed in. Do that. Dennis Leary. I wake up and I'm hitting him in the head with a water bomb. And Bruce Jenner is on the aisle in a karate stance. Like he's about to attack me. Like making karate noises.

And his entire the Kardashian family over there, everybody's going, and the air marshal is trying to grab my arms and screaming. I immediately know that I've been asleep walking. David O'Yellowo. I love this podcast, whether it's therapy or relationships or religion or sex or addiction or you just go straight for the guts. Guy Branham. So anyway, Nicole Kidman broke up with Keith Thurban. Being half of a country couple was always a hat she was going to wear, not like a life she was going to lead. Oh, interesting.

I like that. Did you practice that on your way over? Gait and Moderato from Stranger Things. Tena, monjeu, Camilla Morone at Carrie Kenny Silver. And more. Listen. to these episodes of Dear Chelsea on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Remember when you'd walk into your local video rental place and there were always those two employees behind the counter arguing about movies? Well, that's us. I'm Millie de Cherico. And I'm Casey O'Brien. And now we're arguing about movies on our podcast, Dear Movies I Love You, from the Exactly Right Network. Can I say something about the Criterion Clause? Go ahead, dude.

They're letting too many people in there. Okay, that's another film, grape I got two. Sadly, that rental place doesn't exist anymore. It's probably a store that sells running shoes. Or an ice cream shop with an extra pee and an E at the end. So consider us your slacker movie clerks in podcast form. I would like to establish a timeline of the moment you figured out who Channing Tatum was. Every Tuesday, we dig into the movies we can't stop obsessing over, from hidden gems to big screen favorites.

New episodes drop every week on the Exactly Right Network. Listen to Dear Movies I Love You on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Kate Winkler Dawson, a host of The Wicked Words podcast. Each week I sit down with the true crime writers behind some of the most compelling true crime stories and discuss their years spent investigating and why it still matters. He sees his father coming out of the woods with his hands over his face, and he knows, something happened. His father just grabs him and says she's gone. She's gone. These are the cases that leave survivors, families, and the journalists who cover them changed forever.

Working in national television, it'll push you to your limits and you'll end up doing things you never thought you do. You know, you look back at it and you're like, I can't believe that really happened. Join me and step inside the investigation. New episodes drop every Monday on the exactly right network. Listen to wicked words on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The only way to describe the voices is to say they sounded like ghosts, distant but with unmistakable presence, cutting through the fog, accompanying the sounds of the gurney being wheeled over the linoleum floors, and the sound of the PA system summoning this doctor and that nurse to pick up this or that phone, to report to this room or that one, and of course,

the sound of the bleeping vital signs monitor, slowly but steadily chirping in the background, accenting the sound of Ice T's heartbeat. But the voices were ghostly, paint, damned, and angry about it. Ice T. drifted in and out of semi-consciousness in his L.A. County Hospital bed. The more awake he became, the more scary things got. He didn't know where he was or what was happening. All he knew were the sounds flooding his consciousness. Together they orchestrated a mini horror show in his head. All the aforementioned hospital sounds

mixed with random conversation from the spirits conducting this waking nightmare. Talk of next-of-kin, colostomy bags, DNR and the unmistakable chill engulfing his chest. Cold, hard, fear. Ice tea worked to shut it all out. Because his

injuries were so bad, his limbs wouldn't heal correctly if they put casts on his body, so he lay in traction for 10 weeks. And through the haze of two and a half months of pain meds, he dwelled upon the last big job he had pulled and why two of his homies were now doing time for something he did. Truck hijackings were dangerous. Unlike the docile woman behind the counters at jewelry stores, dudes who drove trucks fancied themselves part-time cowboys with their skull bandits and Clint Eastwood correspondence courses. You never knew what level of redneck or working-class hero you were potentially

running up against. Plus, when you ran up on a truck driver, they had options. Depending on how you executed your jacking, they could run you down, back over you, draw down on you at their piece, which a good percentage of them carried, or they could just keep driving. Later for you, Lou, what were you going to do? Give chase in your stolen car and blast off shots at the truck from your driver's side window right there on the streets of Englewood. But the risk was worth the reward. The sheer amount of merchandise on those trucks was worth far more than anything. they could boost in a store, and trucks were moving so much swag from L.A.X. through Englewood into L.A. that on a yearly basis, it was estimated that upwards of half a billion dollars

was being jacked by street bandits like Ice and his boys with the stash house, Shawnee Sean and Vic. The truck approached the stop sign. Ice and someone from his crew were curbed, waiting opposite the truck on the other side of the intersection, knowing its route and timing, out by the airport in the dead of night. As soon as the truck brake, they floored it. Straight across the intersection, head on toward the truck, slamming on their brakes, nose to nose with the truck. They sprung from their car, guns drawn on the driver the entire time,

while jumping up to meet in his cab, opening both the drivers and passenger side doors, pulling the driver out of the cab and dragging him back to the trailer to have him open the rear doors and gain entry to the merge. At the back of the truck, their accomplice, Nath the cat, was waiting in a second stolen car. They cleaned the truck out, filling every square inch of Nat's car

before tearing off into the night back to Vic and Shawnee Sean's stash house. The job was clean, guns, but no shots, just like iced tea liked it. Leaving bodies was nothing but trouble, real heat and real time. And ice couldn't afford that kind of charge. It was a good thing he was so disciplined

because shortly after the truck job, someone tipped off the LAPD who raided Vic and Shawnee Sean's stash house. Ice tea wasn't there at the time, but all the contraband was, and so was the stolen car and Sean's pounds of weed. LAPD wanted to know who Sean did the hijacking with. No one he told them. Bullshit. They knew he couldn't have done the work all by himself. They reminded him of the stiff sentence he'd receive. 25 years for the truck job and the car was Grant Theft Auto, not to mention the weed. Distribution. Fuck it, Shawnee Sean told him.

Yeah, man, whatever. The shit's in my house. Give me whatever you got. Shawnee Sean took the weight himself. Vic took the weight too. Ice T would never forget it. He would never forget how lucky he was. To not only survive the bus and a potential long prison sentence,

but to also survive the car crash. His body was ravaged, broken pelvis, broken ribs, broken femur, the rest of his body smashed, bashed, cashed. The recuperation was left. long and arduous and gave him time to think. He was too smart to ignore the fact that his luck would eventually run out. So he gave up the hustle. Crime pays but at what costs. So no more crime. From now on, the rhymes would have to pay. His years slinging Cripp rhymes in the underground scene

already had him well-connected. Hot off the success of the Sixth in the Morning single, I signed his first major label deal with Sire Records, a Warner Brothers subsidiary. His debut album from 1987, Rhyme Pays, went gold. His second album, Power, went platinum. At the time, Ice-T was the only gangster rapper in the game, and it made his rhymes fresh. While other rappers were still hiding their street routes to appeal to the mainstream, Ice-T continued to take his cues from Iceberg Slim and rapped only the real shit. And it worked. By the early 1990s, Ice-T was recording the theme song to Dennis Hopper's film, Colors, about gangs in L.A. and he was touring Lollapalooza, doing a half hip-hop set

and then bringing out body count for the second half, exposing himself to a whole new audience. I'm listening to exactly what you wouldn't think Ice-T would be listening to now, he told MTV News and a teaser before his set, and rattled off West Coast hardcore bands like Black Flag and Suicidal Tendencies. In other interviews, he would name Czech Slayer and Black Sabbath, and the new band also features Shawnee Sean and Vic, now known as Beatmaster V, both fresh from doing two years taking the rap for ice.

But the realest shit of all was cop killer, which closed the four-song body-count set every afternoon and whipped suburban teens into an anarchic frenzy that nobody else on the first Lollapalooza bill could match. Rollins band, no. Nine-inch nails? Not even close. Butthole surfers, maybe, but they went on too early. Living color?

Okay, they came close. The controversy over the song exploded into the mainstream. The next year, when Cop Killer was featured as the final song on Body Count's self-titled debut, it caught the attention of the highest office in the land, the president of the United States, who unleashed the national security state on Ice Tea to dig up dirt on him and send him to jail. The surveillance had its effect. Ice was on edge.

He always had the feeling of seeing an ice cream truck parked outside his house in the dead of winter of something being off. G-Men had even questioned his daughter at her school, to find out if her dad, Ice-T, was in any extremist groups. On top of all the heat from the government, the firestorm over Cop Killer was impacting Warner Brothers' bottom line, and the future of his record deal was in doubt. His next record was in the can, but its release had already been delayed.

All of the pressure, all the attention, it had Ice-T wound up. His history on the streets had informed his music and launched him into the stratosphere, but now it dogged him. No matter how successful his artistry, the street was calling out his name, welcoming him home, and with the slightest push, Ice-T was ready to snap.

Ice-T was pissed. At the edge of the stage, looking out at the massive Italian crowd that had assembled to see body count, they were showing their appreciation for the band, with the long-standing European punk rock tradition of spitting on them. Ice-T was not having it.

This wasn't the late 70s, this was the 90s, shit had changed, man, who knew what kinds of disease these Italian kids were sending body counts away. Ice clocked the main culprit, front row, black t-shirt, long, greasy black hair. He looked more like an aimless Italian street kid than an actual fan. Ice told the crowd to chill with the spitting. They didn't. Mainly this kid didn't.

Ice positioned himself right at the front of the stage, right in front of the kid, the main offender. Ice gave the crowd, the kid, basically, one more chance to stop spit. telling them that that shit wasn't cool, and they could do whatever the fuck they wanted, but the spitting had to stop. Most did, but again, the kid did not. As the frontman, Ice-T told the crowd to put their hands in the air, and when they did, the kid included,

Ice-T hauled off and cocked him with his fist right in the grill. Immediately, Ice-T screamed, cop-killer, right into the mic, and the band kicked into the song behind him. The crowd erupted, and the kid who ice-punched, his friends swarmed Ice-T, and began hurling off punches of their own. Ice grabbed his mic stand, a straight stand. This was no boom.

This was a weapon with its dome-shaped metal base. Ice swung it without mercy, flailing around and clearing away back onto the stage, away from what was now turning from an audience into a mob. While the band raged behind him, the crowd started chanting in English, we're going to kill you, we're going to kill you.

And the chants grew louder. Hooligan soccer stadium loud. The band instinctively dropped their instruments and sprinted off of the stage, and the chance only increased. From backstage, it sounded like the roar of the Gladiator's Coliseum. Ice T's instincts quickly kicked in, and exit strategy was imminently needed. It was all the matter. If they didn't break out soon, they'd be consumed by the mob and torn limb from limb for turning on their fans. Their tour bus wasn't an option. Outside the Coliseum, the mob already had it surrounded.

Ice T had the promoter quickly summoned six cabs. and made it to the exit door through the cavernous venue's catacombs. He peaked out the door and the mob was waiting. They'd struck up a massive bonfire in the parking lot, shick up beyond Thunderdome real fast. Ice could see the cabs entering through the gate approaching. He pulled his hoodie up over his head, lowered his gaze, and fast walked out the door

ahead of his bandmates and crew toward the cabs. And for a minute they went unnoticed. Then, as he was walking, he could see members of the mob noticing his entourage, they slowly started closing in, approaching him and his band and crew, putting themselves between them and the cabs. Ice lowered his shoulders and did his best Emmett Smith, sprinting straight into the crowd, pummeling members of the mob unexpectedly with the force of his rushing body. He, his guitarist Erdice, and the promoter made it through to one of the cabs and dove into the back seat. The driver

was shell-shocked, paralyzed by fear. The mob surrounded the cab and began pounding on the windows, rocking it back and forth. Ice-T cuffed the driver in the back. back of the head to snap him out of it. Drive, motherfucker! The driver did no such thing. He popped open his door, rammed his shoulder into it, and pushed his way out of the car to escape. Ice hopped over the seat into the front, took the wheel and began pushing the car into and through

the crowd, bodies banging onto the cab bouncing off of its body. Finally, they made it through and out of the area of the venue into the streets of Milan and back toward their hotel. They'd escaped. They were now on the hook for not only assault. but also a grand theft auto. Smartly, Ice had the promoter drive the cab straight back to the venue to return it to its driver. Ice tea cooled his jets at his hotel.

Before we knew it, morning had come, and he was being ushered to the train station en route to a radio station in Rome for a previously scheduled interview with the country's number one rock DJ. The news of the melee at last night's Body Count concert in Milan was everywhere that morning, especially on the airwaves. The Italians were pissed and while walking into the studio to do the interview,

Ice-T felt like he was walking in front of a firing squad. All right, in studio with us, there's a rapper American, Ice-T, who is also the cantate of the band of rock called BodyCamp.

If you're fun of rock, have you've seen the list of yesterday at the concert of the bodycount in Milan. At what is he's sated in mezzo in the public and he's pressed to himmazzed with the microphone.

And in the meantime he was a cazzoooooooo with the group has continued in perterritory to sound at all volume the other piece the famous cop killer

which then means he will mean it's a manned to hear about bastards, they're gonna get used to get us,

they're gonna have invaded the park to try to get to make their band are miraculously are able to

come to come to come to here to come we're just we're using the same ladies and gentlemen one of the

voices more important of the hipop American, notch, Despite the anger in the DJ's voice, Ice-T took to him straight on, looked him in the eye, shook his hand, sat down at the mic, and he immediately, on air, began recounting his side of the story, that he had given the audience a chance to stop spitting, that it was one dude who wouldn't stop, that he and his band couldn't stand there and take it,

but the dude didn't listen, and what did they expect him to do, stand there and continue to get spit on? The DJ got it. immediately directed his eye at his countrymen. Look, Milano, what did you expect IST to do? This is why we love him. He's a gangster. And if you disrespect him, yeah, he will punch you in your stupid face. The DJ's interpretation of what had gone down turned public sentiment almost immediately

and body count were permitted to continue their tour of Italy. Ice T had stayed true to himself to who he was, to his origins as a gangster. It served him well in the past. It kept him alive at Crenshaw High with the Crips, got him through the army, allowed him to maneuver his way through early adulthood as a hustler who knew exactly when to give up the game before the game gave him a 25-year sentence. And those gangster origins gave him the inspiration necessary to launch not only his rap career, but an entire new genre that he invented, gangster rap.

But when the time came for Ice-T to deal with the mess, cop-killer had made for him, again, he relied on his gangster instinct. The controversy over a song depicting the murder of police officers by a fictional character, something that had been done over and over again in television and film for years, by the way, was deemed so offensive coming from the mouth of a black musician that the president of the United States of America had weighed in. Multiple federal agencies were investigating him. In Warner Brothers Records, the label that released Body Count's music, Cop Killer included,

was under so much scrutiny that their company's stock was a lot of, literally dropping. Ice-T knew what to do. When the heat got too hot for the OG, the OG didn't stick around to get burned. And if the OG didn't have a clear exit strategy and wound up getting popped, then the OG made like Shawnee Sean when he caught the charge at his stash house. What the OG didn't do was bring down his partners with him. So when it came to cop killer, that's what Ice-T did. He took the weight himself. He wasn't going to dig in on some sense. He wasn't going to dig in on some censored artist crusade and sink the whole ship in the process destroying his future earning potential. Because without rhymes, Ice T's only real skill, to that point anyway,

was crime, and he wasn't going back to that. So he did the smart thing. He bore the brunt of cop killer and let his partners at Warner Brothers off the hook by agreeing to take the song off Body Count's album and issuing it as a free single to his fans instead. Some in the media charged dice with being a sellout to giving in a sense of ship, but real OGs knew the score. Public enemies Chuck D. came to Ice T's defense and said, if you ain't in the battles, you shouldn't comment on the war. Ice T knew about war, a certain type of war anyway. He was a soldier, and then a criminal, the original gangster who stayed OG to the end,

using those gangster instincts to navigate through what could otherwise have been, certain disgrace. I'm Jake Brennan. And this is Disgraceland. Disgraceland was created by yours truly and is produced in partnership with Double Elvis. Credits for this episode can be found on the show notes page at disgracelandpod.com. If you're listening as a Disgraceland All Access member, thank you for supporting the show. We really appreciate it.

And if not, you can become a member right now by going to disgracelandpod.com slash membership. Members can listen to every episode of Disgraceland ad-free. Plus, you'll get one brand new exclusive episode every month. Weekly unscripted bonus episodes, special audio collections, and early access to merchandise and events. Visit disgracelampod.com slash membership for details. Rate and review the show and follow us on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and Facebook at Disgracelandpod.

And on YouTube at YouTube.com slash at disgraceland pod. Rock a roll. This season on Dear Chelsea, with me, Chelsea Handler, we have some fantastic. guests like Amelia Clark. When like young people come up to me and they want to be an actor or whatever. My first thing is always, can you think of anything else that you can do?

Rather be disappointed in. Do that. David O'Yello. I love this podcast, whether it's therapy or relationships or religion or sex or addiction or you just go straight for the guts. Dennis Leary, Gaten Matarazzo from Stranger Things. Tena Monsu.

Marone, Carrie Kenny Silver, and more. Listen to these episodes of Dear Chelsea on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Sometimes a suspect is found guilty before a verdict is ever read in court. On the Wicked Words podcast, I talk with the writers who dig deep into the cases that changed history, including Marsha Clark, who went from prosecuting one of the most famous murder cases to writing crime fiction. It doesn't matter that you didn't take part in the murder. If you were at the scene at all, you're guilty of murder. Every week, the real story is revealed. Join us every Monday for new episodes of Wicked Words. Listen to Wicked Words on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Movies can make you feel, make you dream. Sometimes they even make you appreciate architecture. Is there anybody who's been hotter in a doorway than Elizabeth Taylor? That's the kind of analysis. you'll find every week on Dear Movies I Love You, the new podcast from the Exactly Right Network. Every Tuesday, we break down the films we're crushing on, from blockbusters to deep cuts. Listen to Dear Movies I Love You on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.