The Staten Island Problem - Part 4: Wu-Tang vs. Shaolin

Summary

Revisionist History – The Staten Island Problem, Part 4: Wu-Tang vs. Shaolin

Host: Ben Nadiffery
Date: July 30, 2026
Podcast: Pushkin Industries
Episode Theme:
How Wu-Tang Clan’s rise from the “Forgotten Borough” of Staten Island parallels—and is shaped by—the island’s 1993 secession movement. With the backdrop of racial and social tensions in NYC, this episode draws connections between personal independence, group autonomy, and the fantasy of secession that runs through both Wu-Tang and Staten Island’s real-life politics.

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Main Theme & Purpose

Ben Nadiffery explores the unlikely emergence of Wu-Tang Clan from Staten Island during the peak of the borough’s secession movement, delving into how Wu-Tang’s ethos, structure, and mythology mirror the separatist spirit flaring on the island at the time. The episode uses Wu-Tang’s story as a metaphorical lens to examine the desires, divisions, and unresolved tensions at the heart of modern American democracy.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Historian as Obsessed Collector (00:56–03:07)

• Ben introduces his compulsive interest in Staten Island’s secession, comparing himself to Edward Casaubon from Middlemarch, someone obsessed with finding the “key to all mythologies.”
• “I see the Staten Island secession movement everywhere in our world today.” (Ben Nadiffery, 01:38)

Wu-Tang Clan & Staten Island’s Overlooked Status (03:07–06:50)

• Wu-Tang’s debut, Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers), was released one week after Staten Island’s secession vote in 1993.

• Wu-Tang’s naming of Staten Island as “Shaolin” became an act of local myth-making, recasting their environment.

• Wu-Tang’s early work is deeply shaped by the borough’s sense of exclusion, struggle, and gritty reality.

  “Their music is all about their lives, what they witnessed on the island at the time.” (Ben Nadiffery, 03:32)

The Making of Wu-Tang: Race, Segregation, and Origin Stories (08:12–13:26)

• Hip-hop journalist Skiz Fernando recounts meeting RZA (Bobby Diggs) and being struck by his intelligence and unique vision.

• Staten Island, divided by the expressway into mostly Black North and white South neighborhoods, was intensely segregated.

• Filmmaker Daphne McWilliams shares a story about growing up Black in a white neighborhood and the local racism her family faced.

• Wu-Tang’s early environment was a cauldron of both exclusion and creative ferment.

  “When my mother found that house, she got a threatening… call…‘You better hope that you don’t see your kids floating in the pond.’” (Daphne McWilliams, 10:37)

RZA’s Fork in the Road: Crime or Creation? (13:26–14:36)

• RZA’s initial failed record deal as Prince Rakim collapses, he turns back to criminal activity, faces prison, and ultimately decides to invest in his music—choosing creation over destruction.

  “I had 10k and the gag was the plan was to get a brick… But then I was like, nah, I have a second chance.” (RZA, 14:09)

Myth-Making: From Shaolin to Wu-Tang (15:28–23:24)

• RZA’s creative vision is shaped by long walks across Staten Island, envisioning a group that channels the resilience and paradox of their home.

• Drawing from kung fu movies (36th Chamber of Shaolin, Shaolin vs Wu Tang), RZA reframes the struggle—Staten Island as both oppressed (Shaolin) and oppressor (the local power structure).

• Wu-Tang is named not after Shaolin, but after its rival, symbolizing a group pushing against, not just escaping, an oppressive force.

  “Only on a remote island can something like King Kong grow to his full capacity.” (RZA, The Tao of Wu, cited by Ben Nadiffery, 16:39)

  “He took the whole mythology that was in the movies. And he appropriated it to his current conditions of a black man living in Staten island, doing battle in this game called Rap against the music industry.” (Skizz Fernando, 23:02)

Wu-Tang’s Revolution in the Music Industry (23:24–29:03)

• RZA proposes a radical, decentralized model: the group would sign as Wu-Tang, but each MC retained the right to individual deals—mirroring Staten Island’s quest for independence and local control.

• The first single, Protect Ya Neck, is crafted by pooling meager resources—symbolic of group effort and self-determination.

• Stretch and Bobbito debut the song on NYC radio, describing the Wu-Tang’s mysterious, forceful arrival as “a sneak attack.” The track instantly electrifies the city.

  “Putting eight MCs on a track and making it all blend together is as difficult as making Five Boroughs feel like one city. The difference is that RZA was about to pull it off.” (Ben Nadiffery, 23:58)

  “Immediately the phone lines lit up… I don’t know what the record is.” (Stretch and Bobbito, 26:01–26:13)

• Wu-Tang’s decentralized strategy—solo contracts on multiple labels—becomes a template for success.

  “No one had ever done anything like that before.” (Skizz Fernando, 27:16)

Wu-Tang as Secession Fantasy Realized (29:03–30:35)

• Wu-Tang succeeds spectacularly, going quadruple platinum while retaining their unique, collective, yet individual voices.

• Method Man articulates the group’s philosophy: “So what we have to do is build our own industry… to make it right.” (Method Man, 29:03)

• The Wu-Tang’s independence and solidarity fulfill the fantasy driving the borough’s secession movement: break away, return stronger, and upend the establishment.

  “This is the fantasy of secession. You break away, you come back with a crew of guys from Staten Island and you dominate. That’s what Wu Tang did. That’s what the Staten Island secessionists dreamed of doing. It’s the zeitgeist.” (Ben Nadiffery, 30:35)

• Ol’ Dirty Bastard dispels rumors of internal division:

  “Don’t think that because he has a solo deal and I have a solo deal, this man may get a solo deal that we all… just separating and breaking up. It’s not that type of thing, man. We just. We just expanding because the talent is so great.” (Ol’ Dirty Bastard, 30:11)

The Broader Resonance (31:15–32:22)

• The episode closes by hinting at the ambiguous legacy of Staten Island’s secession vote, preparing for the final chapter.

• Other voices reflect on the deeper questions: Who has power? Who feels resentment? The politics of outsider anger remains potent.

  “Who gets to be in this position? What’s fair and what’s not? Who gets to wield power? Who doesn’t?” (Unknown, 31:22)

  “That sense of low boiling resentment towards the people in charge. Like who? Who doesn’t feel that right now?” (Unknown, 31:31)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “I see the Staten Island secession movement everywhere in our world today.” (Ben Nadiffery, 01:38)
• “This is how hip hop started… all these kids running around and adults… just enjoying the music and enjoying each other’s company.” (Skizz Fernando, 08:36)
• “He wanted to be a part of it.” (Skizz Fernando, 09:16)
• “I was a toddler. The sound of her hitting the concrete steps would resonate with me forever.” (You God, via Ben Nadiffery, 17:40)
• “Shaolin school is restricted. Only monks are taught that. If Shaolin techniques could be taught here, then the people could use it to fight…” (Actor, 36th Chamber of Shaolin, 19:11)
• “If some central authority is dominating you and you don’t like it, what do you do? Go away to Shaolin, learn the truth, build a movement and go to war with the oppressor till you remake it in your own image.” (Ben Nadiffery, 22:28)
• “We just expanding because the talent is so great…you can’t come out of one chamber. You just got to spread.” (Ol’ Dirty Bastard, 30:11)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:56–03:07: Ben introduces his “excellent Staten Island facts” and connects Wu-Tang’s rise with secession.
• 05:42–06:50: Skiz Fernando’s early coverage of Wu-Tang and the surprise of their Staten Island origin.
• 10:03–11:59: Daphne McWilliams on racial segregation and exclusion on the island.
• 13:16–14:36: RZA’s turning point from dealer to music pioneer.
• 19:11–20:10: Kung fu influences: “Shaolin vs. Wu-Tang” and the metaphor for oppression and survival.
• 23:44–24:44: Wu-Tang’s first self-funded recording session.
• 25:04–26:13: Stretch and Bobbito’s radio premiere of “Protect Ya Neck.”
• 27:16–27:48: Wu-Tang’s groundbreaking group/solo contract structure.
• 29:03–30:11: Method Man and Ol’ Dirty Bastard on Wu-Tang’s philosophy.
• 31:15–32:22: The episode’s end: larger questions about power, resentment, and Staten Island’s story.

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Episode Tone & Language

• Ben’s storytelling is personal, playful, and slightly obsessive, using literary and mythological analogies to deepen his arguments.
• Interviewees speak plainly, mixing nostalgia, critique, and pride.
• The episode weaves archival Wu-Tang lyrics and kung fu movie lines into the narrative, maintaining an energetic, culturally rich feel.

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Conclusion

Episode 4 of The Staten Island Problem draws a vivid parallel between the borough’s real-world separatist aspirations and Wu-Tang Clan’s rebellion against hip hop orthodoxy and music industry gatekeepers. By holding up the story of Wu-Tang as a mirror to the politics of resentment and independence, Ben Nadiffery reveals the ways in which fractured communities improvise new ways to be heard—and sometimes, to change the world.

Next episode: The fallout of Staten Island’s secession vote and its long shadow over New York and American politics.

Transcript

[Jake Brennan]

On August 4, 1962, Marilyn Monroe died. Then the rumors started and she died again. And now we're going to set the record straight and learn about the way Marilyn Monroe actually died. The third way. I'm Jake Brennan and on my podcast Hollywoodland, I revisit some of the biggest stories from Hollywood history, separating the myths people want to believe from the reality underneath them. Hollywoodland is part of the Exactly Right network. Listen to new episodes every Monday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Santana Oneness Tour 2026 from Woodstock to Supernatural and beyond with very special guest, the Doobie Brothers. Get tickets [e-mail].

[Ben Nadiffery]

Pushkin. One of my favorite books is Middlemarch by George Eliot. It's about the life and manners of a small English town in the 19th century. It's also a cautionary tale for the kind of person I am. There's a character in the book named Edward Casabon, a dreary middle aged man who's engaged in a decades long writing project. Casaubon collects facts. He writes on little sheets of paper that he stores in the pigeonholes of his library shelves. He claims that someday he's going to use these facts to prove that all the myths of the world are really one myth. He's obsessed. He calls it the key to all mythologies and he sees it everywhere. I'm not middle aged and I am fairly upbeat, but I fear that last bit is me. I see the Staten island secession movement everywhere in our world today. I've carried my facts about the Staten island secession movement around with me for quite a while now. They burn a hole in my pocket. I go to parties and inevitably I wind up in the corner with the Staten Islander who has suddenly revealed themselves. They look interested and then mildly concerned as I pull from memory the facts that I have stored in the pigeonholes of a document I have titled Excellent Staten Island Facts. Did you know the towers of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge are so far apart that they had to take into account the curvature of the earth when they built them? Did you know that Staten island claims to have been home to the true and forgotten inventor of the telephone? Am I Casabon? God, I hope not. I caution myself against seeing my project everywhere. Don't be the hammer to whom everything looks like a nail. Don't try to write the key to all mythologies. And then I learned something like this. Wu Tang Clan, arguably the most important group in hip hop history, is from Staten Island. They made their first album and Enter the Wu Tang 36 chambers entirely during the height of the secession movement. And it came out in 1993, just one week after the island was going to vote on secession.

[Method Man]

I grew up on the crime side, the New York Times side. Staying alive was no job, had second hands, moms bounced on old man. So then we moved to Shaolin land.

[Ben Nadiffery]

I began to listen to this record every day. I worked on this project on the ferry to the archives, on the subway to work Shaolin, what they called Staten island is all over it.

[Method Man]

I come from the Shaolin slum and the island from is coming through with enough niggas, enough guns.

[Ben Nadiffery]

Their music is all about their lives, what they witnessed on the island at the time. Like, listen to this from the song Wu Tang Seventh Chamber. They bring up the projects in northern Staten island where Wu Tang formed, nicknamed Killa Hill.

[Ol' Dirty Bastard]

Stop playing a stick like plaster Bush slasher Slit a nigga back like a Dutch Matt Master killer thou jumped off and killer killer I was the thriller in the alley. Frasier Manila.

[Ben Nadiffery]

It's all about their lives in New York City in the early 1990s. Who they were becoming and what it all had to do with being from the rugged lands of Shaolin. I considered putting this on my list of excellent Staten island facts and leaving it at that. But I had no choice. I put on my headphones. I picked up the phone. I opened my notebook. Casabon rides again. You're listening to Revisionist History. I'm Ben Nadiffery, and this is the Staten Island Problem, a series about the movement that threatened to bring down the greatest city in the country. In this episode, I bring you the story of the rise of one of the greatest rap groups in history. That happened all while the secession movement unfolded in the background. We're going to zero in on an entirely different experience taking place on the island at the same time. One that reveals just how entrenched the Staten island problem really is. But one that also, I think, might show us a way to solve it. This is episode four, Wu Tang versus the Shaolin. I should say off the bat that I was unable to reach the Wu Tang Clan. For a brief moment, the manager of a lesser known member of the group considered giving me an interview. Then he stopped taking my calls. Domingo, if you hear this, I'm ready when you are. But luckily, I was able to track someone else down.

[Skizz Fernando]

I was actually one of the first journalists to ever deal with Wu Tang because their record label, Loud, called me up.

[Ben Nadiffery]

Skizz Fernando was a hip hop journalist in the 80s and 90s. He covered WU Tang from the beginning. Had he ever considered the crucial overlap of Wu Tang's formation and Staten island secession? He had not.

[Skizz Fernando]

I had no idea any of that stuff was going on at the time. I don't even know if they did. Like it was the.

[Ben Nadiffery]

They must have. It was the biggest story on Staten Island.

[Skizz Fernando]

What was it going to be? Just like Staten island was just going to be a city.

[Ben Nadiffery]

Yeah. When the Wu Tang Clan first formed their label called Skiz to write their bio. So he connected with the group's de facto leader, a guy named Bobby Diggs, who went by the name rza.

[Skizz Fernando]

And I was immediately struck by this guy. Like I could detect like some serious intelligence in this guy.

[Ben Nadiffery]

RZA was a former drug dealer with no professional prospects living out on Staten Island. That alone was strange. In the pantheon of hip hop, Brooklyn and the Bronx reign supreme. Nobody is from Staten Island.

[Skizz Fernando]

All of the five boroughs in New York were pretty represented in hip hop in the 90s. You had the, you know, you had like the boogie down Bronx.

[Method Man]

It's a one of a kind. It's the place to be. It's a state of mind about the guys.

[Skizz Fernando]

So obviously Brooklyn, The money making Manhattan.

[Method Man]

Now I'm the guy named Curtis Blow and Christmas is one thing I know. So every year, just about this time, I celebrate it with a rhyme.

[Skizz Fernando]

You know, Queens, you had Queensbridge projects produced so many amazing artists like Nas, Mobb Deep Team.

[Method Man]

Every day I deal with the pressure and mixed up is how I feel.

[Skizz Fernando]

And like Staten is, you know, who was from Staten Island. There was not a lot of acts coming out of Staten Island. You know, you had, oh geez, I'm blanking.

[Ben Nadiffery]

This is all to say Skizz was surprised. Here was this relatively unknown MC from the island with an encyclopedic knowledge of kung fu movies and a crew of eight other MCs who'd name themselves after a form of martial arts invented by a Taoist hermit. Skiz was like, what?

[Skizz Fernando]

Wow, this guy is something else.

[Ben Nadiffery]

So Skiz, journalist that he is, began a decades long process of figuring out how exactly the Wu Tang Clan came to be. RZA decided what he wanted to do with his life on America's 200th birthday. He was in the Park Hill projects of Staten island. It was July 1976 and there was a party in the courtyard. The DJ was spinning records and rapping over them.

[Skizz Fernando]

He dip, dip, dive and socialize. I think those are the exact words that Riza remembered. And that kind of just, just that energy and just the excitement of that whole thing of seeing this free party happening in this environment, you know, all these kids running around and adults and it. And people just enjoying the music and enjoying each other's company. This was how. This was how hip hop started.

[Ben Nadiffery]

RZA was 7 at the time.

[Skizz Fernando]

And when you're a young kid exposed to this and this is like the excitement that's happening in your neighborhood, you want to be a part of it.

[Jake Brennan]

And he.

[Skizz Fernando]

He wanted to be a part of it.

[Ben Nadiffery]

He stayed up late into the night transfixed.

[Skizz Fernando]

So immediately he goes home and he starts writing rhymes, you know, and then as soon as he could, he starts DJing.

[Ben Nadiffery]

Rizm moved around a lot as a kid. He was born in Brooklyn, spent some of his childhood in North Carolina, but he landed in the Park Hill projects on the north shore of Staten Island. The buildings were built in 1965, around the same time as the bridge and the expressway that split the island down the middle into north and south shore. North was where the black people lived. South was where the white people lived. Several Staten Islanders told me the expressway was their equivalent of the Mason Dixon line.

[Daphne McWilliams]

People were like, where are you from? And I'm like, so I used to say, if I tell you, I have to kill you. And they're like, why? And then I'm like, staten Island.

[Ben Nadiffery]

One day, when I was listing excellent Staten island facts to a friend, she told me, you should meet Daphne McWilliams. She's a filmmaker from Staten Island.

[Daphne McWilliams]

There were only three houses on my parents block, and then across from the lake was Park Hill projects.

[Ben Nadiffery]

Her parents were from Trinidad and Jamaica and didn't really know the intricate racial codes of Staten Island. Her family moved to the white area across from the Park Hill projects back in the 1970s.

[Daphne McWilliams]

But when my mother found that house, she got a threatening, I guess, call or something where they were like, oh, something like, you better hope that you don't see your kids floating in the pond.

[Ben Nadiffery]

By one estimate, there were fewer than a thousand people of color south of the expressway. Daphne stuck out. She told me a story from when she was a kid about having a crush on an Italian American boy named Billy. One day she called his house, and

[Daphne McWilliams]

his mother picked up, and she was like, don't ever call this house again. So I went to school the next day. I was upset, and I went and speak to this priest. I don't know what I did wrong. I don't know what I did wrong. And I'm telling the guy goes, well, you see, he says something to like, almost like there's a. There's a little heaven for white kids and there's like a little heaven for black kids.

[Ben Nadiffery]

Heaven is segregated.

[Daphne McWilliams]

I was like, oh my God. Like, I had no idea. When I look back and think about it, we always stood out because we were always the black family. My parents didn't raise us in a segregated mindset. We just never. It was the community that made us feel different, especially as you get older.

[Ben Nadiffery]

But the truth is, all of New York City was segregated then. It seemed like there was a defining race riot every year. Very do the right thing. The reality that Mayor Dinkins vision of a beautiful mosaic obscured is that if one bit of colored glass from the mosaic crossed another, someone might end up shot or run over and then the riots would begin again. But southern Staten island was a particularly dramatic case. It may as well have been the Deep South. When one Wu Tang member went to Daphne's area at the he remembered getting chased out by white kids with motorcycles. They spray painted KKK on the rocks to warn the black kids away. This was the Staten Island RZA grew up on. But he had a way of escaping that reality. Hip hop. By the time RZA was In his early 20s, hip hop had gone stratospheric. From the courtyards and rec rooms of the New York City projects to the top of the Billboard charts, the labels were grabbing at any artist they could. RZA got a deal. He brought his new label, a bunch of songs, and they said, we think girls will like you. So he wound up releasing an EP called Ooh, We Love youe Rakim, a record that presented him as a sweet ladies man named Prince Rakim.

[Method Man]

I've got too many ladies I've got to learn to say no oh, we love you, Rakim.

[Ben Nadiffery]

It was an attempt to do something extremely commercial, totally inoffensive and upbeat, and also fundamentally false and corny. And maybe for that reason it bombed. RZA got dropped from his label and he was back to zero. That's when he started dealing drugs and almost went to prison for attempted murder. He argued self defense and beat the charges in the end. And he had $10,000 left. It was enough to buy some drugs and sell them. But he had a kid on the way. He had to make a choice. And this choice became so legendary that he's still talking about it. Here he is on a recent episode of a podcast called flagrant.

[RZA]

I had 10k and the gag was the plan was to get a brick. So we figured, yo, if we flip this 20, we could at least get 80. The thing was, yo, I had a baby in the oven or maybe just born, right? So life was like, what are you going to do? But then I was like, nah, I have a second chance.

[Ben Nadiffery]

That's when he started calling himself rza. R Z A. He would later say it was short for Rakim Zig Zag Zig Allah. While everyone else zigged, it was time for him to zag. And so, living on a Staten island that was in the middle of its own very big zag, he began to make a bold plan for an independence movement of his own, something called Wu Tang Clan. After he beat his charges, Bobby Diggs, AKA the rza, began to walk around Staten Island. And he started to take these long, drawn out walks day after day.

[RZA]

So I'm walking and I'm thinking, yo, and I'm walking all step. I'm walking through standard people. People thought there was. I learned this. People thought I was losing my mind because I'm walking and I'm talking to myself.

[Ben Nadiffery]

He would walk the island and think. Staten island was more than twice the size of Manhattan and RZA could just walk and walk. He would start at the projects on the North Shore, then maybe journey along the coastline through the suburban streets. RZA was ready to make music again. But the first time out with his Prince for Kim project had gone badly. But the idea he was coming up with now was going to be different. And I want to argue here that it has everything to do with Staten Island. Let me share with you some writing from Riz's book, the Tao of Wu. I spent my formative years on an island, Staten island, which is a blessing I've taken with me through life in Staten Island. Wu Tang were set apart from all the influences and fads that were happening in the other four boroughs. A nine man hip hop crew based on mathematics, chess, comics and kung fu flicks wasn't springing up in the middle of a Manhattan art scene. Only on a remote island can something like King Kong grow to his full capacity. But the projects in Staten island were a difficult place to live. A few of the Wu Tang members have written books, and reading them, it's clear that it wasn't just the remoteness of Staten island that led them to the Wu Tang Clan. It was also what they experienced there, especially in the projects. One Wu Tang member, you, God, wrote about the first time he saw somebody die. He was five years old, sitting with his mom, listening to Loving youg by Minnie Riperton play on the radio outside. When he heard a crowd forming in the courtyard. He ran out to look. A woman was standing on the roof, screaming. He watched so long his neck went stiff. Then she jumped or fell. Ugad wrote in his book called Ra. I was a toddler. The sound of her hitting the concrete steps would resonate with me forever. So when RZA walked Staten island, it wasn't just this utopian vision of the isolated island where you can dream big. It was also the deeply segregated place where kids living on their own little island watched adults fall to their death. A kind of paradox, and my theory is that paradox was expressed in the word Shaolin. When RZA was a kid, he and his cousin used to go to a Times Square porno theater. Sometimes it showed kung fu and one movie that they loved in particular, the 36th Chamber of Shaolin.

[Actor (36th Chamber of Shaolin)]

But, sir, all the Manchus are well armed. What can we do? No man's so weak he cannot help.

[Ben Nadiffery]

Most people came to that Times Square movie theater to jerk off, sniff glue, or shoot heroin. But RZA would later say in interviews that he and his cousin were locked in on this poorly dubbed movie about a small village in China that was being oppressed by a distant government. The hero of the movie is a villager who journeys to the Shaolin Temple in China to learn to fight back. Rze saw this movie over 300 times. He hadn't realized that kind of oppression happened to people who weren't black. This is from the 36th Chamber. When our hero learns what Shaolin is,

[Actor (36th Chamber of Shaolin)]

Shaolin school is restricted. Only monks are taught that. If Shaolin techniques could be taught here, then the people could use it to fight the Manchu troops. That would be good.

[Ben Nadiffery]

At some point, RZA started to call Staten Island Shaolin, the place he learned his secret weapon to fighting oppression. Hip hop. But Staten island was also a version of that distant, oppressive government he saw in the films. And as he walked the island trying to come up with his next play, he didn't decide to start a group called the Shaolin Clan. He came up with an idea for something called the Wu Tang Clan, named after Shaolin's rival. This is from another kung fu movie they loved called Shaolin versus Wu Tang.

[Actor (Shaolin vs Wu Tang)]

Isn't it true that you think you are better than us, but you're afraid that one day the Wu Tang will overtake you? You. So you used your special poison to get rid of my master, who was your biggest threat. Nonsense. No, it isn't. I saw it with my own eyes. Nonsense.

[Stretch and Bobbito Libido]

Shaolin aren't afraid of the Wu Tang.

[Actor (Shaolin vs Wu Tang)]

We Wu Chang will fight. Listen to me.

[Ben Nadiffery]

Someone is trying to frame me. RZA kept walking and thinking. Shaolin Wu Tang 36 chambers Shaolin Wu Tang 36 chambers Wu Tang biographer Skiz Fernando knew all about those walks RZA would take.

[Skizz Fernando]

That's one good thing about Staten Island. You can walk around in these nice neighborhoods with like Victorian mansions. You don't have to worry about getting mugged necessarily.

[Ben Nadiffery]

And what would have been on the lawns of all those Victorian mansions? RZA was walking by signs that said, Vote yes for the city of Staten Island. Secession means a better life. Billboards for secession above the streets. The same thing as was on the front page of the paper all the time. The same thing the NAACP of Staten island was hosting meetings about, worrying that this could be really bad for black people living on Staten Island. Let me be clear. I have never found RZA himself talking about Staten island secession. But in my casabon mode, I see a connection. Because as he walked a Staten island that felt like it wasn't welcome in New York City and was striking out on its own, this guy who would have every reason not to feel welcome on Staten island formed a plan for an unlikely hip hop group from Shaolin that was about to do the same. Maybe he thought they could skip the whole major label thing that had screwed him before. Maybe he didn't have to sanitize his life and character to succeed. Maybe there could be a hip hop group from the forgotten borough that made it all happen on its own and that group would be called Wu Tang Clan. He began to assemble his crew, and the core ideology for rza, I think, had a whole lot in common with the secession movement. It's the exact same fantasy. If some central authority is dominating you and you don't like it, what do you do? Go away to Shaolin, Learn the truth, build a movement and go to war with the oppressor till you remake it in your own image. Let me put my kazavan robe back on and bring you back into my library. Please sit at the table, have a mug of tepid tea. I believe that the fantasy Wu Tang Clan had was that there's a way to strike out on your own, independently and take over the forces that oppressed you. And that's the exact fantasy of the secessionists emanating from the exact remote island at the exact moment so many people on the island explored, experienced it. And it was the spirit of what Skiz, that Wu Tang biographer, told me that RZA did next.

[Skizz Fernando]

He took the whole mythology that was in the movies. And he appropriated it to his current conditions of a black man living in Staten island doing battle in this game called Rap against the music industry.

[Ben Nadiffery]

Walking the island, RZA had come up with a five year plan. He'd go to the greatest underrated MCs he knew on the island and band them together into the Wu Tang Clan. He'd been burned by the labels before with that Prince Rakim album, so now he wanted to go it alone. He'd take the $10,000 he'd save and use it to start a production company.

[Skizz Fernando]

These guys had absolutely no future. They're all caught up in the street game. They're all selling crack. You know, two for five on the street. They didn't want to be doing that.

[Ben Nadiffery]

The guys all went out to a diner on Staten Island. They toasted Wu Tang with a bottle of champagne. Each member put up $100 for studio time. The next day, they started recording what became their first single, Protect ya neck. Putting eight MCs on a track and making it all blend together is as difficult as making Five Boroughs feel like one city. The difference is that RZA was about to pull it off. It took days of recording until all the verses were in place. Like students at Shaolin and Wu Tang, each MC was trying to one up the other, pushing farther and farther beyond the reaches of what existed in hip hop at the time. RZA knew each one's style and how to draw out what made them unique. And it was the opposite of some oppressive label telling him, we think girls will like you and neutering his art. He didn't need the label. By December of 1992, the song was finished. The group took the cassette of Protect Ya Neck to the hottest hip hop radio show in town. Stretch and Bobbito Libido was alone in the studio.

[Stretch and Bobbito Libido]

I'm not quite sure how members of the Wu Tang Clan got into our hallway, but I hear a knock on the studio door. I open it and there's five dudes out there and they're not smiling.

[Ben Nadiffery]

They shoved an unmarked record into his hands.

[Stretch and Bobbito Libido]

They're like, yo, man, yo, you gotta play this. You gotta play, yo, play this right now. I was like, yo, fellas, like, I can't. I felt like I was being strong armed to play their record. Immediately I was like, all right, fellas, cool. So I took the record, I threw it on because I was. I was intrigued. I was like, how did these dudes mysteriously get into the studio?

[Ben Nadiffery]

He listened to it privately first.

[Stretch and Bobbito Libido]

And I hear that, you know, with the Martial arts. And I'm like, oh, this, this is dope. You know, I'm gonna play was the

[Ben Nadiffery]

premiere that launched the Wu Tang Clan.

[Stretch and Bobbito Libido]

But yeah, I mean, immediately the phone lines lit up. Immediately. I'll never forget my friend, he called up, he was like, yo, Pop, what

[Daphne McWilliams]

the F is that?

[Stretch and Bobbito Libido]

I was like, yo, I don't know, I don't know. I don't know what the record is.

[Ben Nadiffery]

The entire philosophy of Wu Tang is that they don't need some centralized music industry to take over the world. They can do it all on their own. Basically, you had your chance, you lost it. We don't need you. It's our time now. The song blew up. So of course the labels came knocking. But this time RZA was ready. No more. Prince Rakim, he was the king and he had a plan for world domination. They would make a deal for Wu Tang as a group, but he would do something totally unprecedented in the industry. In the contract there would be a clause though. All the MCs in Wu Tang might be consolidated under the name Wu Tang Clan and Wu Tang might sign a record deal. Each MC was going to retain local control of their own career. Each one could make any deal he wanted with any other record label. Loud records agreed to RZA's terms. Skiz Fernando, again, revolutionary deal in the music industry.

[Skizz Fernando]

The whole first round of Wu Tang solo albums was like that. All on different labels and different artists. But like all the Wu Tang is on each album, so they, so they're using the major label system to spread their own brand out there. That was the genius of it. Like no one had ever done anything like that before.

[Ben Nadiffery]

On November 9, Wu Tang Clan played their album release show for enter the WU 36 Chambers at Webster hall in the heart of the of Manhattan.

[Skizz Fernando]

Skiz was there, the floor was packed with people. They were showing 36 chambers, the original on the, on the big screen. And then when the group got on to perform, honestly I. It seemed like all of Staten island was on stage. You didn't know who was in the group and who was it, because it was just like the whole stage was packed. The whole floor was packed. That whole floor was just bouncing up and down these wooden rafters. I thought the whole thing was going to collapse. It was just like people were ready to tear shit down. The energy, the excitement, because they came from Staten Island. It was like a sneak attack. No one saw it coming.

[Ben Nadiffery]

RZA executed his plan flawlessly. Wu Tang released their debut album. An absolutely bizarre hour long hip hop record full of kung Fu samples and weird jazz and nine unheard of MCs, most of whom hailed from a forgotten island, an island they'd renamed after a Chinese martial arts school. And it went quadruple platinum. Here's Method man on tv.

[Method Man]

And we tried to lock down the industry, which you cannot do because they already set in their ways, like I said before. So what we have to do is build our own industry. Industry to make it right.

[Ben Nadiffery]

Wu Tang's still playing together. So for me, in this series on secession, it's a lesson in how to keep a group of people together. Not that the clan's without its problems, but the genius of the whole thing is that RZA figured out how to showcase each rapper's own personality and give them their own career. He went on to produce a round of solo albums for each of the MCs in the group. Hit after hit after hit. Each one on different record labels who were feverishly trying to ride the Wu Tang wave. Method man on Def Jam Platinum. Ol Dirty Bastard on WMG Platinum. Raekwon on RCA Platinum. Ghostface Killa on Epic Platinum. GZA on Geffen Gold. Six hit albums in three years. Wu Tang Clan ran the industry. These guys who had so much working against them went to Shaolin, came back on their own terms and toppled the oppressor.

[Ol' Dirty Bastard]

Don't think that because he has a solo deal and I have a solo deal, this man may get a solo deal that we all. We all just separating and breaking up. It's not that type of thing, man. We just. We just expanding because the talent is so great. It's like we have mad talent in this, you know, and we just got to spread out, you know, you can't come out of one chamber. You just got to spread.

[Ben Nadiffery]

This is the fantasy of secession. You break away, you come back with a crew of guys from Staten island and you dominate. That's what Wu Tang did. That's what the Staten island secessionists dreamed of doing. It's the zeitgeist. The key to all mythologies. Some force in the early 90s of New York City was shouting, secede, Secede. Oh, and by the way, the vote on secession, it happened seven days before the Wu Tang Clan put out their album. And that vote was going to leave an even bigger mark on our world today. That's coming up on the last episode of the Staten Island Problem, live here

[Skizz Fernando]

on channel 77 from Secession headquarters at the Island Chateau. Channel 77 bringing you that live.

[Unknown Interviewee 1]

It's so parallel. Who gets to be in this position? What's fair and what's not? Who gets to wield power? Who doesn't?

[Unknown Interviewee 2]

These sentiments show up in so many places and parts of our population, right? That sense of low boiling resentment towards the people in charge. Like who? Who doesn't feel that right now you

[Actor (Shaolin vs Wu Tang)]

realize as a city that can plan for its own and doesn't have to say may I, may I do this and may I do that, we will

[Ben Nadiffery]

be doing what are we standing on top of right now?

[Unknown Interviewee 3]

We're standing on the story of New York City. If you lived here between 1948 and 2001, you're here somewhere. Maybe not in this exact mound, but some piece of you, even if you just pass through, some piece of you is underneath us.

[Ben Nadiffery]

The Staten Island Problem is written and produced by me, Ben Nadifafry with Lucy Sullivan and Nina Byrd Lawrence. Our editor is Karen Shakurji. Our executive producer is Jacob Smith. Fact checking by Sam Russik sound design and mastering by Jake Gorski Original music by Stellwagen Symphonette, Luis Guerra, Jake Gorski and thanks to Todd Reynolds for his track the Solution from the album Outer Borough. Special thanks to Malcolm Gladwell. I'm Ben Nadifafry. Here Episodes of Revisionist History the Staten Island Problem early and ad free by subscribing to Pushkin Plus. Sign up on the Revisionist History show page on Apple Podcasts or at Pushkin FM plus. Pushkin plus subscribers can access ad free episodes, full audiobooks and exclusive binges of true crime podcasts throughout the year.