A cryptic website popped up this week that had Rage Against The Machine fans excited for a possible reunion. Now it’s looking like Public Enemy and Cypress Hill fans have reason to get excited too.
The site — ProphetsOfRage.com — doesn’t give too many clues about what’s going on. There’s a logo (pictured above), a timer counting down (with about 1 week, 4 days, 19 hours to go at press time), a hashtag #TakeThePowerBack (also the name of a song from Rage’s 1992 self-titled studio debut), and a place to submit an email address.
Posters with the same logo and the website address also started popping up around Rage’s hometown of Los Angeles over the last few days.
Has anyone seen these mysterious posters appearing around Los Angeles? #TakeThePowerBackhttps://t.co/UhG07gziJzpic.twitter.com/UomEzhRR5u
— FlippenMusic (@flippenmusic) May 17, 2016
A source spilled the beans about what’s going on to Billboard, explaining that the band (minus singer Zack de la Rocha) is teaming up with Public Enemy frontman Chuck D and Cypress Hill’s B-Real to perform songs by the three groups, with their concert debut set for Hollywood Palladium on June 3.
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On May 17, Chuck D tweeted out a couple of links to videos of a Rage performance from 2010. “Prophets Of Rage” is also the name of a track off Public Enemy’s 1988 album It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back.
Chuck D has collaborated with the group before, taking the stage for a performance of “Black Steel In The Hour Of Chaos” at the Pinkpop festival in the Netherlands in 1996, and he also teamed up with Rage’s Tom Morello for a performance with LL Cool J and Travis Barker at the 2013 Grammys.
Rage also recorded a version of Cypress Hill’s “How I Could Just Kill a Man” on their 2000 covers album Renegades.
Rage Against The Machine was a major force in music and political activism in the 90s. They reunited for a few years in the late 2000s, but haven’t released new music together since the turn of the millennium and haven’t performed together since 2011.
