This past May, Yasiin Bey and Talib Kweli reunited as Black Star for the first time in 24 years. The two released their second joint album, No Fear Of Time, which featured the song “So Be It.” Tonight, they brought “So Be It” to the Saturday Night Live stage.
During the performance, Black Star performed in a set-up replicating a nostalgic New York City, as the lyrics to the song displayed on a screen in the back.
“It’s bigger than hip-hop, hypes, and wicked government / Brooklyn award-winning, a not-give-a-f*ckingest,” raps Bey on his verse
In an interview with NPR, Kweli said that although this is their first album in 24 years, Black Star’s mantra of “black excellence, unity, confronting racism, Pan-Africanism, elevating consciousness,” resonates just as much now as it did then.
“We stand tall on the shoulders of our ancestors,” said Kweli “The canon of black art is amazing, and it is the lifeblood of all great art that comes from America in particular. Black people in America have been the moral compass, and we have been the ones who have elevated the art and we have been the ones who have made the most original American things.”
Check out the performance of “So Be It” above.