Gylan Kain; a progenitor of rap music, 81
Gylan Kain, a Harlem-born poet and performance artist who was a founder of the Last Poets, the spoken-word collective that laid a foundation for rap music starting in the late 1960s by delivering fiery poetic salvos about racism and oppression over pulsing drum beats, died Feb. 7 in Lelystad, Netherlands. He was 81.
He died in a nursing home from complications of heart disease, his son Rufus Kain said. His death was not widely reported at the time.
The Last Poets, which originally consisted of Mr. Kain, David Nelson, and Abiodun Oyewole, were aligned with the Black Arts Movement — the cultural corollary to the broader Black Power movement of the 1960s and ’70s — of which activist poet and playwright Amiri Baraka was a central figure.
With their staccato wordplay and sinewy rhythms, the Last Poets were pioneers of performance poetry, spinning out portraits of Black street life that often bristled with the guerrilla spirit of revolution.
They made their public debut May 19, 1968, in Mount Morris Park, now Marcus Garvey Park, in the New York City neighborhood of Harlem, at a celebration of slain civil rights leader Malcolm X. Less than two months after the assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in Memphis, it was a fraught period in Black America, but also a time percolating with calls for dramatic change.
“There was such electricity in the air,” Mr. Kain said in “The Last Poets,” a 2002 documentary that includes commentary by Isaac Hayes, Ossie Davis, and KRS-One. “There was so much happening in the world of Black consciousness. It was just a good time for Black people to be alive — and young Black people in particular.”
The Last Poets were often deeply confrontational, aiming to shake apolitical Black listeners into action with the most racially charged language possible. Still, Mr. Kain considered himself a poet and not a proselytizer, as evidenced by his lyricism on “James Brown,” one of 18 performances included in the 1970 film “Right On!”:
Cry the pain
Of broken men
That stumble past empty dreams
When night opens wide its mouth
To grind you, swallow you Into pieces of black dust
Two decades later, a snippet from Mr. Kain’s introduction to the track — “like we always do about this time” — wove its way into hip-hop lore, appearing as a sample on Dr. Dre’s landmark 1992 album, “The Chronic,” as well as on “Doggystyle,” Snoop Dogg’s debut album, in 1993.
The Last Poets came to be celebrated as rap progenitors, along with their contemporary Gil Scott-Heron, probably best known for his 1970 tour de force “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised,” who is often called the godfather of rap.
In a 2010 profile of ScottHeron in The New Yorker, Chuck D of Public Enemy was quoted as saying that the Last Poets and Scott-Heron were “not only important; they’re necessary, because they are the roots of rap — taking a word and juxtaposing it into some sort of music.”
“You can go into Ginsberg and the Beat poets and Dylan,” he added, “but Gil Scott-Heron is the manifestation of the modern word. He and the Last Poets set the stage for everyone else.”
Frank Gillen Oates was born May 26, 1942, in Harlem. He was raised by his mother, Hilda Oates, and spent much of his childhood the South Bronx. As a youth, he attended services in Pentecostal churches, where the thundering oratory showed him at a young age the power that words had to sway hearts and minds.
The family eventually moved to Queens, where he developed a love of theater — Shakespeare in particular — at Long Island City High School. After a stint at Hunter College in Manhattan, he began acting and adopted a new name, a twist on Dylan, in reference to poet Dylan Thomas and the biblical figure Cain, whom Albert Camus described as the original rebel.
Mr. Kain’s marriage to June Lum ended in divorce; they had three children. Along with his son Rufus, from his relationship with Lian Schaab, Mr. Kain’s survivors include two other sons, Khalil Kain and Khayyam Kain, from his marriage; two daughters, Khairah Klein (from his marriage) and Amber Kain (from his relationship with Karen Perry); and seven grandchildren.