Chris from Castro, New York, is curious about bum rush or bum’s rush, which refers to forcibly removing someone from an establishment. In 1987, Public Enemy’s debut album Yo! Bum Rush the Show popularized the use of bum rush to mean something different — not roughly escorting someone out, but rather a rowdy crowd pushing their way into an establishment or show without tickets or paying admission. Rapper Chuck D has said that this term also alludes to Public Enemy’s effort to push its way to the top of music business and into the national consciousness. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Bum Rush”
Hello, you have A Way with Words.
Hi, this is Chris. I’m calling from Catskill, New York.
Welcome, Chris. What can we do for you?
I’m calling because I wanted to know the etymology and the history of the phrase bum rush.
And the reason I’m asking is because I know that it means, sometimes it means to push somebody out.
But then Public Enemy produced an album called Bum Rush the Show, which sounds more like storming the gates.
So the two opposite sort of meanings there.
And I’m just wondering if you guys could shed some light on that.
Yeah, absolutely.
Yo, Bum Rush the Show was the 1987 debut album of Public Enemy, right?
Yes.
And it was a great album.
And there’s an interesting thing about that album is that really did make popular the idea of a bum rush being a bunch of people trying to get into a place altogether, kind of overwhelming the bouncers or overwhelming the doorman.
There’s an interview that Chuck D gave not all that long ago where he talks about the name of the album.
And he says it has something to do with their gigs, but also the idea that all the guys in the band, I think there were five or six of them in Public Enemy, saw the group and the concert and the album as a chance for them all to get into the industry, to break in.
So kind of referring to themselves maybe as bums a little bit in a self-deprecating way.
But there’s the older bums rush, too, which is a little different there.
Notice bum rush, like bum rush the show is a verb without the possessive on bum, and there’s bums rush.
And that goes back to when, supposedly, when saloons and pubs in New York City would offer free lunches.
So it’d be like pickles and pretzels and other things that would make you drink.
And the bums, the ne’-do-wells, would come into these places and get the free lunch, not buy the beer.
And so the manager, the bouncer, the bartender would throw them out.
And that’s the bums rush.
She just grabbed the belt, grabbed him by the neck, tossed him right out the door.
I see.
Yeah, so there’s lots of evidence for that going back as far as 1910, although the term’s a little late.
Those lunches tended to be more popular before 1910.
In any case, so we have these two, and Public Enemy gets credit for popularizing the new bum rush, the idea that it’s a bunch of people, maybe you all trying to get into a gig,
And you don’t have tickets, so you’re all trying to sneak in the back door or force your way across the rope line or do something as a group so some of you may get in,
Even though some of you might get caught and stopped by the management or the staff.
Okay, so if the older version is sort of throwing somebody out,
That would mean if they come for the free lunch and they’re on it like a hobo on a ham sandwich,
But they don’t buy beer, you give them the bums rush.
Yeah, you talk them out.
Yeah, the new version is interesting.
Both versions have bum in them.
Bum has a lot of different meanings.
So there’s the vagrant sense of bum.
There’s also the kind of schmuck or schmo sense of bum, which is a little more what Public Enemy is talking about.
The bums are the people who can’t afford tickets or don’t want to spend the money on tickets or trying to get a thing for free that everyone else paid for.
I see.
Okay.
Well, thank you for that.
Hey, thanks for calling.
Take care.
Bye.
Bye-bye.
You know, I got a chance to interview Chuck D. A number of years ago.
This would be the late 1980s when Public Enemy was doing a tour.
They did a small gig in the college town that I was living in at the time, Columbia, Missouri.
And even then, Chuck D had this real sense that, as he said at the time, that they were the CNN of the black world, that they were reporting the news.
And even now, when you look at this album, Yo Bum Rushed the Show, that’s 30 years old, and you kind of read through the lyrics of these songs, you’re like, this stuff is prescient.
It had an awareness of language and culture and how they were tied together.
It’s just really kind of incredible how they nailed some stuff.
And if it came out today, I’d like to think it would be just as big a hit.
