Sometimes I try to recall how and when I got switched onto hip hop. I can clearly picture Grand Mixer DXT on Herbie Hancock’s “RockIt” and Kurtis Blow schooling us about his favorite sport while in fourth or fifth grade at Liberty Elementary in Pittsburgh. But, that ain’t special; a lot of those at the tail end of Generation X can probably conjure up the same memories.
Overlapping fifth and sixth grades was a rock phase. While I had posters and pictures on my walls and wore a Van Halen t-shirt, I can’t really recall listening to any specific groups outside of Van Halen, Quiet Riot, and, yes, Ratt, though only because I got a promotional copy of Out Of The Cellar a few years old even then. It must have been a very short-lived exploration because the Beastie Boys arrived and I can clearly remember listening to them all the time and memorizing their lyrics. Then I tried to learn to breakdance. Breakdancing is especially difficult to learn from How To books. Believe me, I tried. Like millions of others, the soundtrack of my high school freshman and sophomore years was written by U2, primarily The Joshua Tree and Rattle And Hum. So far, hip hop didn’t really have a hold on me yet.
Then, from what I remember, hip hop just kicked the door of my musical world in, set up shop, and never left. I don’t only listen to hip hop now, but there was a period beginning in early-1988 and running through 1992 or so where I rarely listened to, let alone spent my meager student earnings on, anything outside of hip hop. Four years of buying tapes meant I accumulated an impressive collection encompassing much of the Golden Age.
Regrettably, I don’t have those well-worn tapes anymore, having lost them in a 1995 break up. Sometimes I think about the groups and artists I listened to nearly two decades ago. One of them was 3rd Bass. If you don’t already know, 3rd Bass was fronted by two white guys (MC Serch and Pete Nice), which inevitably lead to a bit of mild derision from those who felt, being white, they had no place in hip hop and clearly influenced their lyrics and style. However, they had a place and I, for one, felt they deserved it. From my sophomore year in high school to well within the year off I took mid-way through my second season of college I worked in a public library. I can remember shelving books in the restricted areas of the library with The Cactus Album pumping out of my chunky yellow Walkman Sport. The old 3rd Bass stuff is a bit dated now, but it plays well and brings back the smell of the dusty shelves and the heat of those past summers.
Being realistic, I wouldn’t say ‘Prime Minister’ Pete Nice is one of the all-time greatest MCs. Back then, though, he was the fucking bomb and I still think his flow is strong. I don’t know if it was his shtick or what, but those smooth, gangsteresque clothes and the menacing walking stick seemed to accentuate the grip he always had on both his mic presence and verses. Following the release of the second 3rd Bass album, Derelicts Of Dialect, the Serch went his own way and Pete Nice continued to work with 3rd Bass DJ, Richie Rich (Daddy Rich), releasing Dust To Dust in 1993. That’s the last I heard of him. Recently, I wondered what happened to the ‘Prime Minister’. Powered by the Internets and earphones thumpin out vintage 3rd Bass, I did some digging.
So, what happened to ‘Prime Minister’ Pete Nice, Nice, Nice?
Pete Nice, born Peter J. Nash, was apparently no dumbass. Before his 3rd Bass career, he attended Columbia University on a basketball scholarship. After 3rd Bass broke up and Dust To Dust was released, Nash created a short-lived record label - Hoppoh Records - and continued working behind the boards. As music seemingly slipped into the background, another of Nash’s passions moved to the fore - baseball history.
Nash now lives in Cooperstown, New York, home of the National Baseball Hall of Fame, where he worked to get the Cooperstown Dreams Park started and, based all I could find as recently as 2006, was well-underway on founding and building the Baseball Fan Hall of Fame, where the game’s greatest fans would be enshrined. He’s also written two books, Boston’s Royal Rooters and Baseball Legends of Brooklyn’s Green-Wood Cemetary, the former of which he’s produced as a documentary (Rooters: The Birth Of Red Sox Nation) likely to air this summer. This is a man after my own heart. A life grounded in hip hop and a true passion for baseball!
And that’s what happened to ‘Prime Minister’ Pete Nice.
3rd Bass - Product Of The Environment
3rd Bass - Microphone Techniques (ft Nice & Smooth)
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