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Boots Riley
Biography
Boots Riley is an American rapper, producer, screenwriter, film director, and activist. He is the lead vocalist of The Coup and Street Sweeper Social Club.
Born in Chicago and raised in East Oakland's Funktown neighborhood, Boots became a teenage community organizer. From his history of student organizing in Oakland's public schools, serving on the central committee for the Progressive Labor Party, being the President of Youth InCar (Youth International Committee Against Racism), organizing to build California's Anti-Racist Farm Workers' Union, to developing "guerrilla hip hop concerts" (mobile concerts on flatbed trucks), Boots Riley has been an integral part of the progressive struggle for radical change through culture.