RZA reflects on 30 years of ’36 Chambers’ as city commemorates Wu-Tang Day

Wu-Tang Clan’s RZA is reflecting a lot these days on the Staten Island rap group’s impact and legacy .

This week, the rapper-producer is commemorating the 30th anniversary of the hip hop collective’s seminal first album, ‘Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers),’ with a three-night reinterpretation of the record at Gramercy Theatre, while also gearing up to receive one of the city’s highest honors.

“You would think after 30 years of putting out music and performing music that everything would just be easy-peasy,” he told The Daily News just moments before taking the stage for the first of those performances. “But I still have a level of nervousness because this is an interpretation of ’36 Chambers’ that really hasn’t been shared with anyone.”

“There’s definitely nervousness in my system right now,” he added.

The “Protect Ya Neck” rapper attributes those nerves to the vulnerability of presenting such well-known works in a new way.

“So we’re going to give you a rendition of some of these classic songs that are recomposed,” he explained. “For ’36 Chambers,’ when you think about ‘Bring da Ruckus,’ which was pure adrenaline, right? But for some of the songs the adrenaline may have been maybe replaced with empathy with love or with serenity.”

“I think evolution itself is something that as an artist I always strive to, to achieve or to make sure that I am evolving.“

That evolution includes his growing list of accolades within the past few years, including serving as this year’s Urbanworld Film Festival ambassador, an Emmy nomination for executive producing Hulu’s “Wu-Tang: An American Saga”, debuting his first ballet with Colorado Symphony and the Nov. 9 official proclamation of Wu-Tang Day in New York City.

The group members will gather at the Empire State Building to acknowledge the occasion with a lighting ceremony as the building is lit black and yellow at dusk. RZA says the honor is a full-circle moment in his life.

“What makes it surreal is this: I’m a kid that was a New York city messenger, I was a foot messenger. I couldn’t afford a bike. I’m a kid that’s going into Wall Street getting packages and delivering them to the Empire State Building,” RZA shared.

“And so now to know that same building that I delivered packages to, they’re gonna light it for Wu-Tang and to our colors.”

Speaking on behalf of his “brothers” — Method Man, Ghostface Killah, the late ODB, Inspectah Deck, U-God, Masta Killa, Raekwon and GZA — RZA explains “every one of us are excited and delighted” about Wu-Tang Day

“I will say some of these accolades that’s coming this year, this lighting for instance. I’m telling you, me and the crew have been looking at each other like ‘Hmm, we’re living out the words that we said: ‘Wu-Tang Forever.’ And that’s the aspiration and I’m thankful. There’s nothing better than leaving a footprint for someone else to figure out this path.”