On Public Enemy's classic albums, they were indefatigable. Flava Flav, in his role as court jester, was hip hop's greatest hype man, delivering an endless stream of surreal encouragement. Samples were warped by their producers, the Bomb Squad, into squawking anti-melodies, and repeated relentlessly, backed by what sounded like a funk-trained marching band. Looming above all of this was Chuck D, whose prophetic, righteous fury knew no limits.

When he came to Cambridge earlier in the year, however, Chuck was tired. The group had played a "crazy" concert in Brixton the night before, and he was still feeling the effects; later that night, near the end of the concert, he took advantage of a break to sit on a chair. He spoke in the kind of deep voice that commands attention, but he seemed distracted, and kept his answers short. I was hoping to hear about his reactions to Cambridge, but he never got further into town than the generic leisure centre that hosts the Junction. The concert was part of the Don't Look Back concert series, in which artists play their classic albums in full, and in order. Twenty years after the release of It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, a defining album in hip hop history, they were giving it the Don't Look Back treatment. Although there is undeniable appeal in hearing a classic album live, such an approach undermines the unpredictability of the concert experience. Chuck seemed to accept this - as well as describing the tour as a "promoter's dream" and a "fanatic's fantasy", he admitted that, for the group, it was an "artistic challenge". Whereas a rap show in the "classic standard mode" consists of "medley, chop-up, turntable", performing a full album is "more stop-and-go, like a rock band. But we can handle that". His strategy is simple: "You just go up there, kick ass, and play."

It Takes a Nation of Millions... wasn't one of the biggest-selling rap albums of its time, but, more than any other, it helped the genre to establish a degree of artistic credibility. It was the first to top the annual Village Voice Pazz and Jop poll, which is compiled from the lists of hundreds of critics. The NME once ranked it #9 on a list of the greatest albums of all time, and it is regularly held up as the finest rap album ever. This reception didn't take the group by surprise: "Our expectations in 1988 were precisely just that, because we knew that nobody else was doing it. We operated from a standpoint, whether it was the Bomb Squad production or whether it was Public Enemy in performance, that there were a lot of things that were yet to be done in rap music, so we set out to do those things." A crucial element of its success were Chuck's politically conscious lyrics, which complemented the group's militant aesthetic. It was rap's first attempt at a state-of-the-nation record: "We wanted to make a What's Going On of rap, and make a global statement."

When I first got the album as a teenager, I found It Takes a Nation of Millions... difficult to digest. This testifies to its endurance: twenty years on, a song like ‘Rebel Without A Pause' sounds as abrasive as ever. Chuck insists that the album's message remains deeply relevant: "Twenty years is a long time in the music business, but twenty years in life is not. So a lot of those things that we spoke out about that were relevant have increased." As for whether life in America has changed for its black population, he points to a depressing statistic: there were 100,000 black men in prison in 1970, whereas "now you have 1.6 million".

He is frustratingly evasive, however, over the issue of whether rap has become depoliticized. No mainstream rapper is trying to make a What's Going On for this decade, and, aside from The Roots, Chuck doesn't identify anyone whom he considers to be his successors. He points to "all those other things that's happening on MySpace pages, on iLike pages, on YouTube" (he makes references to these sites throughout the interview, and even during the concert). Yet his legacy is less visible in today's hip hop than that of the group's other rapper - as he points out, "Soulja Boy looks like the son of Flava Flav", whose influence can also be seen with Lil Wayne, rap's current superstar.

Perhaps his caution is rooted in the excitement he feels about rap's global ascendancy: having once described it as the "Black CNN", he sees it today as "a worldwide cultural, religious experience for those forty and under". Indeed, Chuck is one of the best examples of how hip hop has entered the establishment. He often gives lectures, having recently spoken at the Southbank Centre, and this year contributed to a book published by MIT Press. Most strikingly, in 2000 he testified before Congress on file sharing, promoting his belief that "everyone should get a sample before they actually get the meal". He has become an authority, and speaks like one, uttering aphorisms such as "artists are freer than they've ever been if they recognize what freedom is".

He is also an example of how rap artists from the older generation are struggling to find their place. The genre is so new that there's no established career path to follow, and it moves so quickly that it's impossible to stay at the cutting edge; Chuck's repeated internet references suggest a strong desire to regain relevance. PE have continued to release albums: their latest, How You Sell Soul to a Soulless People Who Sold Their Soul?, was well received, but it made little impact. They attract more attention as a touring band and they seem to have borrowed their model from rock: their plan for the future is "to make Public Enemy the Rolling Stones of the rap game". But as long as people have reason to fight the power, they'll keep turning to Mistachuck.

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