Tonight (Thursday, April 18th), iconic hip-hop group PUBLIC ENEMY will be inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame, alongside classic rock acts RUSH and HEART, and singer-songwriter RANDY NEWMAN, among others. And while they aren’t the first artist from that genre to be inducted – GRANDMASTER FLASH & THE FURIOUS FIVE, RUN-D.M.C. aND THE BEASTIE BOYS are all Hall Of Famers – there are still people who don’t feel hip-hop belongs in the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame.

ANTHRAX‘s Scott Ian, however, isn’t among them. A true champion of heavy metal, Ian’s band Anthrax is among the “Big Four” of thrash (along with SLAYER, MEGADETH and Hall of Famers METALLICA). His band also has a serious jones for classic rock: their new EP, Anthems, sees them covering classic rock songs by BOSTON, JOURNEY, CHEAP TRICK, THIN LIZZY, AC/DC and Rush. But Ian doesn’t have the bias against hip-hop that perhaps some of his peers might.

“Hip-hop for me – or let’s call it ‘rap,’ that’s what I called it – from, say, 1981 to 1993, I was into that as I was into any other kind of music,” he tells Radio.com.

Indeed, Anthrax experimented with rap on their 1987 track 'I’m The Man', which was something of a novelty. A few years later, in 1991, they collaborated with Public Enemy on a thrash metal update of PE’s 'Bring The Noise'. And while some cross-genre collaborations reek of marketing department experiments, this was a collaboration that was prompted by Ian.

“In 1986, ’87 and ’88, Public Enemy was my favorite band on the planet,” he said. “They changed music. [Their 1987 album] It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back, I compare that album to THE BEATLES’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band or GUNS N' ROSES’ Appetite For Destruction or LED ZEPPELIN’s IV. It you make a list of albums that changed the world, that changed the way we hear music, that album has to be on that list. It was so mind-blowingly sonically different from anything that anyone had ever heard. It was lyrically so strong. And scary – in a good way. I used to think that it was a great thing that people were afraid of Public Enemy. A band could actually make people afraid! That’s incredible that they could evoke that kind of emotion.”

Read more at Radio.com.