The Whatnauts. Three guys from Baltimore who walked into a studio in 1970 and cut Message from a Black Man -- a record so direct, so unflinching in its depiction of Black life in America, that radio stations didn't know where to put it. 'He's called a man, but he's treated like an animal.' The groove was smooth. The words were anything but. Nas sampled it decades later. The message hadn't aged a day.