HIPHOP HISTORY part I

HIPHOP culture originated in the Big Apple (NY) of the mid 70´s. It all started as a groundbreaking expression of black american street culture. Although many of the frontrunners of HIPHOP were actually emigrants. Much of the defining elements of HIPHOP can therefore be traced back to Jamaican Dancehall characteristics.  

In the mid 80´s the DJ´s slowly took a backseat to the MC´s. While the Masters of Ceremony were originally brought to the spotlight to support the DJ, many rappers started performing over DAT tracks and drum computers. Major labels were also more interested to sign rappers without the DJ. Some of the most famous MC´s of the time were Sugarhill Gang, Kuris Blow, Fat boys, Whodini and of course the legendary girl MC Roxanne Shante.

But even in the mid 80´s DJ´s remained an important element of HIPHOP and most HIPHOP productions evolved around samples that obviously link back to the HIPHOP DJ stilo. Also many of the early HIPHOP producers were original DJ´s. For example (Run DMC and) Grandmaster Jay, Eric B (and Rakim) or Mantronix. 

Looking back over the last decades of HIPHOP history many claim that it is the DJ element that has developed the most from the early old skool days. The HIPHOP DJ stilo evolved from the basic skill of mixing, blending and scratching to what is now called turntablism. A term that was invented by DJ Babu another emigrant HIPHOP innovator (Filipino). Grandmasters of today include DJ Qbert, DJ Craze (threefold DMC world champion DJ) and DJ Mike D.

MCing and Rapmusic however is still the most eye- and earcatching element of HIPHOP culture. No serious music critic ever imagined that Rappers would once rule the music charts. Most did not even consider Rap to be a serious form of music. Quotes:´They dont play any instruments and they cant even sing.´  ´Rap is just a trend that will never last.´ How wrong they were... HIPHOP music never died and turned into the Neo-Funk of the new millennium.

In my mind the main reason HIPHOP is here to stay and will never fade away is that all elements of HIPHOP adhere to the same basic rule. The rule of Battle. The DJ´s battle, the MC´s battle and the B-boys battle. Even the Grafitti artists battle for hoods and street corners. Always developing skills in the process. HIPHOP in it´s core is fiercely competitive. The fact that HIPHOP is so very competitive guarantees it´s innovative quality. HIPHOP never stands still. Its always developing itself. It is exactly this quality that keeps HIPHOP culture vibrant.

The battle is always about being FRESH. Survival of the Freshest! There is always someone around the corner to take your crown. Because HIPHOP evolves so quickly New school is considered Old school quite fast. Run DMC for instance are now considered Old school while in fact they were the front runners of the New school rappers of the mid 80´s. In the beginning the tongue twister raps by DMC were even considered too complex by Def Jam owner Russel Simmons. But of course the legendary Def Jam label signed most of the New School superstars.       

Run DMC took rapmusic to a new level with their now classic album ´Raising Hell´ from which rap standards like ´Walk this Way´ and ´My Adidas´ (Due to commercial success of this song and their image enhancing outfits they became the first HIPHOP group that acquired commercial sponsoring on a large scale.) were released. ´Walk this Way´ to this day is one of the earliest and most successful Rap-Rock cross overs, paving the way for home-grown Urban Dance Squad who in turn influenced acts like Rage against the Machine, Limp Bizkit and even the Red Hot Chilli Peppers. Boom!, thats the circle of life for ya.

Run DMC reserviced in ´98 when they featured on Jason Nevins B-Boy productions. DJ Jammaster Jay was lost to the HIPHOP community when he was shot in 2003, just when he was busy working with rapper 50cent. Run DMC with support act Beasty Boys performing in de Jaap Edenhal, Amsterdam was the very first live concert I ever went to. It was 1987 and it was the first major HIPHOP gig in the Netherlands.

OLD SKOOL TOP 10

TRUE OLD SKOOL HIPHOP (PRE 1986):

1. Sugarhill Gang - Rapper's Delight - Sugar Hill – 79

2. Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five - The Message - Sugar Hill - 82
    or Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five - New York, New York - Sugar Hill - 83
    or Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five - White Lines - Sugar Hill – 83

3. Kurtis Blow - The Breaks - Mercury – 80 

    or Kurtis Blow - 8 Million Stories - Mercury - 84
    or Kurtis Blow - If I Ruled The World - Mercury - 85
4. Afrika Bambaataa & James Brown - Unity - Tommy Boy – 84

5. UTFO - Roxanne, Roxanne - Select – 84

6. Roxanne Shante – Roxanns Revenge - 84

7. Whodini - Five Minutes of Funk - Jive - 84
    or Whodini - Freaks Come out at Night - Jive – 84

8. Doug E. Fresh & M.C. Ricky D - La-Di-Da-Di - Danya - 85
    or Doug E. Fresh & M.C. Ricky D - The Show - Danya - 85
9. Fat Boys - Stick'em – 85

10. Run DMC - King of Rock - Profile - 85

GRANDMASTER FLASH

Also an emigrant from the Caribean (born in Barbados), Grandmaster Flash is the best known DJ of the Holy Trinity of Hip Hop.

Flash learned the basic art of cutting between records from Herc in NY of the mid-70's. Along with Afrika Bambaataa, Flash was an early competitor of Herc.  Flash clearly recalls Herc embarrassing him because he didn't have the system (nor did anyone else at the time) that could compete with Herc's. He decided to make up for what he was missing in volume with flawless technique.

Not only could Flash cut from one record to the next without missing a beat, he added in a new element.  He would take phrases and sections of different records and play them over other records (blending).  He installed a device that would allow him, through the use of headphones, to hear what was going on on each record.  Herc didn't use this technique until much later.

He began to develop a following from house parties and block parties. A 13 year old named Theodore, practiced with Flash and is often credited as the inventor of ´scratching´.  Grandwizard Theodore is credited for inventing two dominant deejay techniques- scratching and the needle drop. Not a bad thing for ones resume.

It was in the summer of 1975 as Theodore tells the story,
"I used to come home from school everyday and play records. This one particular day, my mother banged on the door yelling at me because the music was too loud. When she walked in, I still had my hand on the record that was playing and I kind of moved it back and forth. When she left, I was like 'Yo! That sounded kind of cool. I better experiment with that.'"  His initiative to take this accident and recognize it as a means of making original music was pure creative innovation. "I always wanted to be different from other DJs. I kept perfecting my idea so that when I did it in front of an audience it would sound dope."  Obviously this technique was mimicked by every DJ and became standard practice.

By 1978, Flash had surpassed Herc in popularity, but there was a decided shift in the realm of HIPHOP.  While still important, deejays began to take second place to MC's. 1986 is the year that the MC element of HIPHOP took the definite forefront and excallerated its development. The end of the original Old Skool era.

Flash rapped and made the shout outs on his own at first, but he also knew if he wanted to remain innovative and retain his flawless turntable technique he needed some help. He started giving the MC´s more centre stage.

Flash is also credited with using the electronic beat box.  He would put it between his turntables and use it to play the beat in between records. He also came up with the mixing technique of cueing the record with headphones while the other was still playing.

In 1981, Flash released what is considered the most influential display of cutting and scratching ever recorded: "The Adventures of Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel."  On it he uses sections of "Rapture", "Good Times," "Another One Bites the Dust," and sections from some of their previous work. This was the first time that people heard a song of nothing but a record on a record. Its the first all in DJ record ever. But, without question, the most influential song ever recorded by this group was released in 1982. HIPHOP classic "The Message" peaked at #4.

"The Message" changed the playing field for what a rap record could do.  It showed that you could make things other than party songs and still sell records. It featured one of the most talented rappers of the time: Melle Mel. Melle Mel´s lyrics paved the way for later HIPHOP acts as Public Enemy and Boogie Down Productions who would also go on to infuse much of their music with political and social commentaries. Another classic HIPHOP song is "White Lines (Don't Do It)".

To this day Grandmaster Flash is considered to be the HIPHOP emisary that brought HIPHOP culture to the masses.

AFRIKA BAMBAATAA

Afrika Bambaataa´s HIPHOP legacy is allround.
As a NY teenager in the mid-1970's, he joined the Black Spades gang, but already had a different interest than causing trouble. Bam already started deejaying in 1970.

Bam had a passion for buying records (he is known as the "Master of Records") and his tastes were very diversified from rock to r&b to African sounds to Latin, calypso, and classical.  Although Kool Herc was the top DJ at the time, Bam knew he owned most of the same records as Herc so he decided to start playing on his own. Bam´s DJ style is original eclectic which makes him the frontrunner of DJ´s like Real.
His ideological influences ran the gamut of the black political leaders of the time. 

He saw the film Zulu which depicted the battle between British troops and the Zulu tribe in 1879. He took his name "Afrika Bambaataa" which meant "affectionate leader" from the movie.   In 1974 Bam decided to form his own Zulu Nation to help assemble what he referred to as "the elements" of the HIPHOP culture into organisation.  It was a break dance crew at first but then grew to include rappers, deejays, and graffiti artists.

The Zulu DJ's at the time were Bam, Jazzy Jay, Grand Mixer D.ST. (His most influential project was his later work with Herbie Hancock on the seminal jazz/hip hop junction "Rockit" in 1983.  His hands were controlling the scratching for the song. This was the first collaboration between HIPHOP and Jazz that was put on wax), and Afrika Islam. 

In 1982, Bam was part of the first hip hop tour to Europe with among others Fab 5 Freddy (Fab´s name is mentioned and he even features as a graffiti artist in Blondie's music video "Rapture´), Grand Mixer D.ST.,The Rock Steady Crew, the Double Dutch Girls, and graffiti godfathers Phase , Futura, and Dondi.

Bam has been the first Hiphopper to officially collaborate with James Brown (the most sampled artist in HIPHOP. James Brown´s record "Give it Up or Turn it Loose" is considered by many to be the B-boy anthem.) and not just sample his tracks. He is also often credited with naming the urban street culture: HIPHOP.

I witnessed the Afrika Bambaataa stilo when he visited Rotterdam July 2004 to play at the Speedfreax party in Now&Wow.

KOOL HERC

Kool Herc emigrated from Kingston, Jamaica to the NY Bronx in 1967 when he was 12 years old.  His first deejay gig was as his sister's birthday party.  It was the start of an industry. Next to his HIPHOP DJ innovations Herc is also credited for phrasing the term B-Boy (Break boy).

Herc became aware that although he knew which records would keep the crowd moving, he was more interested in the break section of the song.  At this point in a song, the vocals would stop and the beat would just ride for short period.  His desire to capture this moment for a longer period of time would be a very important one for HIPHOP.

Herc would purchase two copies of the same record and play them on separate turntables next to each other.  He would play the break beat on one record then throw it over to the other turntable and play the same part.  Doing this over and over, he could rock any house in NY.  (Not to mention it being an early form of looping that would be made easier through electronic sampling.)

He would dig in crates and look everywhere to find the perfect break beat for his parties.  He didn't care what type of music, because he only needed a small section of a song for his purposes.
His fame grew.  In addition to his break beats, Herc also became known as the man with the loudest system around.  When he decided to hold a party in one of the parks, it was a crazy event.  And a loud one.  At this time Afrika Bambaataa and other competing DJ's began trying to take Herc's crown.  A member of Afrika Bambaataa´s Zulu Nation recalls one momentous meeting between Herc and Bam: 

Herc was late setting up and Bam continued to play longer than he should have.  Once Herc was set up he got on the microphone and said "Bambaataa, could you please turn your system down?"  Bam's crew was pumped and told Bam not to do it.  So Herc said louder, "Yo, Bambaataa, turn your system down-down-down."  Bam's crew started cursing Herc until Herc put the full weight of his system up and said, "Bambaataa-baataa -baataa, TURN YOUR SYSTEM DOWN!" And you couldn't even hear Bam's set at all.  The Zulu crew tried to turn up the juice but it was no use.  Everybody just looked at them like, "You should've listened to Kool Herc."

Finally his fame peaked and at last, in 1975, he began working at the Hevalo in the Bronx.  As competing DJ's looked to cut in on the action, Herc would soak the labels off his records so no one could steal his beats. This practice has generally stopped as most of todays top DJ´s now compete on turntable skils (Ref. DJ Qbert).
Grandmaster Flash had another story about Herc in his heyday:

Flash would go into the Hevalo to check out Herc, but Herc would always embarrass him.  He would call Flash out on the mike and then cut out all the highs and lows on the system and just play the midrange.  Herc would say, "Flash in order to be a qualified disc jockey...you must have highs."  Then he would crank up the highs and they would sizzle through the crowd.  Then he would say, "And most of all, Flash, you must have...bass."  And when Herc's bass came in the whole place would be shaking.  Flash would get so embarrassed he would leave.

After a while spinning the records got to be an all intensive thing and Herc wouldn't have as much time to talk to the crowd and get them going.  He needed someone else to help out and act as the Master of Ceremonies for him.  And thus, for all practical purposes, Coke La Rock became the first HIPHOP MC ever.

In 1977, Herc's career began to fall.  The rise of Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, and Bambaataa's various crews with their polished emcee styles put Herc at a disadvantage. 

One night he was even stabbed three times at his own party and his career never fully recovered.
Similar to Bambaataa though he does appear in Europe and New York from time to time. I was honoured to meet the eclectic DJ wizard Kool Herc when he visited Rotterdam for the Art Of Hiphop festival October 2004.

ROOTS OF STREET ART

The roots of Grafitti inspired moderrn street art are deeply based in HIPHOP culture. The 4 pillars of HIPHOP are the arts of MCing, DJing, Bdancing and of course last but not least Grafitti. All of which are in origin STREET ARTS.

On my STREET ART website I display my private collection of STREET ART photos I've made around the world. Most of these artworks are Grafitti inspired.

On this blog, which is linked to my site, I want to pay tribute to the other STREET ARTS, the other pilllars of HIPHOP culture. I have dabbled in all these artforms except Djing, and my sole intention here is to profess my unfaltering love for HIPHOP.

I will first focus my first blogz on DJing and MCing..

Peace,
JAGO aka MC JAGO