History of hip-hop

I don't think international hip hop is recent per se, only that it's just starting to get more coverage. I mean, both Japan's MC Pooh and France's MC Solaar both go back at least ten years, no?

I think Europe started with the hip hop explosion not too long after the explosion* of hip hop in 1987-1989 in the U.S., except, I guess, there isn't a huge history of "old skool/Run DMC era" hip hop in Europe before then.. although I'd love to be proven wrong. (For argument's sake, we'll count out Slick Rick, who was raised by British(?) parents, but grew up in NYC)

* what i mean by "explosion" is the explosion in number of new groups that were unique, along with polishing the skills and attributes thereof.

Public Enemy were really big in Europe around the same time as in the U.S. though, especially in England. Possibly Ice-T, too. I remember one of my favorite hip-hop groups in the late 80s was England's Hijack.. "The Badman Is Robbin'". Great single. Their only publicity shots were in terrorist cloth, and they refused to give interviews. They got signed to Ice-T's Rhyme Syndicate label, but didn't go too far after that.

The best example of PE's popularity in the UK though was in dance culture.. you couldn't escape a breaks/house/club hit in the UK in 1988-1989 without hearing at least one James Brown sample and one Public Enemy sample, even in some acid tracks. Simon Harris, Tim Simenon, and the Coldcut guys were notorious for this. "Bass! How low can you go?" was a Simon Harris hit. How obvious can you get?

I think hiphop history is especially interesting if you look at it from a geographic outlet - which influences come from where to reach a flashpoint in S. Bronx, then how it spreads from there. Since there isn't much in the way of regional sounds in rock anymore, but yiou can often tell where a rap record was made from the accents and how the beats feel and so on.

Me too! wow that brings back memories. I don't even own this anymore.

Maestro Fresh-Wes was from Toronto, and his single "Let Your Backbone Slide" got a little bit of American radio play back in 1990. If you've never heard it, it's a great slice of party rap (think "Jump Around") with some surprisingly complex rhymes. And yes, Snow was from Toronto, too.

hip-hop started small in the bronx as a culture, not yet self-identified.

The music becomes business w/ rapper's delight;

we have crossover acts and "hardcore" acts for the rest of the 80s and early 90s.

Then "hardcore" doesn't cross over, but w/ Dre forces mainstream to move to "hardcore."

This is based on (what may be an incorrect) observation that mainstream hip-hop didn't equal mainstream music until the mid-90s.

This would definitely be a large part of at least day one (and maybe day two) of Polyphonic Presents... Hip-Hop, the Mini-Series.

Granted, there's always the line about how "the winners always get to rewrite history" etc. etc.

"Subterranean Homesick Blues", "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised", and Lightning Bolt/Kool & The Gang's Hustler's Convention album -- among many other examples -- were certainly inspirations, but calling them "pre-hip hop" would be misguiding.

MC Buzz B - Words Escape Me

haha, here you go--

http://music.msn.com/album/?album=40850046

i don't know anything about it or him, but maybe this'll have different (better) interpretations

But, why would ILM want to "stand" anywhere on hip hop, or select one model of history to use, as the original question suggests? For myself, I just don't share this impulse to document "dominant modes of thought."

Kurtis Blow wrote some great liner notes for a Rhino set a few years ago that you might be interested in, djdee. Lots of red meat for the "who made the first rap song" krewe.

http://www.rhino.com/Features/liners/72851lin.lasso

I was just using that as a way to provoke discussion, I don't actually expect to reach some conclusions or something!

(I forgot to put K.M.D.'s Mr. Hood in my best hip-hop albums ever list from 1991. Also Main Source)

here

Listening to an obsessively comprehensive and chronological collection of '80s Billboard hits, and I just realized that the first three charting rap singles of the decade were 'Rapture', 'The Breaks', and 'General Hospi-Tale'.

Hey, so this is a project I've been working on for a long time. Smithsonian Folkways is partnering the National Museum of African American History and Culture to create "The Smithsonian Anthology of Hip-Hop and Rap". We are doing a Kickstarter to get the project into production.

http://kck.st/2yokcFc

whaaaat

that's tight!

The Smithsonian Anthology of Jazz was my primary introduction to jazz. It's cool to think that some future 12 year old, maybe even my kids, will have the same experience with rap.

very cool

smithsonian classic country music is still something i listen to all the time

That's awesome. Folkways catalog is a treasure trove.

Kind of a shame Smithsonian and Folkways need to do a Kickstarter to fund this project, but hope they reach the number they want

So like I said I work for the Smithsonian and among other things I do, I do online fundraising and crowdfunding.

This is the third Kickstarter we’ve done - the first two were to support conservation of Neil Armstrong’s spacesuit and the Ruby Slippers. I don’t really view doing a Kickstarter as a shame - we rely on private support (all amounts) for about 40% of our budget.

doin the lord's work, good on ya

I am so excited for this! I signed up yesterday!

Nice!