New York: Day Eight - A Global Culture

Life is a complicated mass of energy, which we navigate through the stories we are told by others, and the stories we then tell ourselves. Shared stories can give us lifelong bonds, whilst stories that differ can create conflict and even wars. 

I'm very mindful of this when I navigate the history of Hip hop, a culture which has spread around the world since it began, and which means so much to so many people. Stories are not simply made up tales that you can disregard at will, they’re powerful interpretations of people’s lived experiences. They tidy up the clutter of life, building roads for our minds to travel down without getting lost. Currently I’m on a road that leads from the recreation room of 1520 Sedgwick Avenue in the Bronx, back on August 11th 1973. That’s the time and place that DJ Kool Herc, his sister Cindy Campbell and the guests at their ‘Back To School’ party, started Hip-hop. 

I visited that same room today as part of the Hush Hip-hop Tour. I was there with people from Greece, Denmark, France, Germany, Holland, California and Canada. All there because we share the same stories, many of the same tastes in music, art and fashion. All of us keen to connect further with the culture that brought us here and the place it was born, and this time we have a guide, someone to invite us into this part of the history properly.

Although not even he’s allowed into the recreation room of 1520 Sedgwick Avenue any more, I had to sneak a peak in there myself. There was a lot of work being done inside, as well as on the outside of the building. It was hard to tell if this was for staging and decor to accommodate the block party happening this weekend, or whether there is still building work to be done. Either way it feels kind of symbolic somehow.

I’m mindful of telling you too much about the Hush Hip-hop Tour as it’s something you should definitely do yourself if you come to New York. Suffice to say there are iconic landmarks, and many places of interest for us Hip-hop heads. I chose the Bronx and Harlem one but there are others too. All of the friends I know who have recommended the tour to me previously have had legendary Cold Crush Brothers emcee, Grandmaster Caz as their guide, whilst I’ve also heard rumour that both Kurtis Blow and KRS One have been guides also. So I admit to being a little disappointed when a much younger guide shows up. I didn’t recognise him at first either but I’d seen him perform at the Sean Price tribute the night before. 

Turns out Rayza is a fantastic guide. Full of passionate, infectious enthusiasm for Hip-hop culture and the stories he’s relaying. As well as being good friends with Grandmaster Caz, KRS One, Melle Mel and many other legends, the comments on his latest video show, he has the respect of many more. He was also performing with Rakim at the J Period show in Lincoln Plaza that very night.

Big Daddy Kane was also on the line up fo that show and given the mic fiasco of Rock The Bells I planned to attend. Sadly that never worked out, but I’ll get to that. 

We also had a brief Breaking lesson from B Boy Eli, a 6th generation member of legendary crew Dynamic Rockers. Eli is also competing for Puerto Rico in the Olympics this year and was one of the Breakers I saw perform with Grandmaster Flash last Friday. I had been wondering who they were, turns out they were all Dynamic Rockers members with some of their students. To be honest there hasn’t been a lot of Breaking at any of the other shows I’ve been to. At some point over the next few days I’m going to try and address who is missing from the Hip-hop 50 celebrations, and break down some of the different audiences that are attending the shows, and those that aren’t. I also feel we will also need another conversation around nostalgia at some point.

Whilst driving around in the Hush tour bus we drive through East Harlem, also known as Spanish Harlem, or El Barrio, due to the high concentration of people with Puerto Rican heritage, as well as other Latin American countries. This is largely where music such as Mambo, Boogaloo and Salsa was born, and whilst I’ve been buying Latin music since the 90s, I’ve still never quite felt qualified to make any Salsa playlists on my regular Spotify offerings. To try and help with that I head for Johnny's Spaha Salsa Museum (I should add, that this is not to be confused with the International Salsa Museum who are still trying to find a home in the city). Sadly the museum is closed with no sign as to when it might reopen, but just as I get there, I heard music coming from a couple of blocks away. 

There was a mini festival at the White Playground on East 106th Street, where DJ Agujita was spinning some seriously heavy Salsa tunes whilst old couples took to the dance floor, families hung out chatting and enjoying the music, and a group of old men played dominoes together. There were a few stalls, dance displays by the children and messages of community support, including District Leader Peggy Morales offering school supplies, bags, and even haircuts to any parents that might need them for their kids. It was another roasting hot day and I found the whole scenario as refreshing as the pineapple and coconut ice drink I bought from one of the makeshift bars. 

I wish I’d stayed to catch the full live band who had been setting up the whole time I was there and jamming over Agujita’s selections. It felt like nobody was in too much of a hurry to get the show moving though so I headed own to Orchard Beach in the Bronx for another live Hip-hop concert, this time with The Lox and Ja Rule due to headline. To be honest I really just wanted to hear ‘New York’ and I’d convinced myself that Fat Joe had to jump up and join them for it.

Sadly that wasn’t to be. There was no Fat Joe, Jadakiss disappeared after a few tunes leaving Styles P and Sheek Louch to the rest, who did start to play the track but then got cut short. I’m not entirely sure why someone felt the need to do that. There was a long gap afterwards as everyone tried to find a lost girl’s parents and then expecting Ja Rule to come next (of course, he’ll perform ‘New York’ in his set), we got Grand Puba and Lord Jamar instead. Now don’t get me wrong I love Grand Puba way more than Ja Rule, but I’d seen both him and Jamar at Rock The Bells last Saturday, and more importantly the crowd were a little disappointed, or at the very least unenthused.

Live music nostalgia is heavily reliant on the collective memory. I was already riding solo by this point so had nobody except the crowd around me to bounce off, and to be honest they just weren’t that fussed about artists like Grand Puba, or CL Smooth who was on stage earlier. Not even the Pete Rock collaborations. Chubb Rock just about held them but only did ‘Treat Em Right’ and mostly had his DJ play a bunch of Soul, Disco and Dancehall classics. To be fair it was the perfect crowd warm up and Chubb Rock is one of my all time favourites who I’ve never had the opportunity to see live. He also brought on: Joeski Love to do the ‘Pee Wee Herman Dance’ (in tribute to the man himself perhaps?); Milk Dee from Audio Two to perform ‘Top Billin’’, which is definitely an anthem here in New York; and Peter Gunz for his Lord Tariq collaboration ‘De Ja Vu’, who in turn brought out his son Cory Gunz for his remix of ‘A Milli’ (Cory is part of Lil Wayne’s ‘Young Money Entertainment’). Although the crowd aren’t really here for anything new, it was refreshing to see a young artist up on stage performing. It’s only happened a few times since I've been here, and mostly consists of older rapper’s children. Still it gives a greater sense that all of this history is continuing into the future. 

Maybe Ja Rule did perform, but it was 10 minutes to close by the time I realised that the buses were meant to have finished, the Lincoln Centre was around 2 hours away so I’d have missed the show there, and the apartment was around the same length of time away in the other direction. By that point I wasn’t really too fussed either way. Just tiredness from a long hot day perhaps? Or maybe I never cared too much about Ja Rule anyway (though he has bangers, you can’t deny it). Perhaps it’s deeper than that and I’m getting nostalgia fatigue. We shall see how the next few days pan out.