Welsh Hip-hop History: 79 to 82
Hip-hop is 50 years old this year. Of course history is never that clear cut and the date is often argued about, but August 11th 1973 is considered by many worldwide to be the birthdate of a culture that grew from humble beginnings in the Bronx, New York into a global phenomenon. I’m pretty sure you’ve heard of it.
That genesis moment, when it all started, was a party put on by Cindy Cambell and her brother Clive, who was to be the DJ, in the communal recreation room of their apartment at 1520 Sedgwick Avenue. Clive is more widely known as DJ Kool Herc, and it was partly his unique style of DJing that laid the foundations for hip-hop. Having been influenced by sound system culture from his native Jamaica, he had the right system to power a party, but rather than relying on reggae music or the proto-disco soul music that was popular in the other parties around town, he opted for a night that was heavier on the funk, and most importantly he would use his two turntables to extend the drum breaks of some tracks, because that’s what sent a number of the dancers in the party wild. The moves that those particular dancers would be throwing down, would later earn them the name b-boys or breakers. Kool Herc was also a graffiti artist with the Ex-Vandals crew, and would emcee his parties in a rudimentary rap style, more similar in style to the sound system selectors than the rappers we know today, but definitely an early influence. All of these factors have led him to be called the ‘Father Of Hip-hop’ and that's why this seminal party is considered by so many as the starting point, when everything came together.
Eventually other DJs such as Afrika Bambaata and Grandmaster Flash became influenced by Herc’s style, as well as other local legends such as Disco King Mario, and added their own personal touches. Then DJs from other boroughs of the city started to spread it far and wide, as tapes started to circulate of the jams and rappers started to have their moment too. Eventually in 1979, Enjoy Records and new independent Sugar Hill Records, would put Hip-hop music on vinyl, and thanks in part to some savvy licensing of the Sugarhill Gang classic ‘Rappers Delight’ by British music lover and entrepreneur Morgan Khan for Pye Records, hip-hop music hit the UK Top 40 in December that year.
This is when Wales at large would have first heard hip-hop music, although most DJs at the time would have considered it as a Disco record. Early hip-hop records on labels such as Sugar Hill, Prelude or Enjoy would come into Wales via the funk, soul and disco DJs, many only on import. Once again Morgan Khan stepped in and started licensing some of the biggest rnb, boogie, electro funk and rap releases from the states for his Street Sounds compilations which launched in 1982, with the first record making a particular point in shouting about a popular new tune from Grandmaster Flash & The Furious 5 called The Message, which eventually hit the UK Top 40 in August 1982. Of course nobody knew it as hip-hop yet. It wasn’t until September that year that Afrika Bambaata, whose legacy has been severely tarnished recently with allegations of sexual abuse, first popularised the term in an interview with the Village Voice and it would be under another name, inspired largely by Bambaata’s single Planet Rock (which dropped in the UK at the same time as The Message, although only hit the lower reaches of the charts) that the first real wave of hip-hop would hit the UK early the following year, as ‘electro’. However the biggest spark for Wales and the UK as a whole, came at the end of 1982 thanks to punk legend and former Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren.
By this time in New York, the downtown arts scene through influential figures like Fab 5 Freddy and Michael Holman, had distilled the explosion of Bronx creativity and culture into a more marketable package of djing, rapping, breaking and graffiti - it was these ‘four elements’ (later adding knowledge as the fifth) that Bambaata would dub ‘hip-hop’. Michael Holman had taken Malcolm McClaren to one of Bambaata’s parties in the Bronx, leading McLaren to book him and the Soul Sonic Force, DJ Jazzy Jay and The Rock Steady Crew to open for a new wave band he was managing called Bow Wow Wow (he also booked a graffiti writer, but not sure who - this has lead some to claim this was the first proper all elements show).
Malcolm McLaren also borrowed heavily from this newly named culture for his next single Buffalo Gals. Produced in conjunction with British musicians Trevor Horn and Anne Dudley as well as New York’s World Famous Supreme Team, ‘Buffalo Gals’ was a post punk approximation of a hip hop square dance, but it was the video which would prove most inspirational, as it was the first internationally popular video to feature graffiti art (by Dondi) and both breakin’ and body popping courtesy of the Rock Steady Crew. It was released in December 1982 and inspired a generation of young hip hop pioneers worldwide, including right here in Wales. The first wave of hip hop in the country was about to begin. To be continued…
