A Hip Hop Track I'm Working On

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Just another day in the home studio, working on some Hip Hop. A little sample of what I've been producing on the MPC ...

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=14 ... =2&theater

I like it. It doesn't seem like it's "hip hop" in the conventional "rap" sense, though. It seems like it's some sort of fusion-type music--which even has somewhat of an eclectic quality to it.

I could be wrong; my knowledge of hip-hop is limited to "old-skool" type hip hop which originated in the Bronx, NY (where I grew up until age 3 1/2).

Good luck in your deejaying.

Have you ever listened to REALLY old hip hop, from the 1970's and early 80's? Like: Sugar Hill Gang, Grandmaster Flash and the Furious 5.

Hip Hop started around the early to mid 1970s in Bronx parks. Disco music was used., so was James Brown. The emphasis was on creating a "party atmosphere." The MC was the person who had the burden of creating that "party atmosphere."

If you haven't already, you should see movies like "Krush Groove."

I wish I could say I was a true Bronxite LOL

Our family left the Bronx when I was 3 1/2, in 1964, during the "white flight" era. We moved to the borough of Queens, still in NYC. I still live there, today, though in a more "suburban" part than during my childhood.

By the time Hip Hop started, parts of the Bronx had literally burned down via fire. The Bronx was a vicious place in the 1970s, worse than the worst of your "Council Estates."

Today, the Bronx is better, but it still has its really bad sections.

I first heard rap around 1979 in Jamaica, Queens. I was 18. People were calling it "rhyme" then--at least in Queens. People used to say "rhymes" to the hip hop songs acapella. The first "rhyme" I heard was about Muhammad Ali.

Little kids who weighed about 60 pounds could be found carrying 40-pound "boom boxes" by the late 1970s--not before then, since technology had not evolved to that point as of yet. It was amazing to see. Sometimes, they even balanced speakers on top of the "boom boxes!" People used to sit on "stoops" (stairways which led to over-the-ground entrances) listening to their boom boxes all night. Basketball courts would be set up in the street (the road, to a person from the UK). Games would be played to the accompaniment of the boom boxes.

Graffiti was rampant on the subways until the early 90's. People used to have parties in the back of subway trains, smoking marijuana and sniffing coke; the back car was known as the "party car." I experienced this first-hand, though I didn't indulge.

Have a great day.

I'm Jewish-Dutch-Russian Caucasian.

Jamaica, Queens, reminds me somewhat of Hackney, London.

There are some parts of Hackney which are okay. Jamaica Avenue, in a smaller, less-crowded sense, reminds me of Camden Town. Brixton, apparently, is becoming gentrified, because of its proximity to Central London by British Rail.

It's interesting: some of the NYC rappers came from tree-lined streets, some from not-so-nice areas. I'm not sure exactly where they lived---but if you could send me where they lived, I could evaluate the area for you.

Have you read about Hollis, Queens? Where some of the old-skool rappers come from? Hollis is an interesting area; it varies widely. Most of it, however, consists of single or two-family houses with more-or-less well-kept lawns. I live about 2 miles from central Hollis.

I live near Hollis Hills, which is a very nice area. Jamaica Estates, located near Hollis and Jamaica, reminds me of the Hampstead Heath area.

I would say the only part of Queens which is really "ghetto" is South Jamaica. Even Jamaica proper isn't that bad, anymore.

Sorry for going on and on......My Aspie Proclivities! LOL