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Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Ladies and gentlemen, Welcome to another episode of Quest Love Supreme.

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Speaker 3: Whatever I'm being built.

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Speaker 4: Man, it's a good day.

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Speaker 3: It's Philly day. I'm excited.

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Speaker 2: Whenever you're quiet, I feel like you're working on something monstrous.

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Speaker 3: What are you working on?

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Speaker 4: I feel like you think that, because I have all

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Speaker 4: this gear behind me, that I do a lot of

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Speaker 4: cool shit. But I don't. None of it works.

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Speaker 3: It's just for looks, just looks good. It's just for show. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: No, there's no potential movie or or Broadway project coming up.

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Speaker 3: Not the moment.

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Speaker 4: I'm too busy watching boy band scam documentaries about lou

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Speaker 4: what's his name?

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Speaker 5: That guy?

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Speaker 3: Anyway, That's what I've been doing today. There's a new documentary. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: it's on Netflix. It's called Dirty Pop. That's pretty nice.

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Speaker 3: I recommend it. I'm in it. Say no more, Steve, whatever, bro,

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Speaker 3: Good morning. How's it going? It's am so I don't

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Speaker 3: know what's going. Steve doesn't do morning. You know that?

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Speaker 3: That sounds about right? All right?

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Speaker 2: That sounds about right? What can I say? As a

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Speaker 2: podcast host? As a writer of several books, Liner Note

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Speaker 2: obsessive author of many a nineteen twenty paragraph Instagram post.

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Speaker 3: That's understating it.

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Speaker 2: Even as the world record holder for podcasts show intros

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Speaker 2: lengthy intros, it's an understatement to say that I have

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Speaker 2: an obsession with journalism, And of course the answer to

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Speaker 2: that is duh.

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Speaker 3: Of course.

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Speaker 2: You know, I'm probably one of the few casts to

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Speaker 2: sees the journalists of the person that brings the story

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Speaker 2: as just as important as the artist making the story.

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Speaker 3: In my childhood, they were.

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Speaker 2: Equally influential music periodicals that took up space just like

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Speaker 2: the records did. So I just didn't grow up with records,

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Speaker 2: but you know, I grew up in a house with

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Speaker 2: a goad jillion serious music periodicals. And then I think

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Speaker 2: in my senior year of high school something clicked in

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Speaker 2: kind of in the summer of eighty eight, I ran

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Speaker 2: across a magazine with Llo cool J on the front cover,

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Speaker 2: and not knowing what it was, sort of like a

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Speaker 2: last minute purchase. I purchased a bunch of records and

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Speaker 2: there's magazines at the at the register.

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Speaker 3: On my way home.

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Speaker 2: Reading that periodical, I got admit that the writing style

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Speaker 2: was a little bit different than when I was used

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Speaker 2: to because there was no Internet in eighty eight, so

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Speaker 2: pretty much I had to rely on the words of

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Speaker 2: anyone working at those magazines like Ride On or Black

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Speaker 2: Beat or Word Up, you know, and there'd be an

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Speaker 2: occasional blurb in mainstream media, but it was always just

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Speaker 2: one degree of you know, either run DMC's cover story

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Speaker 2: for Rolling Stone, like see not all Rapid is Violent,

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Speaker 2: you know, that sort of thing. But for me, I

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Speaker 2: always saw that the hip hop coverage in the late

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Speaker 2: eighties in very early nineties almost the equivalent of letting

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Speaker 2: a vegan judge a Texas barbecue contest. And the aforementioned

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Speaker 2: periodical comes along and starts treating the music that I

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Speaker 2: love and that we all love is high art, and

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Speaker 2: I went from casual reader to obsessive in about twenty minutes.

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Speaker 2: And so the friendships I've cultivated, and the name of

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Speaker 2: that magazine, the business partners I've chosen because of that magazine,

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Speaker 2: my art direction in life, the art I've created, even

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Speaker 2: though those actual participants of that magazine become lifelong friends

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Speaker 2: of mine. For me, the story of the Source magazine,

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Speaker 2: which you know, I still refer to as hip Hop's bible.

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Speaker 3: You know, our guest today was.

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Speaker 2: Very, very instrumental in bringing that periodical, that religion, that culture,

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Speaker 2: that way of life, and all those writers and all

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Speaker 2: those artists and all those photographers in our world. And

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Speaker 2: you know, it's rare to read any in depth interviews.

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Speaker 2: I've yet to hear his side of the story of

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Speaker 2: his stint there between eighty seven and eighty eight there

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Speaker 2: until nineteen ninety four, not to mention his other ventures

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Speaker 2: as well. And he's given us the honor to pick

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Speaker 2: his brain for this episode. John Check, finally you come

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Speaker 2: to Cout's Love Supreme.

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Speaker 5: It's my pleasure. It's my pleasure. Thank you, Thank you, Mair.

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Speaker 5: I really appreciate that.

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Speaker 3: Sorry, I hope I embarrass.

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Speaker 5: You, not at all. I'm a big fan of the podcast.

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Speaker 5: I was getting my rap ready. I guess we're not

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Speaker 5: going to do that today. He got a wrap ready.

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Speaker 5: But I can let it. I can hold it till

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Speaker 5: the future. It's all good.

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Speaker 2: Got you, got you okay, I see you're NS ten's

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Speaker 2: behind you. Where are you broadcasting from?

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Speaker 5: I am in my office in Las Vegas, where we

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Speaker 5: work with a lot of DJs, because one of my

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Speaker 5: partners is a guy named Eddie Mack, who has a

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Speaker 5: DJ agency here, So we have this is kind of

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Speaker 5: our office headquarters here in Las Vegas. It's very close

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Speaker 5: to the Las Vegas Strip. And yeah, there's a lot

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Speaker 5: of DJs here, a lot of hip hop here, a

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Speaker 5: lot of vinyl here, all that good stuff it is.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, you're the first person to tell me.

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Speaker 2: I think maybe in I went to what was the

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Speaker 2: convention that used to come out there, the fashion convention,

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Speaker 2: like Magic. Yeah, I went to the Magic Convention once

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Speaker 2: and you told me like, yeah, I'm living in Vegas,

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Speaker 2: and I'm like Vegas.

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Speaker 3: Who lives in Vegas?

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Speaker 2: You know, like where we only see Vegas as a

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Speaker 2: five cent slot machine and nothing else.

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Speaker 5: Yeah, most people come and go in like three days

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Speaker 5: is the That's like kind of the typical experience, like

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Speaker 5: seventy two hours or like get me the hell out

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Speaker 5: of here. I ended up staying for like twenty five years.

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Speaker 2: But you were the one that told me that not

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Speaker 2: only Vegas is the future, but you you predicted even then.

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Speaker 2: I think this was maybe ninety eight, ninety nine, definitely

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Speaker 2: wasn't in two thousand and yet you told me, like yo,

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Speaker 2: like I predict that Vegas is going to be the

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Speaker 2: epicenter taken away from Los Angeles.

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Speaker 3: Like I guarantee you in the first something. I don't

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Speaker 3: know about all that, but you actually turned out to

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Speaker 3: be right man.

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Speaker 2: Like, practically my entire community of friends that I'm used

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Speaker 2: to running into in Los Angeles have moved to Vegas

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Speaker 2: and made Vegas their home.

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Speaker 3: Like what was it about?

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Speaker 2: Because you were like one of the earliest people saw

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Speaker 2: the potential in it. Like I'll say, for a lot

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Speaker 2: of us, Vegas just got cool. You know, even in

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Speaker 2: music terms, when I tell the band like Las Vegas,

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Speaker 2: it's always like a cheesy term, like you know, like

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Speaker 2: New York Studies jazz version of shaving a haircut. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: you know, that's sort of But like, what was it

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Speaker 2: about Vegas that told you, especially twenty years before the fact,

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Speaker 2: that you know this, this will be the new spot?

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Speaker 5: You know, I found a lot of things about Vegas appealing.

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Speaker 5: What we do best out here is music, food, the

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Speaker 5: weather for those who can take the heat, and it's

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Speaker 5: actually a pretty good, easy lifestyle if you can, you know,

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Speaker 5: find your niche out here. But when it comes to music,

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Speaker 5: I mean, obviously that was sort of my you know,

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Speaker 5: one of my main reasons for being here. I saw

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Speaker 5: a lot of opportunity. I saw I got here right

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Speaker 5: as the sort of nightlife wave was beginning with a

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Speaker 5: lot of DJs, and I kind of jumped right in

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Speaker 5: and started like bringing a bunch of my friends out here,

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Speaker 5: like djam Mark, Ronson Stretch, Armstrong, DJ Premiere, people like that.

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Speaker 5: But yeah, yeah, Vegas is you know, has come a

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Speaker 5: long way in the time I've been here, and now

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Speaker 5: I think it really is one of the best music

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Speaker 5: cities in the world for sure. I mean, there's so

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Speaker 5: much here whatever you're into, whatever genre you're into, if

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Speaker 5: you want to see live acts, if you want to

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Speaker 5: see DJs, if you want to just have a nice

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Speaker 5: meal and listen to some good music, we got it

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Speaker 5: all covered.

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Speaker 2: The idea of what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas?

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Speaker 3: Is that truly a myth?

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Speaker 2: Or is the idea of that whole what happens in

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Speaker 2: Vegas stays in Vegas thing?

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Speaker 3: Is that real or not?

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Speaker 5: Everyone finds their own Vegas. That's a phrase I like

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Speaker 5: to say, meaning pretty much early on when you first visit,

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Speaker 5: you have that all out wild experience where you you

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Speaker 5: know someone they go to extreme in one direction or another,

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Speaker 5: and then over time, whether you're a visitor or whether

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Speaker 5: you're a resident here, you begin to assimilate into a

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Speaker 5: newer kind of environment and in the sense that nothing

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Speaker 5: really shocks you anymore, nothing really surprises you, and you

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Speaker 5: can kind of just take it all in stride. And

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Speaker 5: I think I hit that a while back, you know,

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Speaker 5: like and for people who are frequent visitors, the same

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Speaker 5: thing happens. You stop having those extreme moments and you

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Speaker 5: kind of just settle into like a good experience and

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Speaker 5: you kind of find your niche. You know, you find

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Speaker 5: the places you like to go, or you're here for

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Speaker 5: particular music events or something like that. So yeah, I

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Speaker 5: mean there's some truth to that, but I think that

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Speaker 5: usually refers to people who are more beginners in Las

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Speaker 5: Vegas and on you once you become more experience, you

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Speaker 5: take it all in stride.

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Speaker 2: Basically for your taste, Like what's your restaurant of choice.

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Speaker 5: Well, I'm pescatarian leaning vegan vegetarian, so you know, I

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Speaker 5: look for those kind of spots. There's so much you know,

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Speaker 5: what I will say is that if I'm going to

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Speaker 5: give one restaurant recommendation, I'm just going to recommend a

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Speaker 5: whole block which is Spring Mountain Road, which which is

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Speaker 5: very close to the Strip. It's Vegas is Asia Town,

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Speaker 5: and there's literally hundreds of amazing restaurants there, and most

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Speaker 5: tourists never see it because it's not in a casino.

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Speaker 3: You know.

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Speaker 5: The typical experience is most people will come to Vegas

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Speaker 5: and they'll check into one of the casinos. They'll literally

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Speaker 5: never leave that one building because every casino has like

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Speaker 5: fifteen restaurants and three nightclubs and the pool and the

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Speaker 5: gym and everything else. So but what I recommend to

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Speaker 5: people is you go, like literally five minutes away from

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Speaker 5: the wind is a street called Spring Mountain Road, and

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Speaker 5: on that street is literally hundreds of amazing restaurants. And

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Speaker 5: among those hundreds, there's about a couple dots in that

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Speaker 5: are world class Japanese, Thie, Vietnamese, Korean, et cetera. So

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Speaker 5: that's my recommendation.

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Speaker 2: So you're saying that, you know, for us to stay

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Speaker 2: on the Strip is the equivalent of people visiting New

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Speaker 2: York and just staying in Times Square and really not.

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Speaker 5: Yeah, it's like kind of like staying in Times Square,

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Speaker 5: but to some extent, I mean listen, I'm not going

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Speaker 5: to say that I work with a lot of casinos.

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Speaker 5: I work with a lot of restaurants. I go to

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Speaker 5: a lot of restaurants. So you know, I'm not going

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Speaker 5: to say that there's there's nothing to be found there,

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Speaker 5: because there's a ton of amazing places. But you know,

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Speaker 5: over time, most locals tend to avoid the Strip unless

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Speaker 5: absolutely necessary. That's kind of the process that every local

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Speaker 5: goes through, is eventually weaning yourself away from the Strip

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Speaker 5: and towards like the regular Las Vegas city, which is,

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Speaker 5: you know, pretty significant city. But yeah, I mean, obviously

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Speaker 5: I get why most people come here and they just

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Speaker 5: kind of check into one of these places and stay

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Speaker 5: there because it's that's what you're you know, that's what

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Speaker 5: they expect you to do. And it's nothing wrong with that, right,

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Speaker 5: But as time goes on, you start to see sort

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Speaker 5: of a wider a wider frame.

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Speaker 3: All right, next time, I'm you're my tour guide.

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Speaker 5: So let me take you off the strip. I'd be

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Speaker 5: happy to do it, man, happy to do it.

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Speaker 2: Okay, awesome, all right, So I want to get into

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Speaker 2: your story because you know, I've heard practically anyone that

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Speaker 2: is cross paths of that institution known as The Source magazine.

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Speaker 2: I've spoken to in great detail, but I've never ever

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Speaker 2: really picked your brain just about the whole modus operandi

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Speaker 2: of the place and whatnot.

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Speaker 5: So let it be known that we've known each other

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Speaker 5: for quite a long time, but we've actually, yeah, we've

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Speaker 5: never really had like a deep talk about it, which

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Speaker 5: is great. Exactly do it here, this is a time

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Speaker 5: to do. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Well for starters, you and I have something in common.

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Speaker 2: We're both from the city of Philadelphia, so oh yeah,

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Speaker 2: absolutely talk to me about your beginnings before you start

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Speaker 2: the magazine, Like what was your life basically before in

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Speaker 2: the first half of the eighties.

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Speaker 5: Okay, So I grew up in Center City Philadelphia, which

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Speaker 5: is you know, literally like where the downtown part of

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Speaker 5: Philia is for those who don't know. And I went

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Speaker 5: to school a place called Friends Select, which is a

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Speaker 5: Quaker school on seventeenth in the Parkway. I was there

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Speaker 5: in my whole childhood, from kindergarten through twelfth grade. So

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Speaker 5: every single day in my life, yes, I would, I would.

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Speaker 5: I would walk you know, through the city past Chestnut

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Speaker 5: Market JFK and then to the school, you know. Being

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Speaker 5: a young kid who was drawn to music at a

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Speaker 5: very young age. You know, I used to listen to

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Speaker 5: the radio all the stations, from the pop stations, to

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Speaker 5: the rock stations, to the to the urban slash black

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Speaker 5: music stations, and I would walk through the city and

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Speaker 5: you just, you know, you can't help, especially in the

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Speaker 5: eighties in Philly, you can't help but soak up culture,

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Speaker 5: you know, just walking around. I'm talking about fashion, music,

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Speaker 5: you know, just just sort of energy. I mean, we

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Speaker 5: talk about music. I mean there I was in the

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Speaker 5: city that was creating all this music. I didn't even

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Speaker 5: realize what was happening around me. In other words, like

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Speaker 5: some of my earliest memories about music are like hearing

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Speaker 5: like wake Up Everybody in like a pizza place in

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Speaker 5: like nineteen seventies, Evan, I guess, And you know, I

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Speaker 5: didn't realize it was made in Philly. I had no idea,

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Speaker 5: but I just knew that it was something. You know,

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Speaker 5: when you hear a song like that with that much

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Speaker 5: you know, emotional depth, it kind of rewires your brain

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Speaker 5: a little bit. I think, you know, not just that song,

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Speaker 5: all the Philly soul that was that was around us.

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Speaker 5: So basically I was drawn to music at a young age.

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Speaker 5: But it wasn't until I was about in eleventh grade

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Speaker 5: at friend Select that I decided to do something about it.

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Speaker 5: I had been spending a lot of time prior to

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Speaker 5: that listening to records. I was really into disco, you know,

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Speaker 5: Disco was kind of my first love of music. First

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Speaker 5: record I ever bought was a chic Yaoza Yasa Yasa

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Speaker 5: dance Dance Dance fun fact.

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Speaker 2: Yes, according to Nile Rogers, Yes, the voice of ya

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Speaker 2: ya Yaza is Luther Vandros Wow.

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Speaker 5: I did not know that. That's awesome fun fact.

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Speaker 3: Yes, I love it.

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Speaker 5: I remember I bought the forty five on Atlantic Records.

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Speaker 5: It was like a red label and I would listen

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Speaker 5: to it constantly. I will confess that I loved all disco,

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Speaker 5: including the Beg's, the Village People, everything else. You know,

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Speaker 5: we all did, We all did. Yeah, I mean, it

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Speaker 5: was just great music. And the thing is for me though,

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Speaker 5: I also loved rock, so like you know, back when

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Speaker 5: they used to be disco versus rock, there was a

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Speaker 5: huge conflict in like the late seventies where you had

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Speaker 5: to pick a side and I could never pick a side.

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Speaker 5: It was weird, like there was like half the kids

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Speaker 5: were like, you know, Pink, Floyd, led Zeppelin, Queen. You know,

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Speaker 5: some of those groups ended up doing disco records too.

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Speaker 5: But you know, but basically there was this big conflict.

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Speaker 5: I could never pick aside. I always liked both, and

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Speaker 5: I just like wrote it out that way. But then

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Speaker 5: when I got to eleventh grade, I was so into

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Speaker 5: hip hop. At that point, it's like nineteen eighty four

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Speaker 5: and you know, Run, DMC, the Fat Boys, Houdini, LLL

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Speaker 5: cool J, Curtis Blow. You know. I was loved all

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Speaker 5: those groups, and I decided that I wanted to work

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Speaker 5: in radio, so I forced my way into the building

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Speaker 5: at Power ninety nine FM WUSL.

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Speaker 3: He used to work for Dave what's his name? At

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Speaker 3: Power ninety.

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Speaker 5: Nine, there was a yeah, that was the I think

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Speaker 5: he was the PD yeah when when I was. But

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Speaker 5: but when I walked in, it was a there was

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Speaker 5: a newly hired MD and his name was Tony Gray,

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Speaker 5: and he called his on air name, and this is

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Speaker 5: kind of silly now, his on air name was Mike Jackson.

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Speaker 5: Mike Jackson, remember Mike Jackson, the man.

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Speaker 3: Who invented the Power nine at nine.

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Speaker 5: That's correct, That is correct, Mike Jackson. So Mike Jackson,

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Speaker 5: he had a hold like that's an alias. Yeah, Like

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Speaker 5: can you imagine picking that as your alias? I mean,

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Speaker 5: it kind of doesn't make sense, but that's what he did.

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Speaker 3: Smart, Okay.

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Speaker 5: So I walked in. It was kind of like one

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Speaker 5: of those remember in Wayne's World, when what's the guy's name,

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Speaker 5: like handsome George or something like that, a gorgeous George

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Speaker 5: and they walk in and there it's he has this

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Speaker 5: huge voice and they walk in. There's like a very

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Speaker 5: kind of little guy and he doesn't like it looks

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Speaker 5: kind of nerdy. It was very similar to that. It

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Speaker 5: was very similar. He had this looked like yo, yeah,

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Speaker 5: he had this like very powerful like voice. He was

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Speaker 5: doing the Evening Drive, so he was on from I

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Speaker 5: think like six to ten.

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Speaker 3: Mike on the Power nine at nine, Oh my.

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Speaker 5: God, exactly exactly.

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Speaker 3: So wow.

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Speaker 5: Yeah, And so he was like, you know, he was

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Speaker 5: kind of like a hero of mine. But he had

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Speaker 5: just started, like I think a few months before I

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Speaker 5: got there, and it just so happened when I walked

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Speaker 5: in and I wanted to be an intern and he was.

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Speaker 5: He saw me, and he was kind of like a

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Speaker 5: slim kind of you know, smaller dude. He had hair

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Speaker 5: almost like a a perm, but it was like a

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Speaker 5: gumby perm if you can imagine those two things going together.

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Speaker 5: And anyway, he was very friendly to me at a

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Speaker 5: very I was. I was totally nervous and and like

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Speaker 5: he took me in and he started talking to me,

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Speaker 5: and you know, basically we hit it off like that

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Speaker 5: first night and I started working for him like literally immediately.

348
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Speaker 5: And back then it was like the radio station was, uh,

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Speaker 5: you know they use carts which looked like eight track tapes. Yes, yes,

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Speaker 5: and you would like put that. So the first job

351
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Speaker 5: was there was like a pile of carts like on

352
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Speaker 5: the floor with like two hundred of them, and I

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Speaker 5: had to like sort through them and organize them and

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Speaker 5: stuff like that.

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Speaker 2: Can you explain something to me, because okay, so I

356
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Speaker 2: am from the era. I mean I've seen every era

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Speaker 2: of radio, but first doing the radio I do remember

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Speaker 2: those a track carts like one. What was the purpose

359
00:18:46,040 --> 00:18:48,200
Speaker 2: of it to like who would do those edits?

360
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Speaker 3: Like?

361
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Speaker 2: Was the purpose to store as much music as you

362
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Speaker 2: can on that particular cart?

363
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Speaker 3: Or like the purpose?

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Speaker 5: There was a combination when I was there they were

365
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Speaker 5: still playing records for the most part, but some songs

366
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Speaker 5: when they made into heavy rotation would be on a cart.

367
00:19:05,080 --> 00:19:07,720
Speaker 5: I think the main purpose of it. Also, all ads

368
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Speaker 5: and all drops, all announcements, all bumpers, all that kind

369
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Speaker 5: of stuff was on the cart. But I believe the

370
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Speaker 5: reason they used them was because when it finished, it

371
00:19:16,200 --> 00:19:19,479
Speaker 5: would end up right on cue, so it automatically, like

372
00:19:19,520 --> 00:19:21,840
Speaker 5: you hit play, it would play whatever was on there,

373
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Speaker 5: and then it would stop and it would be immediately

374
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Speaker 5: cued up again. So I think it was just the

375
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Speaker 5: convenience of having you pop it in and you know

376
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Speaker 5: it's going to be right on cue, I believe.

377
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Speaker 3: So you don't need to look for the spot where right.

378
00:19:35,160 --> 00:19:37,240
Speaker 5: Yeah, so they're like, we have to play a song,

379
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Speaker 5: so you just hit play and you know, it's like

380
00:19:38,840 --> 00:19:42,640
Speaker 5: it's immediately it's always on cue. So I'm pretty sure

381
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Speaker 5: that was the reason that they used them, or that

382
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Speaker 5: was the purpose of the invention. But that was also

383
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Speaker 5: a time and then we can talk about this maybe

384
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Speaker 5: as we get into it, but that was when DJs

385
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Speaker 5: were doing edits on reel to reel, so I actually

386
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Speaker 5: witnessed some of the most amazing artistry you've ever imagined

387
00:19:59,600 --> 00:20:03,280
Speaker 5: with a razor blade and like a real to real tape.

388
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Speaker 3: With those days, You're gonna ask you something.

389
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Speaker 5: Yes, yes, yes, Do you know who Yaman super mixes?

390
00:20:11,840 --> 00:20:14,720
Speaker 5: Oh man, I'm so glad you said that name. He

391
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Speaker 5: was the king of the tape edit. He was our

392
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Speaker 5: Latin rascals, Latin rascals, he was Latin rascals.

393
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Speaker 3: Oh my god.

394
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Speaker 5: And I witnessed him making edits. I saw him in

395
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Speaker 5: person making edits and I saw exactly and he's totally forgotten.

396
00:20:30,160 --> 00:20:34,359
Speaker 5: Nobody remembers he was and where is he? As I recall,

397
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Speaker 5: he was like an Arabic gentleman, kind of coming up

398
00:20:38,200 --> 00:20:41,520
Speaker 5: in the same exact style as Latin rascals in New

399
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Speaker 5: York City, and he would make these phenomenal I mean

400
00:20:45,400 --> 00:20:48,880
Speaker 5: like I would walk into that room and there would

401
00:20:48,920 --> 00:20:52,000
Speaker 5: be like all the segments of tape would be hanging

402
00:20:52,040 --> 00:20:55,280
Speaker 5: on the wall because he would be he would remember like, oh, yeah,

403
00:20:55,280 --> 00:20:57,560
Speaker 5: this is the chorus over here, this is the bridge,

404
00:20:58,080 --> 00:21:00,800
Speaker 5: this is the whatever, you know, and you know, he

405
00:21:00,840 --> 00:21:02,639
Speaker 5: would go in with that blade and there would be

406
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Speaker 5: like that little piece of metal that you would put

407
00:21:04,640 --> 00:21:07,040
Speaker 5: the tape in and you'd slice and then you'd like

408
00:21:07,080 --> 00:21:09,920
Speaker 5: put like a white piece of like masking tape like together, right,

409
00:21:10,040 --> 00:21:12,600
Speaker 5: uh huh and uh, And the tape would go all

410
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Speaker 5: the way through the tape machine and then all the

411
00:21:14,240 --> 00:21:16,760
Speaker 5: way back around the pole and back again so that

412
00:21:16,840 --> 00:21:19,439
Speaker 5: you could get the right length for the tape, you know.

413
00:21:20,680 --> 00:21:22,239
Speaker 5: So yeah, and then as you watch it go by,

414
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Speaker 5: you'd see all the little white strips, like all the edits,

415
00:21:25,280 --> 00:21:27,680
Speaker 5: you know, and it was amazing. Yeah, that was like

416
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Speaker 5: a crazy artistry that I totally forgotten art form.

417
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Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm in supermix. Was was like pro tools before

418
00:21:37,240 --> 00:21:41,119
Speaker 2: pro tools. Like he would do a mix, then I'd

419
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Speaker 2: get on, like we would have like three h JBC

420
00:21:44,640 --> 00:21:47,439
Speaker 2: ghetto blasters at the crib, and I would try to

421
00:21:47,480 --> 00:21:50,679
Speaker 2: emulate whatever I heard him doing because that's how I

422
00:21:50,680 --> 00:21:52,760
Speaker 2: thought people made remixes and shit.

423
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Speaker 5: So I mean with the set you would use, you'd

424
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Speaker 5: make a pause tape to try to make it like

425
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Speaker 5: like an edit.

426
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Speaker 3: Yes, we all did that, do anything to hear any

427
00:22:01,560 --> 00:22:02,760
Speaker 3: of that stuff again, Man.

428
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Speaker 5: He was absolutely brilliant. There was also a Philly DJ

429
00:22:07,040 --> 00:22:10,880
Speaker 5: named Jeff Mills. Yeah, just saying Jeff Mill, Jeff Mills

430
00:22:10,920 --> 00:22:21,920
Speaker 5: moves moves, Yes, exactly so that's the world I walked

431
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Speaker 5: into when I was just like, you know, a high

432
00:22:23,960 --> 00:22:26,840
Speaker 5: school kid, and it was sort of the aftermath of

433
00:22:26,880 --> 00:22:30,600
Speaker 5: when Howard ninety nine had become a black station already,

434
00:22:30,680 --> 00:22:32,600
Speaker 5: but they still had a lot of remnants of sort

435
00:22:32,600 --> 00:22:36,359
Speaker 5: of their r yeah, like kind of like dance music,

436
00:22:36,440 --> 00:22:41,920
Speaker 5: you know those people exactly exactly, Yes, Jeff Jeff Wyatt

437
00:22:41,960 --> 00:22:44,919
Speaker 5: is another name that was back then. But anyway, so

438
00:22:45,080 --> 00:22:47,920
Speaker 5: Tony Gray aka Mike Jackson and we hit it off

439
00:22:48,080 --> 00:22:51,520
Speaker 5: and and I started working for him. And I was

440
00:22:51,560 --> 00:22:54,399
Speaker 5: also very close friends with Jojo Davis, who was the

441
00:22:54,520 --> 00:22:58,920
Speaker 5: nighttime night Flight ninety nine. It was the overnight kind

442
00:22:58,960 --> 00:23:02,080
Speaker 5: of the Philly version of the quiet Well there was

443
00:23:02,119 --> 00:23:04,320
Speaker 5: a quiet storm. The way you would work is Mike

444
00:23:04,400 --> 00:23:06,720
Speaker 5: Jackson would play from six to ten, then there was

445
00:23:06,760 --> 00:23:09,560
Speaker 5: a quiet storm and then night Flight ninety nine will

446
00:23:09,560 --> 00:23:11,399
Speaker 5: come on, and that was like the overnight shift.

447
00:23:11,760 --> 00:23:12,000
Speaker 4: Yeah.

448
00:23:12,000 --> 00:23:16,199
Speaker 5: And Jojo was actually a relative of Miles Davis. I

449
00:23:16,200 --> 00:23:19,000
Speaker 5: think it was his nephew. I never knew that he

450
00:23:19,200 --> 00:23:21,400
Speaker 5: was the one that, you know, it was like when

451
00:23:21,400 --> 00:23:24,240
Speaker 5: I was with Tony Gray, he was he was a

452
00:23:24,359 --> 00:23:28,359
Speaker 5: very serious dude. He was a hard working, kind of

453
00:23:28,680 --> 00:23:31,359
Speaker 5: not partying type guy. You know, he would show up

454
00:23:31,400 --> 00:23:34,040
Speaker 5: for work, he carried about the business. He was straight laced.

455
00:23:34,960 --> 00:23:38,000
Speaker 5: Then I would leave for the Quiet Storm because that

456
00:23:38,040 --> 00:23:40,320
Speaker 5: was actually no DJ. It was just like they were

457
00:23:40,359 --> 00:23:43,040
Speaker 5: just playing like records and that would be you'd hear

458
00:23:43,160 --> 00:23:46,480
Speaker 5: like you know, like Shirley Murdoch and stuff like that,

459
00:23:46,640 --> 00:23:47,160
Speaker 5: and then.

460
00:23:47,800 --> 00:23:50,480
Speaker 3: Well there's like pre taped or like done live.

461
00:23:51,000 --> 00:23:52,959
Speaker 5: I think there was someone in the studio playing records,

462
00:23:52,960 --> 00:23:54,480
Speaker 5: but they had a list. I think they had like

463
00:23:54,520 --> 00:23:57,560
Speaker 5: a playlist they had to follow, and they had the

464
00:23:57,600 --> 00:24:00,880
Speaker 5: great sound effects with like the rainstorm if you remember it,

465
00:24:01,240 --> 00:24:02,720
Speaker 5: and it was it would put you in the mood.

466
00:24:03,840 --> 00:24:06,240
Speaker 5: But then I would come back. So I would leave

467
00:24:06,240 --> 00:24:08,720
Speaker 5: with Tony Gray and he would leave and I would

468
00:24:08,800 --> 00:24:11,040
Speaker 5: leave and go to a friend's house. And then midnight

469
00:24:11,080 --> 00:24:13,080
Speaker 5: I would come back to the station and it was

470
00:24:13,160 --> 00:24:15,880
Speaker 5: Jojo Davis and that was when the party was on.

471
00:24:16,440 --> 00:24:18,480
Speaker 5: So we would like hang out and that was where

472
00:24:18,520 --> 00:24:20,920
Speaker 5: we could get loose. And you know, that was where

473
00:24:20,960 --> 00:24:23,720
Speaker 5: I met all its people and talked about music and

474
00:24:23,960 --> 00:24:25,080
Speaker 5: the whole nine yards.

475
00:24:25,320 --> 00:24:29,840
Speaker 2: Wow man, So how influential as the intern, like even

476
00:24:29,920 --> 00:24:32,360
Speaker 2: where I work now at thirty or Rock, It's the

477
00:24:32,359 --> 00:24:38,159
Speaker 2: interns here that keep me hip to what's next, you

478
00:24:38,200 --> 00:24:38,680
Speaker 2: know what I mean.

479
00:24:39,240 --> 00:24:39,880
Speaker 3: Like, I'm in my.

480
00:24:39,840 --> 00:24:43,520
Speaker 2: Fifties, but my interns here in the twenties. They're the

481
00:24:43,520 --> 00:24:46,480
Speaker 2: first ones to yo question you up on this, yup

482
00:24:46,520 --> 00:24:48,760
Speaker 2: on this, yump on this. So there's always the intern

483
00:24:48,840 --> 00:24:53,480
Speaker 2: that knows what tomorrow is. Were you that voice for them.

484
00:24:53,760 --> 00:24:55,840
Speaker 5: To some extent? I think I was because I was

485
00:24:56,040 --> 00:24:59,240
Speaker 5: very into hip hop. So at that moment in time,

486
00:24:59,359 --> 00:25:03,800
Speaker 5: hip hop not really become the main programming. It was

487
00:25:03,840 --> 00:25:06,920
Speaker 5: still the programming was great. I mean, listen, it was

488
00:25:06,960 --> 00:25:09,119
Speaker 5: the eighties. It was the best era of music I

489
00:25:09,119 --> 00:25:11,720
Speaker 5: think of all time. But what was great about the

490
00:25:11,760 --> 00:25:14,400
Speaker 5: programming was that it was very diverse and very funky

491
00:25:14,480 --> 00:25:18,280
Speaker 5: and very you know, and I loved it. But there

492
00:25:18,320 --> 00:25:21,320
Speaker 5: wasn't enough hip hop for my taste. So I was

493
00:25:21,359 --> 00:25:24,280
Speaker 5: in there pushing. I was in there pushing low key

494
00:25:25,200 --> 00:25:26,320
Speaker 5: on the hip hop side.

495
00:25:26,480 --> 00:25:27,280
Speaker 3: This is what happened.

496
00:25:27,320 --> 00:25:29,560
Speaker 2: So the Spring of eighty five, my mother's side of

497
00:25:29,600 --> 00:25:33,919
Speaker 2: the family is from California. Spring of eighty five, we

498
00:25:34,160 --> 00:25:38,000
Speaker 2: do our pilgrimage to Los Angeles and we'll stay out

499
00:25:38,000 --> 00:25:40,480
Speaker 2: there for like three to four weeks, so say like

500
00:25:40,520 --> 00:25:42,600
Speaker 2: a month or so, and.

501
00:25:43,280 --> 00:25:45,400
Speaker 3: You know, it's very different.

502
00:25:46,119 --> 00:25:50,200
Speaker 2: Eighty five Los Angeles was night and Day from eighty

503
00:25:50,240 --> 00:25:54,760
Speaker 2: five Philadelphia and Greg Mack and Katie A.

504
00:25:54,840 --> 00:25:55,960
Speaker 3: Why was you know?

505
00:25:56,119 --> 00:25:59,400
Speaker 2: AM was the first twenty four hour hip hop radio stage.

506
00:25:59,520 --> 00:26:02,560
Speaker 2: They're playing a lot of their Malaco records, like a

507
00:26:02,560 --> 00:26:06,040
Speaker 2: lot of the West Coast stuff like Rodney what's his name?

508
00:26:06,359 --> 00:26:09,440
Speaker 2: California and those out of Party like basically like post

509
00:26:09,480 --> 00:26:13,480
Speaker 2: Electro that sort of stuff, and.

510
00:26:13,080 --> 00:26:15,080
Speaker 5: La Dream Team stuff like yeah, all that.

511
00:26:15,040 --> 00:26:16,800
Speaker 3: Stuff, Doctor Dre shit.

512
00:26:17,359 --> 00:26:24,440
Speaker 2: And so that's the summer of Toddy T's batter Ram, right, Yeah,

513
00:26:24,480 --> 00:26:28,320
Speaker 2: And they're playing it constantly, constantly, playing it constant, constantly.

514
00:26:28,920 --> 00:26:32,520
Speaker 2: So in August when we get back to Philadelphia and

515
00:26:32,560 --> 00:26:35,320
Speaker 2: I get on the block where all my friends are

516
00:26:36,600 --> 00:26:41,280
Speaker 2: and we're sort of just trade and comparing notes. You know,

517
00:26:41,480 --> 00:26:44,920
Speaker 2: something happened in the summer of eighty five and which

518
00:26:45,000 --> 00:26:51,879
Speaker 2: suddenly hip hop was allowed in the evening And I

519
00:26:51,920 --> 00:26:53,720
Speaker 2: don't know what a lot of do you know, how

520
00:26:53,960 --> 00:26:58,840
Speaker 2: how stupid you one has to feel when everyone's like,

521
00:26:59,000 --> 00:27:00,760
Speaker 2: what do you mean you don't know Lotty Dotty in

522
00:27:00,800 --> 00:27:03,880
Speaker 2: the show, and I'm like, no, yo, it's about batter Ram.

523
00:27:03,960 --> 00:27:04,120
Speaker 3: Now.

524
00:27:04,160 --> 00:27:06,680
Speaker 2: The way that La people were acting to Totty T's

525
00:27:06,760 --> 00:27:09,280
Speaker 2: batter ram I put it on for them and they

526
00:27:09,359 --> 00:27:11,520
Speaker 2: looked at me like like this was the first time

527
00:27:11,560 --> 00:27:14,439
Speaker 2: I witnessed like a cultural region.

528
00:27:14,880 --> 00:27:16,800
Speaker 5: Regional difference is regional difference.

529
00:27:17,160 --> 00:27:21,440
Speaker 2: And I played my song first and they weren't impressed

530
00:27:21,480 --> 00:27:25,879
Speaker 2: at all, and then they played me Lotty Dotty and

531
00:27:26,080 --> 00:27:27,800
Speaker 2: you know they're taping off the radio. So this is

532
00:27:27,800 --> 00:27:30,520
Speaker 2: how I know what a Power nine at nine is.

533
00:27:30,560 --> 00:27:32,800
Speaker 2: You know, Mike Jackson is number one song is Lottie Dotty.

534
00:27:32,840 --> 00:27:35,760
Speaker 2: But you remember when the show and Lottie Dotty were

535
00:27:35,800 --> 00:27:38,560
Speaker 2: like number one for like alls nine months.

536
00:27:38,960 --> 00:27:42,159
Speaker 3: So how does a record like that crack.

537
00:27:42,000 --> 00:27:45,600
Speaker 2: The mainstream in a way that pre Spring of eighty five,

538
00:27:45,880 --> 00:27:49,119
Speaker 2: I'm only used to, you know, Lady b Show on

539
00:27:49,320 --> 00:27:53,160
Speaker 2: Sunday for three hours and nothing else. Maybe Drexel will

540
00:27:53,160 --> 00:27:56,119
Speaker 2: have like an hour of it. But talk to me

541
00:27:56,160 --> 00:27:58,560
Speaker 2: about like the inside of the machine, like how are

542
00:27:58,600 --> 00:28:02,160
Speaker 2: they penetrate that unpenetrable system.

543
00:28:02,560 --> 00:28:05,040
Speaker 5: So you know you're right on the time, because that

544
00:28:05,119 --> 00:28:07,760
Speaker 5: was literally when I was getting involved there eighty five,

545
00:28:08,520 --> 00:28:11,160
Speaker 5: and I as time went on, I actually took over

546
00:28:11,280 --> 00:28:14,080
Speaker 5: that Power nine and nine. I was the person that

547
00:28:14,359 --> 00:28:17,760
Speaker 5: was compiling that that was supposed to be based on requests,

548
00:28:17,840 --> 00:28:20,480
Speaker 5: so there was kind of like a there was a

549
00:28:20,640 --> 00:28:22,439
Speaker 5: there's a balance there, so that I ask.

550
00:28:22,359 --> 00:28:24,240
Speaker 3: You the discobobblated, boobulated question.

551
00:28:24,320 --> 00:28:28,480
Speaker 5: Next we'll talk about mc breeze. No problem, that's my buddy, okay.

552
00:28:28,720 --> 00:28:31,240
Speaker 5: But yeah, so I would make I would make a charge,

553
00:28:31,240 --> 00:28:33,680
Speaker 5: and you know, in the beginning, they didn't really trust

554
00:28:33,680 --> 00:28:35,080
Speaker 5: me to do it, but after I'd been there for

555
00:28:35,240 --> 00:28:37,280
Speaker 5: you know, a number of months, they saw that I

556
00:28:37,320 --> 00:28:38,800
Speaker 5: kind of knew what I was doing, so they would

557
00:28:38,840 --> 00:28:42,120
Speaker 5: let me literally make the whole top nine. And it

558
00:28:42,240 --> 00:28:45,400
Speaker 5: was always it was kind of like a little bit

559
00:28:45,440 --> 00:28:48,680
Speaker 5: of science, a little bit of creativity kind of mixed together,

560
00:28:48,760 --> 00:28:50,720
Speaker 5: you know, like it would be. The science part is

561
00:28:51,200 --> 00:28:54,600
Speaker 5: they did have requests, and they did have a system

562
00:28:54,720 --> 00:28:57,920
Speaker 5: for logging these requests, so you did see what was

563
00:28:57,960 --> 00:29:00,520
Speaker 5: like actually the most requested. But as you know, those

564
00:29:00,600 --> 00:29:04,160
Speaker 5: kind of move, it's kind of a backwards looking stat

565
00:29:04,440 --> 00:29:07,280
Speaker 5: you know, like requests kind of can be almost like

566
00:29:07,320 --> 00:29:09,440
Speaker 5: what's already a hit usually, you know what I mean.

567
00:29:09,520 --> 00:29:11,960
Speaker 5: And so I had to also kind of bring in

568
00:29:12,240 --> 00:29:15,000
Speaker 5: a little bit of the newness. And I'm not saying

569
00:29:15,000 --> 00:29:17,480
Speaker 5: it was all me. There was a lot of forces

570
00:29:17,480 --> 00:29:20,880
Speaker 5: in play. The biggest force is just the you know,

571
00:29:20,960 --> 00:29:23,640
Speaker 5: it was a combination of run DMC breaking down those

572
00:29:23,680 --> 00:29:26,120
Speaker 5: big barriers. You know, I think they were the biggest

573
00:29:26,720 --> 00:29:29,520
Speaker 5: reason why hip hop broke through. But there was a

574
00:29:29,520 --> 00:29:32,240
Speaker 5: lot of other records, you know, force M d's, I mean,

575
00:29:32,440 --> 00:29:36,160
Speaker 5: like you know, Dougie Fresh, and so it was like, yeah,

576
00:29:36,200 --> 00:29:39,880
Speaker 5: it was just kind of you know, it just slowly happened,

577
00:29:39,880 --> 00:29:41,880
Speaker 5: and so they would at some point along the line.

578
00:29:41,920 --> 00:29:45,400
Speaker 5: But you're dead on correct in that the regular station

579
00:29:45,600 --> 00:29:48,480
Speaker 5: rotation would not include these records. But during the Power

580
00:29:48,560 --> 00:29:50,880
Speaker 5: nine at nine, we were allowed to put in what

581
00:29:50,960 --> 00:29:53,360
Speaker 5: the streets really wanted to hear. And then of course

582
00:29:53,400 --> 00:29:56,320
Speaker 5: on Sundays with Lady B that was an all out

583
00:29:56,360 --> 00:29:58,480
Speaker 5: you know, that was like the center of hip hop

584
00:29:58,480 --> 00:30:01,360
Speaker 5: and Philly basically, you know, that was most important show.

585
00:30:01,600 --> 00:30:04,280
Speaker 5: But the big songs would break through and they would

586
00:30:04,320 --> 00:30:06,200
Speaker 5: end up hanging around on the chart, on that Power

587
00:30:06,280 --> 00:30:08,520
Speaker 5: nine chart for a long time. And you know, one

588
00:30:08,520 --> 00:30:10,480
Speaker 5: of the biggest gotta be deaf for me. What I

589
00:30:10,480 --> 00:30:12,160
Speaker 5: think is you could argue one of the greatest twelve

590
00:30:12,200 --> 00:30:15,080
Speaker 5: and singles of all time is the show in Loddie Dottie.

591
00:30:15,160 --> 00:30:17,760
Speaker 5: I mean that's like, you know, you can't beat that.

592
00:30:18,280 --> 00:30:22,200
Speaker 5: You know, it became a religion, and it did. It

593
00:30:22,320 --> 00:30:24,560
Speaker 5: was huge in Philly, huge as big as can be.

594
00:30:25,120 --> 00:30:26,520
Speaker 5: But you know what else was huge in Philly, And

595
00:30:26,520 --> 00:30:28,280
Speaker 5: I'm curious to hear if you see, if you remember

596
00:30:28,920 --> 00:30:34,120
Speaker 5: shout by Tears for Fears was massive in like like,

597
00:30:36,120 --> 00:30:38,320
Speaker 5: oh the Craig g I was that came up the

598
00:30:38,400 --> 00:30:40,800
Speaker 5: other day. I was actually there the day that one

599
00:30:40,800 --> 00:30:43,320
Speaker 5: of the good men showed up from Pop Art Records

600
00:30:43,320 --> 00:30:46,040
Speaker 5: and dropped off that Craigg shout record. I remember, actually

601
00:30:46,080 --> 00:30:48,560
Speaker 5: I was in the studios. Yeah it was.

602
00:30:49,160 --> 00:30:50,600
Speaker 3: You got pop art stories.

603
00:30:50,840 --> 00:30:54,840
Speaker 5: I got pop Art stories stories, yo. Yeah, I forget

604
00:30:54,880 --> 00:30:55,280
Speaker 5: the source.

605
00:30:55,320 --> 00:30:58,160
Speaker 2: We can just talk about the first two years at

606
00:30:58,480 --> 00:30:59,200
Speaker 2: ninety nine.

607
00:31:00,080 --> 00:31:02,120
Speaker 5: Yeah, I'm sorry, I mean interrupt, but I was just

608
00:31:02,120 --> 00:31:03,440
Speaker 5: going to say. The point I do want to make

609
00:31:03,440 --> 00:31:06,040
Speaker 5: though about those days was that and this is something

610
00:31:06,040 --> 00:31:08,960
Speaker 5: that has followed me in my whole life. When the

611
00:31:09,040 --> 00:31:12,920
Speaker 5: station brass was deciding like what to program, there was

612
00:31:12,960 --> 00:31:18,480
Speaker 5: this very open attitude. Anything funky was okay. So that

613
00:31:18,600 --> 00:31:20,160
Speaker 5: was a time when you could turn on a black

614
00:31:20,280 --> 00:31:24,160
Speaker 5: radio station. Here Tears for Fears. You could hear the

615
00:31:24,160 --> 00:31:27,520
Speaker 5: Tom Tom Club and Talking Heads. You could hear Holland

616
00:31:27,520 --> 00:31:31,640
Speaker 5: Oates and many other examples of stuff like that, which

617
00:31:32,600 --> 00:31:36,280
Speaker 5: that has always been my kind of like DNA guiding

618
00:31:36,280 --> 00:31:40,400
Speaker 5: philosophy is like, if it's funky, it doesn't matter who's

619
00:31:40,440 --> 00:31:44,360
Speaker 5: making it. And somewhere along the lines it got more segregated,

620
00:31:44,400 --> 00:31:47,520
Speaker 5: I think, like music, you know, but back then the eighties,

621
00:31:47,640 --> 00:31:50,760
Speaker 5: you know, those records were as big as like you know,

622
00:31:51,360 --> 00:31:54,560
Speaker 5: Alexander O'Neill or Shorell or something like that. You know,

623
00:31:54,640 --> 00:31:55,920
Speaker 5: they were just side by side.

624
00:31:56,240 --> 00:32:01,760
Speaker 2: Fun fact, the first time I heard is weird trivia moment,

625
00:32:02,080 --> 00:32:04,760
Speaker 2: the first time I heard shout on Power ninety nine.

626
00:32:06,000 --> 00:32:11,160
Speaker 2: I lived on Osage Avenue. Wow, I lived on fifty

627
00:32:11,240 --> 00:32:17,640
Speaker 2: second in Osage Avenue. Okay, And every Philadelphia my age

628
00:32:17,840 --> 00:32:22,000
Speaker 2: knows what happens or May thirteenth, nineteen eighty five on.

629
00:32:22,160 --> 00:32:24,880
Speaker 3: Osage Avenue of course the bombings.

630
00:32:25,200 --> 00:32:28,520
Speaker 2: So the thing was because this drama has been brewing

631
00:32:29,520 --> 00:32:32,640
Speaker 2: all week, you know. Jack Jones was like, it's almost

632
00:32:32,680 --> 00:32:34,720
Speaker 2: like being live at Vietnam, like you'd be behind the

633
00:32:35,400 --> 00:32:39,920
Speaker 2: cars like reporting, and it seemed contained. I mean, back

634
00:32:39,960 --> 00:32:43,000
Speaker 2: then it was just about like, okay, there's gun exchange

635
00:32:43,040 --> 00:32:47,800
Speaker 2: between the move organization and the police, so we may.

636
00:32:47,760 --> 00:32:51,360
Speaker 3: Drop the bomb on top of the house. You know.

637
00:32:51,440 --> 00:32:53,600
Speaker 2: For like three hours, it seemed like it was contained,

638
00:32:54,840 --> 00:32:57,840
Speaker 2: but then when it spread to another block, then we

639
00:32:57,840 --> 00:33:00,800
Speaker 2: started getting concerned, like, okay, well we live here and

640
00:33:00,880 --> 00:33:03,320
Speaker 2: this scene seems to be spreading, Like how late will

641
00:33:03,320 --> 00:33:06,880
Speaker 2: it be until it comes to our block? And there

642
00:33:06,920 --> 00:33:10,600
Speaker 2: was a moment where our block captain around like eleven

643
00:33:10,680 --> 00:33:16,400
Speaker 2: PM kind of just gave the warning like, look, you know,

644
00:33:16,480 --> 00:33:18,720
Speaker 2: I'm in contact with the other block captains and whatnot.

645
00:33:19,280 --> 00:33:20,320
Speaker 3: If they don't contain that.

646
00:33:20,400 --> 00:33:24,760
Speaker 2: Fire, maybe at three four in the morning, we might

647
00:33:24,800 --> 00:33:27,680
Speaker 2: have to vacate our cribs. So it was almost like

648
00:33:27,720 --> 00:33:32,600
Speaker 2: a pack a pack, what's important that sort of thing.

649
00:33:33,280 --> 00:33:35,160
Speaker 3: And I remember having the.

650
00:33:35,200 --> 00:33:37,720
Speaker 2: Radio on while we were packing, like in case we

651
00:33:37,720 --> 00:33:40,720
Speaker 2: had to go to my Grandmam's house or whatever, and I.

652
00:33:40,680 --> 00:33:41,360
Speaker 3: Looked at the radio.

653
00:33:41,400 --> 00:33:43,600
Speaker 2: I was like, wait, what the hell's Tears Fears doing

654
00:33:43,680 --> 00:33:45,320
Speaker 2: on Power ninety nine, Like it.

655
00:33:45,200 --> 00:33:48,640
Speaker 5: Was just you remember hearing that song during the move crisis,

656
00:33:48,640 --> 00:33:51,520
Speaker 5: you're saying, right, yeah, yeah, I remember. Of course that

657
00:33:51,720 --> 00:33:53,800
Speaker 5: was a major moment for Philly. We were all like

658
00:33:53,880 --> 00:33:55,920
Speaker 5: you know, it was on the it was live, it

659
00:33:55,960 --> 00:33:58,800
Speaker 5: was covered live. You know there's like live shots. Yeah,

660
00:33:58,800 --> 00:34:00,520
Speaker 5: that was crazy. That was a moment.

661
00:34:01,040 --> 00:34:04,560
Speaker 3: So what was your Philly nightlife experience?

662
00:34:04,640 --> 00:34:08,880
Speaker 2: Like, like, like, were you ever an attendee of about

663
00:34:08,880 --> 00:34:10,280
Speaker 2: to call it the spaghetti Warehouse?

664
00:34:10,800 --> 00:34:11,520
Speaker 3: After Midnight?

665
00:34:12,160 --> 00:34:15,640
Speaker 5: The mid They used to call it the mid h. Yeah,

666
00:34:15,760 --> 00:34:19,200
Speaker 5: the mid was like the abbreviation. I was too young

667
00:34:19,280 --> 00:34:22,960
Speaker 5: to get into after Midnight, but I would. I'm now

668
00:34:23,000 --> 00:34:24,880
Speaker 5: I'm too old for almost everything, but back then I

669
00:34:24,920 --> 00:34:26,840
Speaker 5: was too young to get into after Midnight. But I

670
00:34:26,880 --> 00:34:30,600
Speaker 5: remember hanging outside and I met all the people involved,

671
00:34:31,120 --> 00:34:33,160
Speaker 5: and there was actually a white guy that was like

672
00:34:33,200 --> 00:34:36,279
Speaker 5: I think running after Midnight. I can't remember his name.

673
00:34:36,880 --> 00:34:40,839
Speaker 5: And if you remember, there was this the most incredible

674
00:34:41,480 --> 00:34:45,239
Speaker 5: ll cool J freestyle came out of After Midnight and

675
00:34:45,280 --> 00:34:48,600
Speaker 5: it's like he's rhyming over Tee La Rocket's yours, It's

676
00:34:48,600 --> 00:34:52,319
Speaker 5: yours yeah, and it's it's like magic. That shit was

677
00:34:52,360 --> 00:34:54,400
Speaker 5: so powerful and so amazing.

678
00:34:54,760 --> 00:34:58,040
Speaker 2: Last year when we tour with LLL the amount of

679
00:34:58,120 --> 00:35:01,439
Speaker 2: begging we had to do to get him, he only

680
00:35:01,480 --> 00:35:02,920
Speaker 2: did it once, like that was going to be his

681
00:35:02,960 --> 00:35:05,680
Speaker 2: on core before we did Rock the bells together. Wow,

682
00:35:06,280 --> 00:35:09,440
Speaker 2: like he has zero clue or how much of a

683
00:35:09,560 --> 00:35:13,600
Speaker 2: spiritual experience that was for most of the Tri state

684
00:35:13,640 --> 00:35:16,879
Speaker 2: area and the amount of tape trading and that sort

685
00:35:16,880 --> 00:35:17,160
Speaker 2: of thing.

686
00:35:17,600 --> 00:35:20,000
Speaker 5: Oh, forget it, listen. And I figured this is going

687
00:35:20,040 --> 00:35:22,319
Speaker 5: to come up later. But I saw the Force Tour

688
00:35:22,360 --> 00:35:25,400
Speaker 5: when you guys came to Vegas, and oh, man, you guys.

689
00:35:26,440 --> 00:35:29,160
Speaker 5: I mean I've seen so I've seen literally probably you know,

690
00:35:29,320 --> 00:35:32,440
Speaker 5: hundreds of rap shows in my life, but I'm serious,

691
00:35:32,480 --> 00:35:35,279
Speaker 5: that was the greatest rap concert I've ever seen in

692
00:35:35,320 --> 00:35:38,200
Speaker 5: my life. And that includes the Fresh Fest one, Fresh

693
00:35:38,280 --> 00:35:41,839
Speaker 5: Fest two, all the classic Public Enemy concerts, all that.

694
00:35:42,680 --> 00:35:45,960
Speaker 5: The reason is it's you deserve it because it was

695
00:35:46,640 --> 00:35:50,879
Speaker 5: so well choreographed, so well run. There was no downtime.

696
00:35:51,160 --> 00:35:54,080
Speaker 5: It was like constant action on the stage and with

697
00:35:54,120 --> 00:35:57,080
Speaker 5: those three Frilly guys in the middle, it was flawless.

698
00:35:57,160 --> 00:35:59,600
Speaker 5: And I think like you really raised the bar for

699
00:35:59,640 --> 00:36:01,120
Speaker 5: what around conser it can be.

700
00:36:01,440 --> 00:36:05,800
Speaker 2: You know what, yo, dude, it's hitting me right now

701
00:36:05,880 --> 00:36:10,239
Speaker 2: as we speak. One of the key pivotal moments in

702
00:36:10,360 --> 00:36:13,839
Speaker 2: Roots history. You came to the Tracadero and witnessed your

703
00:36:13,840 --> 00:36:21,759
Speaker 2: first Roots performance, and you gave me real constructive criticism.

704
00:36:22,200 --> 00:36:25,000
Speaker 2: I took it to heart and applied it. He's like, hey,

705
00:36:25,080 --> 00:36:28,879
Speaker 2: it was dope, but listen, you got to figure out

706
00:36:28,880 --> 00:36:31,879
Speaker 2: a way to engage your audience and grab them in.

707
00:36:32,719 --> 00:36:34,680
Speaker 3: And you taught me about formatting.

708
00:36:35,360 --> 00:36:37,320
Speaker 2: You said, you guys are going to heavy on the

709
00:36:37,400 --> 00:36:39,360
Speaker 2: on the dazz, drum solo and all that stuff. But

710
00:36:40,040 --> 00:36:42,560
Speaker 2: you know, I think a dope thing you all should

711
00:36:42,560 --> 00:36:46,680
Speaker 2: consider is occasionally in your song like pepper It like

712
00:36:46,760 --> 00:36:51,799
Speaker 2: condiments with hip hop references that people would know. We

713
00:36:52,880 --> 00:36:56,960
Speaker 2: did that while we were a busking group, but then

714
00:36:57,000 --> 00:37:00,760
Speaker 2: we decided, you know, when you're busting and you're playing

715
00:37:00,760 --> 00:37:01,400
Speaker 2: for like three.

716
00:37:01,200 --> 00:37:04,040
Speaker 3: To four hours on the corner, you're gonna run out

717
00:37:04,040 --> 00:37:04,279
Speaker 3: of shit.

718
00:37:04,840 --> 00:37:06,920
Speaker 2: So you know, it was easy to tell your upright

719
00:37:06,960 --> 00:37:10,040
Speaker 2: bass player, all right, start with discoursions, all right, let's

720
00:37:10,040 --> 00:37:12,200
Speaker 2: go to bugging out. Okay, let's go to wrapping promoter,

721
00:37:12,440 --> 00:37:13,200
Speaker 2: all right, let's go to.

722
00:37:13,200 --> 00:37:15,759
Speaker 3: It like you. We would literally go through the.

723
00:37:15,800 --> 00:37:19,600
Speaker 2: Entire tribe discography because there's this drum and upright bass.

724
00:37:20,600 --> 00:37:23,000
Speaker 2: But once we got like, okay, we're not playing on

725
00:37:23,000 --> 00:37:23,839
Speaker 2: the streets no more.

726
00:37:24,080 --> 00:37:25,680
Speaker 3: Let's just do all original material.

727
00:37:26,160 --> 00:37:28,560
Speaker 2: And you told me it's like yo, man, like y'all

728
00:37:28,560 --> 00:37:31,560
Speaker 2: got to bring back and you said hip hop one

729
00:37:31,560 --> 00:37:35,359
Speaker 2: on one And I had a meeting the next day

730
00:37:35,360 --> 00:37:37,399
Speaker 2: with the dudes and they were like, all right, well

731
00:37:37,520 --> 00:37:41,560
Speaker 2: let's see what happened. And that single handedly, like I

732
00:37:41,640 --> 00:37:45,200
Speaker 2: totally forgot that you kind of were the spark that

733
00:37:45,480 --> 00:37:48,920
Speaker 2: started that moment of me figuring out the show as

734
00:37:50,120 --> 00:37:52,160
Speaker 2: in format terms and how to how.

735
00:37:52,040 --> 00:37:54,799
Speaker 4: To pace things and all that stuff. I totally forgot that.

736
00:37:55,200 --> 00:37:56,840
Speaker 4: I mere, how Coen do you call audibles during the

737
00:37:57,000 --> 00:37:59,200
Speaker 4: during the show? Do you do that ever? Like in

738
00:37:59,239 --> 00:38:01,000
Speaker 4: the middle of a show, like you feel the crowd,

739
00:38:01,040 --> 00:38:02,440
Speaker 4: you feel a thing like if all of a sudden

740
00:38:02,640 --> 00:38:04,240
Speaker 4: LL is like, let's do this. Do you ever audible?

741
00:38:04,280 --> 00:38:05,759
Speaker 4: I've never seen you do that, but I know you

742
00:38:05,800 --> 00:38:07,000
Speaker 4: talk all the time to the band.

743
00:38:07,280 --> 00:38:07,480
Speaker 3: You know.

744
00:38:07,520 --> 00:38:09,840
Speaker 2: It's so weird, man, because I come from the Prince

745
00:38:09,880 --> 00:38:13,400
Speaker 2: school of presentation. You know, George Clinton used to always

746
00:38:13,520 --> 00:38:18,880
Speaker 2: joke that prints would rehearse spontaneity like and do I

747
00:38:18,920 --> 00:38:24,160
Speaker 2: ever allow for a moment that requires that. This past weekend,

748
00:38:24,880 --> 00:38:29,680
Speaker 2: in which of this taping, I will call it the

749
00:38:29,719 --> 00:38:36,080
Speaker 2: Microsoft Gate domino effect. There was a Microsoft update effect

750
00:38:36,239 --> 00:38:40,319
Speaker 2: that effected any business that uses Microsoft, including airports and

751
00:38:40,800 --> 00:38:41,880
Speaker 2: hotels and whatnot.

752
00:38:42,440 --> 00:38:45,520
Speaker 3: So as a result, this.

753
00:38:45,440 --> 00:38:50,960
Speaker 2: Past weekend we were doing fragmentute root shows like you know,

754
00:38:51,040 --> 00:38:53,880
Speaker 2: somehow we went from a trio to earth Wind and

755
00:38:53,920 --> 00:38:56,719
Speaker 2: Fire like there's eleven of us now and.

756
00:38:56,719 --> 00:38:58,160
Speaker 3: So we were kind of reduced.

757
00:38:58,560 --> 00:39:04,799
Speaker 2: We were reduced to a seven man group, which you know,

758
00:39:04,960 --> 00:39:09,920
Speaker 2: because I am a somewhat of a former creature of habit.

759
00:39:10,320 --> 00:39:12,839
Speaker 2: If there's a monkey Wrinch store in my way, yes,

760
00:39:13,200 --> 00:39:16,839
Speaker 2: I'm able to adjust. Do I like that? I hate

761
00:39:16,840 --> 00:39:20,800
Speaker 2: it for me. I want the well oiled, well rehearsed

762
00:39:20,960 --> 00:39:26,440
Speaker 2: version of perfection for everyone to see it. But I

763
00:39:26,480 --> 00:39:30,640
Speaker 2: will say that in the last month or so, I'm

764
00:39:30,680 --> 00:39:36,759
Speaker 2: purposely calling shit. While Rica's mid third verse, I'm like, yo,

765
00:39:36,840 --> 00:39:38,720
Speaker 2: do you remember without a doubt from things fall apart?

766
00:39:39,080 --> 00:39:40,680
Speaker 3: And he'll be ron and dad like.

767
00:39:40,719 --> 00:39:43,359
Speaker 2: Treeka has the ability to communicate with me as he's

768
00:39:43,360 --> 00:39:46,759
Speaker 2: still rhyme and shake his said yeah I know. Or

769
00:39:46,840 --> 00:39:48,839
Speaker 2: he'll say like two verses like I know that much,

770
00:39:48,960 --> 00:39:52,920
Speaker 2: and then you know, show download a Saturday night real

771
00:39:53,000 --> 00:39:54,640
Speaker 2: quick by school. We d just take the drum baker

772
00:39:54,640 --> 00:39:58,200
Speaker 2: from the beginning, like literally in the last month and

773
00:39:58,239 --> 00:40:02,320
Speaker 2: a half or so I've been sort of in that

774
00:40:02,480 --> 00:40:04,439
Speaker 2: place to see if I can leave my comfort zone

775
00:40:04,560 --> 00:40:07,000
Speaker 2: because right now we have way too much material, and

776
00:40:07,160 --> 00:40:10,040
Speaker 2: especially with these records that we have coming out in

777
00:40:10,239 --> 00:40:13,080
Speaker 2: twenty twenty five, like I'm gonna have to literally throw

778
00:40:13,160 --> 00:40:17,879
Speaker 2: this entire perfect show away and start all over again.

779
00:40:18,000 --> 00:40:20,719
Speaker 2: So I'm this time, I'm looking forward to it. Previously

780
00:40:20,800 --> 00:40:25,040
Speaker 2: I had dread like, man, we got to build it

781
00:40:25,080 --> 00:40:27,520
Speaker 2: from the beginning. But you know, I feel as though

782
00:40:28,760 --> 00:40:31,799
Speaker 2: that's that's my life lesson, like pivoting and that sort

783
00:40:31,840 --> 00:40:32,040
Speaker 2: of thing.

784
00:40:32,160 --> 00:40:34,719
Speaker 5: So that was why the Force Tour was so great.

785
00:40:35,120 --> 00:40:38,240
Speaker 5: Was Tarique was the greatest hype man in the history

786
00:40:38,239 --> 00:40:41,960
Speaker 5: of hipp I mean, yeah, there's nobody ever who can

787
00:40:42,760 --> 00:40:45,759
Speaker 5: you know, he's a center MC, he's the star. But

788
00:40:45,840 --> 00:40:47,480
Speaker 5: then when he's time for him to be the hype man,

789
00:40:47,560 --> 00:40:50,960
Speaker 5: he's the greatest hype man of all time. And you know,

790
00:40:51,560 --> 00:40:53,840
Speaker 5: you guys got so much out of like like a

791
00:40:54,000 --> 00:40:56,719
Speaker 5: rock him, who's you know, not necessarily known for being

792
00:40:56,760 --> 00:40:59,719
Speaker 5: a great live performer, but you guys certainly worked so

793
00:41:00,360 --> 00:41:02,160
Speaker 5: you got the max you could get out of a

794
00:41:02,239 --> 00:41:05,800
Speaker 5: lot of these people. And also the stro Elliot aspect

795
00:41:05,920 --> 00:41:07,960
Speaker 5: was another thing because you had, you know, real eight

796
00:41:08,000 --> 00:41:10,160
Speaker 5: oh eight and all that stuff on there, and I

797
00:41:10,200 --> 00:41:12,400
Speaker 5: mean you figured it out. You figured out the formula.

798
00:41:12,960 --> 00:41:14,959
Speaker 5: Whereas you know and other wrap shows of the past,

799
00:41:15,000 --> 00:41:18,880
Speaker 5: it used to be long delays and you know, miscommunication,

800
00:41:19,160 --> 00:41:21,400
Speaker 5: no choreography, you know, et cetera, et cetera.

801
00:41:21,560 --> 00:41:28,399
Speaker 3: You know, So when did you leave Power ninety nine?

802
00:41:28,840 --> 00:41:31,439
Speaker 5: When I graduated from high school in nineteen eighty six,

803
00:41:31,719 --> 00:41:33,680
Speaker 5: that was the end of my Power ninety nine time.

804
00:41:35,120 --> 00:41:35,719
Speaker 3: What year was it?

805
00:41:35,800 --> 00:41:38,560
Speaker 5: When the end the story you just told about when

806
00:41:38,640 --> 00:41:40,480
Speaker 5: we when I saw your show and made some comments,

807
00:41:40,520 --> 00:41:41,080
Speaker 5: what year was that?

808
00:41:41,320 --> 00:41:41,440
Speaker 2: Was that?

809
00:41:41,600 --> 00:41:46,480
Speaker 5: Like nineteen ninety That was ninety three, ninety three?

810
00:41:46,680 --> 00:41:50,680
Speaker 2: Okay, us at Master Ace were at the layup was

811
00:41:51,080 --> 00:41:55,400
Speaker 2: kind of like of you from the Undergrounds, you know whatever,

812
00:41:55,440 --> 00:41:58,359
Speaker 2: those cartoons whoever like Sees and Tramp and all those.

813
00:41:58,320 --> 00:42:00,680
Speaker 5: Jazz stations and see yeah yeah, good h yeah.

814
00:42:01,080 --> 00:42:04,200
Speaker 2: Philly guys like they had one of the very first

815
00:42:04,239 --> 00:42:06,759
Speaker 2: examples of what I call like your hip hop shop.

816
00:42:06,880 --> 00:42:10,120
Speaker 2: Now every city has a hip hop shop where there's

817
00:42:11,040 --> 00:42:13,000
Speaker 2: the T shirt in the gear, but you know, if

818
00:42:13,040 --> 00:42:15,640
Speaker 2: you wanted to get fresh jive shirts or your skateboard

819
00:42:15,719 --> 00:42:21,080
Speaker 2: gear or you know, what's supreme is now that's you know.

820
00:42:21,239 --> 00:42:26,880
Speaker 2: So Keith McPhee are our longtime production manager, owned one

821
00:42:26,920 --> 00:42:29,319
Speaker 2: of those hip hop shops and he used to work

822
00:42:29,360 --> 00:42:32,360
Speaker 2: at Sound the Market and he organized the show, and

823
00:42:32,560 --> 00:42:36,160
Speaker 2: I think, yeah, it was us master Ace. I think

824
00:42:36,280 --> 00:42:39,959
Speaker 2: Onyx made their debut in Philly at night, but you guys,

825
00:42:41,000 --> 00:42:43,600
Speaker 2: you guys came and I was like excited, like yo,

826
00:42:43,719 --> 00:42:46,359
Speaker 2: the guys from The Sorcerer were here. Oh my god,

827
00:42:46,480 --> 00:42:49,080
Speaker 2: Like I think it's the first time we had like

828
00:42:49,239 --> 00:42:50,280
Speaker 2: our first rehearsal.

829
00:42:50,360 --> 00:42:52,800
Speaker 3: We never rehearsed. We would just like go off the

830
00:42:52,880 --> 00:42:53,520
Speaker 3: top and whatever.

831
00:42:53,600 --> 00:42:58,160
Speaker 2: And I think the nervousness of preparing something sort of

832
00:42:58,239 --> 00:43:00,440
Speaker 2: took us off our game where we were little too

833
00:43:00,560 --> 00:43:03,920
Speaker 2: serious about it and not And you told us like

834
00:43:04,000 --> 00:43:06,160
Speaker 2: y'all didn't do the things that I heard about you

835
00:43:06,280 --> 00:43:08,560
Speaker 2: guys doing. And I was like, yeah, you're right, Like

836
00:43:08,680 --> 00:43:13,640
Speaker 2: I was over preparing and I learned to bring back

837
00:43:13,719 --> 00:43:14,319
Speaker 2: hip hop one on.

838
00:43:14,400 --> 00:43:16,279
Speaker 5: One so nice.

839
00:43:16,320 --> 00:43:17,080
Speaker 3: Now, do you know?

840
00:43:17,400 --> 00:43:19,160
Speaker 5: Before we leave Philly, I just want to just mention

841
00:43:19,280 --> 00:43:22,040
Speaker 5: one more part of Philly, which is a did you

842
00:43:22,080 --> 00:43:25,520
Speaker 5: ever hear of Rubber Park? Does that name of ring

843
00:43:25,600 --> 00:43:26,160
Speaker 5: a bell at all?

844
00:43:26,600 --> 00:43:27,279
Speaker 3: Rubber Park?

845
00:43:27,760 --> 00:43:32,680
Speaker 5: Rubber Park was a park that, like as the name implies,

846
00:43:32,840 --> 00:43:35,759
Speaker 5: was covered in like a rubber substance. It was down

847
00:43:35,880 --> 00:43:39,799
Speaker 5: on It was down on Delaware Avenue kind of near

848
00:43:39,920 --> 00:43:43,640
Speaker 5: South Street, like Bainbridge around like Bainbridge and Delaware Avenue

849
00:43:44,080 --> 00:43:46,959
Speaker 5: back I'm talking about in like eighty five, nineteen eighty five,

850
00:43:47,160 --> 00:43:50,400
Speaker 5: eighty four, eighty five. That was where I got my

851
00:43:51,680 --> 00:43:53,560
Speaker 5: It was it was past South Street. You'd have to walk.

852
00:43:53,560 --> 00:43:55,560
Speaker 5: It's right along the river, like when you remember how

853
00:43:55,560 --> 00:43:57,319
Speaker 5: they used to be like parks and things right along

854
00:43:57,360 --> 00:44:00,440
Speaker 5: the river there. And that was where I got my

855
00:44:00,600 --> 00:44:03,399
Speaker 5: first dose of real hip hop culture. That was where

856
00:44:04,719 --> 00:44:10,719
Speaker 5: you know, people would break, dance, graffiti, rap, all of it.

857
00:44:11,000 --> 00:44:12,120
Speaker 5: Not DJ because but.

858
00:44:12,360 --> 00:44:15,759
Speaker 3: Is this like Second Street or Delaware Avenue.

859
00:44:15,560 --> 00:44:18,279
Speaker 5: Delaware Avenue like it was like facing the water, like right,

860
00:44:18,360 --> 00:44:19,640
Speaker 5: you know, like close to the water.

861
00:44:20,080 --> 00:44:21,759
Speaker 3: You know what. I'll be honest with you.

862
00:44:22,440 --> 00:44:27,720
Speaker 2: Because of crack Era, like after that limb Bias story

863
00:44:27,800 --> 00:44:30,840
Speaker 2: broke out, my dad and mom were like.

864
00:44:31,760 --> 00:44:34,920
Speaker 3: Super visual, super vigilant, like.

865
00:44:35,719 --> 00:44:38,120
Speaker 2: Before that Oprah theme comes on, Yeah, it's better be

866
00:44:38,200 --> 00:44:39,680
Speaker 2: in this crib and da da da dah dah.

867
00:44:39,719 --> 00:44:42,879
Speaker 5: So like when you're like four or five years younger

868
00:44:42,920 --> 00:44:44,880
Speaker 5: than me, So I think that's probably why. You know,

869
00:44:44,960 --> 00:44:46,800
Speaker 5: I wasn't that old either, but you know, I was

870
00:44:47,239 --> 00:44:49,560
Speaker 5: making my way down there. But that was that The

871
00:44:49,640 --> 00:44:51,960
Speaker 5: reason I mentioned is just because no one ever mentions it,

872
00:44:52,040 --> 00:44:54,680
Speaker 5: and it's like that was one of the first places

873
00:44:54,760 --> 00:44:59,160
Speaker 5: in downtown Philly that real hip hop culture emerged. It

874
00:44:59,239 --> 00:45:03,759
Speaker 5: was because there's a proximity to South Philly. There's you know,

875
00:45:03,880 --> 00:45:06,040
Speaker 5: there's a lot of neighborhoods in that area that where

876
00:45:06,360 --> 00:45:08,560
Speaker 5: there was real hip hop culture and they kind of

877
00:45:08,680 --> 00:45:11,120
Speaker 5: kids would gather in that park, and that was a

878
00:45:11,200 --> 00:45:13,640
Speaker 5: time when I was like just consuming all the records,

879
00:45:13,760 --> 00:45:15,520
Speaker 5: like you know, like it's sort of all the big

880
00:45:15,600 --> 00:45:18,839
Speaker 5: names like Fat Boys, who Don't get who Don't Get

881
00:45:18,920 --> 00:45:21,840
Speaker 5: enough love? By the way, You're right, I love the

882
00:45:21,880 --> 00:45:25,600
Speaker 5: Fat Boys people. I was listening to can You Feel

883
00:45:25,640 --> 00:45:29,120
Speaker 5: It yesterday, which is one of my favorite songs. I'm

884
00:45:29,160 --> 00:45:32,120
Speaker 5: pretty sure Larry Smith produced that. I'm not exactly I think.

885
00:45:32,000 --> 00:45:36,440
Speaker 2: So, but adjacent Curtis and Larry were adjacent who have

886
00:45:36,600 --> 00:45:38,680
Speaker 2: told me that was his first record you ever purchased.

887
00:45:39,400 --> 00:45:40,000
Speaker 5: Can You Feel It?

888
00:45:41,120 --> 00:45:43,759
Speaker 3: The very first Fat Boys record was the first album that.

889
00:45:43,960 --> 00:45:48,279
Speaker 5: Wow, the album Yeah, yeah, okay anyway, So that was it.

890
00:45:48,360 --> 00:45:49,799
Speaker 5: I was just curious if you if you had heard

891
00:45:49,840 --> 00:45:51,680
Speaker 5: of that locale in Philly.

892
00:45:52,160 --> 00:45:56,440
Speaker 2: Nah, Like really, I didn't start. I only hung with adults,

893
00:45:56,680 --> 00:45:58,920
Speaker 2: like if I had free time. I was in the

894
00:45:59,000 --> 00:46:03,759
Speaker 2: family business, traveling with my dad a lot during school time.

895
00:46:03,800 --> 00:46:06,359
Speaker 2: I always came straight home, never allowed to hang out.

896
00:46:07,000 --> 00:46:10,279
Speaker 2: And then kind of when I met Treek, that's when

897
00:46:10,520 --> 00:46:13,080
Speaker 2: the sort of arrange were like lift it a little bit.

898
00:46:13,560 --> 00:46:15,759
Speaker 3: Where maybe I can go to a movie or that

899
00:46:15,920 --> 00:46:16,400
Speaker 3: sort of thing.

900
00:46:16,480 --> 00:46:21,359
Speaker 2: But like my first real act of rebellion was, yo,

901
00:46:21,480 --> 00:46:24,359
Speaker 2: let's go bust on South Street, you know, because even

902
00:46:24,480 --> 00:46:28,520
Speaker 2: then the thing was like wait, take my drums on

903
00:46:28,680 --> 00:46:30,040
Speaker 2: South Street, my dad will kill me.

904
00:46:30,320 --> 00:46:34,200
Speaker 3: Like it was that type of that type of atmosphere.

905
00:46:34,360 --> 00:46:37,080
Speaker 5: So for those who were from back in the eighties,

906
00:46:37,160 --> 00:46:39,759
Speaker 5: South Street was it didn't have a lot of hip hop.

907
00:46:39,800 --> 00:46:41,520
Speaker 5: When I first started hanging out there, it was all

908
00:46:41,600 --> 00:46:44,560
Speaker 5: punk rock. It was a punk rock place, and they

909
00:46:44,600 --> 00:46:47,400
Speaker 5: had that Zipperhead record clothing store and there was a

910
00:46:47,480 --> 00:46:50,600
Speaker 5: record store right by there. I would go to Gym Staks.

911
00:46:50,800 --> 00:46:52,759
Speaker 5: I lived very close to Gym Stakes, so I would

912
00:46:52,760 --> 00:46:55,359
Speaker 5: go there. I would go to Gym Stakes like all

913
00:46:55,400 --> 00:46:59,000
Speaker 5: the time, and and then you know, even just by

914
00:46:59,120 --> 00:47:01,359
Speaker 5: being there on South Street. I wasn't really a punk

915
00:47:01,480 --> 00:47:03,520
Speaker 5: rock guy, but I got into it because it was

916
00:47:03,760 --> 00:47:07,480
Speaker 5: it was all around, and it was yeah, it was

917
00:47:07,520 --> 00:47:09,480
Speaker 5: happening at the same time as hip hop, as we

918
00:47:09,560 --> 00:47:11,120
Speaker 5: all know, so it was there was kind of a

919
00:47:11,640 --> 00:47:13,840
Speaker 5: there was a pairing there, you know, there was some connection.

920
00:47:14,120 --> 00:47:16,320
Speaker 5: So I was, you know, exposed to a lot of

921
00:47:16,360 --> 00:47:18,680
Speaker 5: punk rock at that at that stage. But it wasn't

922
00:47:18,760 --> 00:47:21,359
Speaker 5: until later that it became more of like a hip

923
00:47:21,360 --> 00:47:24,040
Speaker 5: hop street, you know. But in the beginning it was

924
00:47:24,120 --> 00:47:26,120
Speaker 5: it started as a hippie place, you know, back in

925
00:47:26,200 --> 00:47:29,000
Speaker 5: the day, and then it evolved into like, yeah, counterculture.

926
00:47:29,280 --> 00:47:32,320
Speaker 2: My sister was slightly older, so she would hang on

927
00:47:32,440 --> 00:47:35,279
Speaker 2: South Street with their girlfriends and there was like that

928
00:47:35,600 --> 00:47:38,200
Speaker 2: that ice cream spot, once upon a porch or something

929
00:47:38,280 --> 00:47:41,680
Speaker 2: like that, right right, right, yeah, Like I remember South

930
00:47:41,680 --> 00:47:44,319
Speaker 2: Street when it was actual like the village like counterculture.

931
00:47:44,320 --> 00:47:47,640
Speaker 6: And then totally in the gap and Tower Records came

932
00:47:47,680 --> 00:47:52,640
Speaker 6: and then yes, exactly, the Starbucks and then right so,

933
00:47:52,960 --> 00:47:56,480
Speaker 6: if you're friends elect and obviously of course this makes

934
00:47:56,520 --> 00:48:00,520
Speaker 6: you ivy leak material, what were your other college options?

935
00:48:01,520 --> 00:48:05,240
Speaker 3: Like, why did you choose Pin Wait, what did you say? Harvard? No, Harvard?

936
00:48:05,280 --> 00:48:06,240
Speaker 3: Why did you choose Harvard?

937
00:48:07,080 --> 00:48:10,200
Speaker 5: Well, okay, I had what was your essay about?

938
00:48:10,680 --> 00:48:13,760
Speaker 3: Where do you want to be? What were your KAT scores?

939
00:48:13,800 --> 00:48:15,360
Speaker 3: I want to know all the ship checky, let's get it.

940
00:48:16,080 --> 00:48:19,359
Speaker 5: Okay. So what happened was when I got to senior year.

941
00:48:20,560 --> 00:48:22,319
Speaker 5: You know, I was kind of living this dual life

942
00:48:22,320 --> 00:48:24,440
Speaker 5: because I would go and hang out with all the

943
00:48:24,719 --> 00:48:28,480
Speaker 5: Power ninety nine people, and you know, I would still

944
00:48:28,480 --> 00:48:30,640
Speaker 5: go to school every day. I was kind of doing both.

945
00:48:30,680 --> 00:48:33,359
Speaker 5: I was burning the candle at both ends kind of thing,

946
00:48:35,040 --> 00:48:38,399
Speaker 5: and I was able to be. I was a good

947
00:48:38,440 --> 00:48:43,960
Speaker 5: student for the most part, and particularly with English. I

948
00:48:44,160 --> 00:48:48,520
Speaker 5: was like, you know, I was a English major type guy.

949
00:48:48,680 --> 00:48:51,719
Speaker 5: You know. I was reading and writing and focusing on

950
00:48:52,040 --> 00:48:53,440
Speaker 5: books and stuff that kind of thing.

951
00:48:54,040 --> 00:48:54,200
Speaker 3: You know.

952
00:48:54,239 --> 00:48:56,160
Speaker 5: In addition to working at Power in nine, I also

953
00:48:56,239 --> 00:48:59,280
Speaker 5: started writing about hip hop at a very like early stage,

954
00:48:59,400 --> 00:49:02,719
Speaker 5: like in like eighty five, I was writing articles for

955
00:49:03,560 --> 00:49:06,360
Speaker 5: not only my school newspaper, but also there was a

956
00:49:06,800 --> 00:49:10,399
Speaker 5: newspaper on South Street. It was called the I can't

957
00:49:10,440 --> 00:49:12,400
Speaker 5: even remember what it was called, maybe the South Street

958
00:49:12,480 --> 00:49:14,120
Speaker 5: Star possibly, but.

959
00:49:14,719 --> 00:49:15,880
Speaker 3: It was like a village voices.

960
00:49:16,000 --> 00:49:18,080
Speaker 5: It was like a village voice type exactly. It was

961
00:49:18,160 --> 00:49:20,960
Speaker 5: like a village voice. It didn't last probably that long,

962
00:49:21,080 --> 00:49:23,920
Speaker 5: but so I was starting to write, like you know

963
00:49:24,120 --> 00:49:26,960
Speaker 5: these what ended up being what I do with the source.

964
00:49:27,160 --> 00:49:30,319
Speaker 5: I started at a you know, in Philly, writing about

965
00:49:30,400 --> 00:49:32,160
Speaker 5: rap and I would attend. It's mainly because I was

966
00:49:32,200 --> 00:49:34,960
Speaker 5: going to the concerts and I was, you know, writing

967
00:49:35,000 --> 00:49:37,839
Speaker 5: about that. So like you know, Fresh Best one, Fresh

968
00:49:37,880 --> 00:49:42,960
Speaker 5: Best two. There was a concert called the Philly versus

969
00:49:43,040 --> 00:49:43,800
Speaker 5: New York Battle.

970
00:49:43,960 --> 00:49:44,640
Speaker 3: I remember that.

971
00:49:45,160 --> 00:49:47,160
Speaker 5: You remember that? Okay, I remember.

972
00:49:46,880 --> 00:49:49,799
Speaker 2: Hearing about it, but I was, yeah, okay, wait, I'm

973
00:49:49,840 --> 00:49:54,480
Speaker 2: one of those hip hop stages, elders.

974
00:49:54,080 --> 00:49:57,360
Speaker 3: Whatever you want to call me that you don't say.

975
00:49:59,080 --> 00:50:03,000
Speaker 2: There will be some time is where like I'll revisit

976
00:50:03,120 --> 00:50:05,279
Speaker 2: something from thirty years ago that I swore.

977
00:50:05,920 --> 00:50:08,920
Speaker 3: Basically the Mandela effect. Are you familiar with that term,

978
00:50:09,000 --> 00:50:11,239
Speaker 3: the Mandela effect? No? What is that? But I like

979
00:50:11,280 --> 00:50:13,040
Speaker 3: it when you refer to yourself as Mandela though here

980
00:50:13,120 --> 00:50:14,920
Speaker 3: we go. Wait, wait, you guys don't know what the

981
00:50:15,040 --> 00:50:17,239
Speaker 3: Mandela effect is. I've never heard of this of life.

982
00:50:17,480 --> 00:50:21,600
Speaker 2: Okay, So so the Mandela effect is kind of like

983
00:50:22,680 --> 00:50:26,600
Speaker 2: a good version of an urban legend. Like basically, I

984
00:50:26,680 --> 00:50:31,680
Speaker 2: think Mandel effects started with people thinking that the Mandela

985
00:50:31,800 --> 00:50:35,000
Speaker 2: funeral was televised, Like I could have sworn that happen,

986
00:50:35,440 --> 00:50:38,520
Speaker 2: and it didn't happen. You know, like six degrees of

987
00:50:38,560 --> 00:50:40,960
Speaker 2: Kevin Bacon was like a thing and pop culture. Yea,

988
00:50:41,239 --> 00:50:45,360
Speaker 2: now the term the Mendela effect. Okay, So some common

989
00:50:45,360 --> 00:50:49,640
Speaker 2: examples of the Mendel effect of logical explanations like mister

990
00:50:49,760 --> 00:50:53,880
Speaker 2: Monopoly wearing a monocle because it complements his old fashioned

991
00:50:54,000 --> 00:50:57,279
Speaker 2: satirical Like mister Monopoly doesn't wear a monocle, but we

992
00:50:57,680 --> 00:50:58,239
Speaker 2: think he does.

993
00:50:58,640 --> 00:51:00,960
Speaker 5: I understand. So it's like the mistake in memory that

994
00:51:01,000 --> 00:51:03,480
Speaker 5: everyone shares that that is not necessarily a bad thing.

995
00:51:03,600 --> 00:51:03,799
Speaker 3: Yeah.

996
00:51:04,080 --> 00:51:06,480
Speaker 4: Yeah, it says widespread false memories that large number of

997
00:51:06,480 --> 00:51:08,480
Speaker 4: people are groups believe got it right.

998
00:51:08,640 --> 00:51:12,880
Speaker 2: And just like in my version of it is, you know,

999
00:51:13,239 --> 00:51:18,200
Speaker 2: I will return to the storied summer of nineteen eighty

1000
00:51:18,239 --> 00:51:22,560
Speaker 2: eight in which everything was changing our lives. But then

1001
00:51:22,640 --> 00:51:25,640
Speaker 2: I'll go back and listen to it, and then I'll

1002
00:51:25,680 --> 00:51:31,120
Speaker 2: be like, Okay, was this sophomore album as good as

1003
00:51:31,200 --> 00:51:35,320
Speaker 2: I thought it was in terms of the folkal or whatnot?

1004
00:51:36,000 --> 00:51:38,400
Speaker 2: And let's just say that, like if you were to

1005
00:51:38,440 --> 00:51:40,080
Speaker 2: put a gun in my head and basically say, like,

1006
00:51:40,120 --> 00:51:42,440
Speaker 2: all right, was this really a classic record?

1007
00:51:42,520 --> 00:51:44,000
Speaker 3: Were you just in your moments?

1008
00:51:44,160 --> 00:51:46,839
Speaker 2: I talked to this with ll like you couldn't tell

1009
00:51:46,880 --> 00:51:49,399
Speaker 2: me shit about Walking with the Panther in eighty nine.

1010
00:51:50,120 --> 00:51:52,440
Speaker 2: But when I let five years ago by I went

1011
00:51:52,520 --> 00:51:56,640
Speaker 2: back to it, I was like, Okay, I see where

1012
00:51:56,640 --> 00:51:59,280
Speaker 2: the ridicule came in. But I still hold that album

1013
00:52:00,160 --> 00:52:04,399
Speaker 2: precious to me, even though it's not as classic as

1014
00:52:05,040 --> 00:52:07,719
Speaker 2: my seventeen year old mind said it was. So I'm

1015
00:52:07,800 --> 00:52:11,239
Speaker 2: just asking you were rap shows back then as you

1016
00:52:11,400 --> 00:52:16,360
Speaker 2: remember it as legendary as we.

1017
00:52:18,719 --> 00:52:22,520
Speaker 3: Thought it was, or was it? Just like, Okay, shows

1018
00:52:22,520 --> 00:52:25,520
Speaker 3: are better now, even though the feeling is better than my.

1019
00:52:25,640 --> 00:52:28,080
Speaker 5: Take on it is. If you want to talk about

1020
00:52:28,120 --> 00:52:30,120
Speaker 5: nineteen eighty eight, I still believe to this day of

1021
00:52:30,160 --> 00:52:32,600
Speaker 5: the eighty eight was the most incredible year for hip hop.

1022
00:52:32,640 --> 00:52:34,759
Speaker 5: I will always believe that. I think eighty eight was

1023
00:52:34,840 --> 00:52:38,120
Speaker 5: the pinnacle of hip hop. However, when it came to

1024
00:52:38,200 --> 00:52:41,839
Speaker 5: the shows, as I said, a lot of them were problematic.

1025
00:52:41,960 --> 00:52:43,920
Speaker 5: I mean, you know, like, even though I was loving it,

1026
00:52:44,160 --> 00:52:46,400
Speaker 5: there was nothing for us to compare it to in

1027
00:52:46,480 --> 00:52:49,880
Speaker 5: the early days in Philly, I would witness crazy scenes

1028
00:52:50,120 --> 00:52:54,480
Speaker 5: of you know, at the door inside the venue. This

1029
00:52:54,640 --> 00:52:56,920
Speaker 5: is mostly out the spectrum. That was most of the

1030
00:52:56,960 --> 00:52:58,960
Speaker 5: shows I will go to. We're out the spectrum, you

1031
00:52:59,000 --> 00:53:01,680
Speaker 5: would see people being thrown off the balcony. I mean

1032
00:53:01,760 --> 00:53:04,800
Speaker 5: it would be crazy shit. Oh yeah, oh, crazy stuff.

1033
00:53:04,840 --> 00:53:08,360
Speaker 5: I mean throughout you know, most of those shows, there

1034
00:53:08,360 --> 00:53:10,920
Speaker 5: would be some crazy incidents. I mean, for the most part,

1035
00:53:11,000 --> 00:53:13,759
Speaker 5: they were fine. There was not a you know, nobody died,

1036
00:53:13,800 --> 00:53:16,680
Speaker 5: I don't think, but you know, there was, you know,

1037
00:53:16,960 --> 00:53:21,160
Speaker 5: there was. They weren't well put together shows, but I

1038
00:53:21,280 --> 00:53:23,320
Speaker 5: think it was we were so starved for you know.

1039
00:53:23,360 --> 00:53:25,919
Speaker 5: I mean back then there weren't very even videos really

1040
00:53:26,040 --> 00:53:28,560
Speaker 5: for most songs, so you were just kind of seeing

1041
00:53:28,600 --> 00:53:30,520
Speaker 5: the artists. All you saw was the record cover and

1042
00:53:30,600 --> 00:53:32,719
Speaker 5: then what was in the venue right there with you,

1043
00:53:32,880 --> 00:53:36,040
Speaker 5: you know, so there was I think the moment was

1044
00:53:36,120 --> 00:53:38,319
Speaker 5: so like, I mean, I saw all those shows, all

1045
00:53:38,440 --> 00:53:40,959
Speaker 5: those amazing and especially and you want to talk about

1046
00:53:41,000 --> 00:53:44,520
Speaker 5: eighty eight. Chuck de often refers to a certain show

1047
00:53:44,560 --> 00:53:46,640
Speaker 5: at the Philly Spectrum in nineteen eighty eight as the

1048
00:53:46,719 --> 00:53:49,280
Speaker 5: greatest hip hop concert of all time, And I agree

1049
00:53:49,960 --> 00:53:52,840
Speaker 5: it was. I mean, you know of that era anyway,

1050
00:53:53,040 --> 00:53:55,719
Speaker 5: It was right when Nation of Millions was red hot,

1051
00:53:55,920 --> 00:53:59,080
Speaker 5: and it was like perfect, perfect timing. Also on the

1052
00:53:59,120 --> 00:54:04,480
Speaker 5: bill was rock Him and Eric b. Ll Statsosnic I

1053
00:54:04,520 --> 00:54:07,680
Speaker 5: think Big Daddy Kane, like a whole bunch of great artists.

1054
00:54:08,239 --> 00:54:11,160
Speaker 5: But I just remember a Nation of Millions being at

1055
00:54:11,200 --> 00:54:14,239
Speaker 5: the pinnacle of that moment and just like the energy was,

1056
00:54:14,440 --> 00:54:17,240
Speaker 5: you know, through the roof. I mean, obviously that record

1057
00:54:17,320 --> 00:54:19,839
Speaker 5: had captured the hip hop generation almost like no other

1058
00:54:21,120 --> 00:54:21,560
Speaker 5: that album.

1059
00:54:21,719 --> 00:54:25,879
Speaker 2: Yeah, so were any of your hip hop contemporaries, those

1060
00:54:25,960 --> 00:54:29,320
Speaker 2: of it, of age at least even thinking of traveling

1061
00:54:29,400 --> 00:54:32,920
Speaker 2: up north to the Latin Quarter to witness it?

1062
00:54:33,080 --> 00:54:35,279
Speaker 5: Or as you all know, if you guys grow up,

1063
00:54:35,280 --> 00:54:37,359
Speaker 5: if you grow up in Philly, there's always this sort

1064
00:54:37,400 --> 00:54:40,719
Speaker 5: of New York is like this big, imposing, like big brother,

1065
00:54:41,000 --> 00:54:42,719
Speaker 5: like next to you, you know what I mean. It's

1066
00:54:42,840 --> 00:54:48,400
Speaker 5: like we always admired it, respected it, maybe feared it,

1067
00:54:48,719 --> 00:54:51,880
Speaker 5: maybe didn't understand. You know, we wanted we were jealous

1068
00:54:51,920 --> 00:54:54,160
Speaker 5: of it, but then we acted like we weren't jealous

1069
00:54:54,200 --> 00:54:56,480
Speaker 5: of it. You know, there was this there was this

1070
00:54:56,600 --> 00:54:59,680
Speaker 5: whole sort of thing where New York was the big

1071
00:54:59,760 --> 00:55:02,560
Speaker 5: city and Philly was like you know, the sixth Borough

1072
00:55:02,560 --> 00:55:05,719
Speaker 5: of New York or something like that, you know, and

1073
00:55:07,120 --> 00:55:09,719
Speaker 5: we were, you know, always drawn to it. For sure.

1074
00:55:11,480 --> 00:55:13,480
Speaker 5: I was probably too young during the prime of the

1075
00:55:13,600 --> 00:55:15,480
Speaker 5: Latin Quarter era to go there, but I did end

1076
00:55:15,600 --> 00:55:18,000
Speaker 5: up going there later in like eighty eight, I think

1077
00:55:18,040 --> 00:55:20,440
Speaker 5: I went there. But there was, you know, there was

1078
00:55:20,480 --> 00:55:23,680
Speaker 5: always that sort of love hate relationship. You remember when

1079
00:55:24,320 --> 00:55:27,120
Speaker 5: Double D n Steinsky had a record that was the

1080
00:55:27,480 --> 00:55:28,920
Speaker 5: you know, that great mashup record.

1081
00:55:29,360 --> 00:55:29,800
Speaker 3: Yeah it was.

1082
00:55:30,600 --> 00:55:32,440
Speaker 5: That was such a great song, right, it was one

1083
00:55:32,440 --> 00:55:34,880
Speaker 5: of the first mashups ever. And you remember at one

1084
00:55:34,920 --> 00:55:37,120
Speaker 5: part that used to go New York is red hot,

1085
00:55:37,800 --> 00:55:40,680
Speaker 5: New York is read right, and everyone in Philly used

1086
00:55:40,719 --> 00:55:44,000
Speaker 5: to go New York ain't shit, New York ain't shit.

1087
00:55:46,200 --> 00:55:48,399
Speaker 5: And then around that same time you brought up mc

1088
00:55:48,560 --> 00:55:53,239
Speaker 5: breeze Discombobulated Boobulator, right, and then the flip side was

1089
00:55:53,280 --> 00:55:55,600
Speaker 5: a song called it Ain't New York because Philly is

1090
00:55:55,600 --> 00:55:57,480
Speaker 5: stepping in. You know that song.

1091
00:55:57,840 --> 00:55:59,280
Speaker 3: I know I have the twelvens.

1092
00:55:59,600 --> 00:56:02,600
Speaker 5: Yeah, the b side to Discombobulate or Boobulater, which was

1093
00:56:02,680 --> 00:56:06,000
Speaker 5: a song about you know, pro Philly anti New York

1094
00:56:06,120 --> 00:56:08,880
Speaker 5: kind of sentiments. So yeah, it was always there as

1095
00:56:09,000 --> 00:56:12,920
Speaker 5: kind of like this big, imposing place, and eventually all

1096
00:56:13,000 --> 00:56:14,839
Speaker 5: of us ended up making our way there one way

1097
00:56:14,920 --> 00:56:15,719
Speaker 5: or another. You know.

1098
00:56:16,719 --> 00:56:18,520
Speaker 2: Yeah, because I could have sworn that you were just

1099
00:56:18,600 --> 00:56:22,000
Speaker 2: straight up New Yorker, I didn't realize that you had

1100
00:56:22,040 --> 00:56:23,800
Speaker 2: Philly ties, and I was shocked.

1101
00:56:23,800 --> 00:56:27,279
Speaker 3: I was like, oh shit, okay, I see. So yeah,

1102
00:56:27,440 --> 00:56:32,480
Speaker 3: like your time at Harvard, when you're graduating, what do

1103
00:56:32,640 --> 00:56:35,000
Speaker 3: you want to be? What are you aspiring to.

1104
00:56:35,040 --> 00:56:38,560
Speaker 5: Be graduating high school? Yeah, when I was graduating high school,

1105
00:56:38,920 --> 00:56:41,360
Speaker 5: I wanted to be I think I just wanted to

1106
00:56:41,400 --> 00:56:44,040
Speaker 5: be on the radio. I think that was kind of

1107
00:56:44,120 --> 00:56:47,719
Speaker 5: my main goal, or my main sort of I wanted.

1108
00:56:47,760 --> 00:56:50,440
Speaker 5: I knew I wanted to be around music, somewhere on

1109
00:56:50,560 --> 00:56:52,880
Speaker 5: the I guess on the business side of music or

1110
00:56:52,960 --> 00:56:56,719
Speaker 5: on the broadcasting side of music. And to answer your question,

1111
00:56:56,880 --> 00:57:00,360
Speaker 5: I got into Penn as well. And then they let you.

1112
00:57:01,800 --> 00:57:05,080
Speaker 5: Pen allowed you if you lived in Pennsylvania and you

1113
00:57:05,160 --> 00:57:07,839
Speaker 5: applied to Penn, you got in early, then you could

1114
00:57:08,360 --> 00:57:11,200
Speaker 5: still apply to other schools. So once I got into Penn,

1115
00:57:11,760 --> 00:57:14,120
Speaker 5: then all I I just went for the number one place,

1116
00:57:15,440 --> 00:57:18,440
Speaker 5: and and and and I got rejected from Yale and Princeton,

1117
00:57:18,520 --> 00:57:23,320
Speaker 5: but I got into Harvard. Yeah. But anyway, as I

1118
00:57:23,400 --> 00:57:25,720
Speaker 5: went there, I mean I pretty much remember that my

1119
00:57:25,880 --> 00:57:30,160
Speaker 5: first real mission upon arriving at Harvard was radio station.

1120
00:57:30,520 --> 00:57:33,400
Speaker 5: So I went right down to w HRB, which was

1121
00:57:33,480 --> 00:57:36,880
Speaker 5: the school's radio station. It was primarily a classical station.

1122
00:57:39,160 --> 00:57:41,480
Speaker 5: It's Harvard. Yes, it was exactly as you would picture it,

1123
00:57:42,240 --> 00:57:54,280
Speaker 5: you know, exactly that music was playing exactly and so like.

1124
00:57:55,040 --> 00:57:58,520
Speaker 5: They had an urban music department, but it was only

1125
00:57:58,600 --> 00:58:02,360
Speaker 5: on the weekends, but I signed up for it. There

1126
00:58:02,440 --> 00:58:04,920
Speaker 5: was a time slot allotted on like Friday and Saturday

1127
00:58:05,000 --> 00:58:09,200
Speaker 5: night for urban music. It had a very unfortunate name,

1128
00:58:09,840 --> 00:58:14,160
Speaker 5: the Darker Side TDS. It had nothing to do with race.

1129
00:58:14,360 --> 00:58:16,360
Speaker 5: It was because it was at night, okay, but it

1130
00:58:16,440 --> 00:58:20,160
Speaker 5: was still a dumb name. Yes, right, Okay. Anyway, so

1131
00:58:20,240 --> 00:58:22,520
Speaker 5: I walk in and I'm like, listen, I came in

1132
00:58:22,640 --> 00:58:24,479
Speaker 5: with all and now I got all the power ninety

1133
00:58:24,520 --> 00:58:27,080
Speaker 5: nine experience under my belt. I feel like I know

1134
00:58:27,240 --> 00:58:29,760
Speaker 5: more than everyone else, you know. I walk in and

1135
00:58:29,920 --> 00:58:32,479
Speaker 5: they say, okay, I'm like, I'm filling out the form

1136
00:58:32,560 --> 00:58:35,960
Speaker 5: of like any past experience, and I write like, you know,

1137
00:58:36,040 --> 00:58:38,600
Speaker 5: extra sentences like about all the stuff I've been doing

1138
00:58:38,680 --> 00:58:41,240
Speaker 5: with Power ninety nine and all this other stuff. And

1139
00:58:41,320 --> 00:58:44,320
Speaker 5: then they just put me in a room with all

1140
00:58:44,360 --> 00:58:46,440
Speaker 5: the other beginners and I have to just pay my

1141
00:58:46,600 --> 00:58:50,080
Speaker 5: dues and kind of like, you know, be an intern

1142
00:58:50,200 --> 00:58:52,160
Speaker 5: for them. You know, like when you're a freshman, you

1143
00:58:52,280 --> 00:58:54,720
Speaker 5: kind of have to just like in any any program

1144
00:58:54,840 --> 00:58:57,080
Speaker 5: in kylie Is, you have to like pay your dues

1145
00:58:57,200 --> 00:58:59,720
Speaker 5: and you know, show that you really you're really serious

1146
00:58:59,720 --> 00:59:02,000
Speaker 5: about working there and all that stuff. So I start

1147
00:59:02,040 --> 00:59:06,600
Speaker 5: to go through that process, and you know, they didn't

1148
00:59:06,640 --> 00:59:07,320
Speaker 5: have a raps show.

1149
00:59:07,360 --> 00:59:07,520
Speaker 3: It was.

1150
00:59:07,640 --> 00:59:10,280
Speaker 5: It was really just R and B, a straight R

1151
00:59:10,320 --> 00:59:13,280
Speaker 5: and B, straight R and B kind of thing, a

1152
00:59:13,320 --> 00:59:18,760
Speaker 5: little bit of dance music, I think, and Baker and

1153
00:59:18,880 --> 00:59:22,560
Speaker 5: Luther and yeah, yeah, yeah it was. It was at night,

1154
00:59:22,640 --> 00:59:25,800
Speaker 5: so more uptempo stuff, I guess. And but again this

1155
00:59:25,960 --> 00:59:28,640
Speaker 5: is now, So I graduated in eighty six, so now

1156
00:59:28,720 --> 00:59:31,520
Speaker 5: we're talking about, like, you know, we're entering one of

1157
00:59:31,600 --> 00:59:34,720
Speaker 5: the prime times of hip hop, Golden era time I

1158
00:59:34,800 --> 00:59:37,360
Speaker 5: consider golden era, and everyone has their own definition. I

1159
00:59:37,440 --> 00:59:41,000
Speaker 5: consider Golden era eighty four to ninety four. That's just

1160
00:59:41,080 --> 00:59:43,720
Speaker 5: my opinion. Everyone has their own opinion. But that's my

1161
00:59:43,840 --> 00:59:49,720
Speaker 5: personal opinion from run DMC too like the yeah to

1162
00:59:49,840 --> 00:59:53,120
Speaker 5: non it's basically yeah exactly, but at any rate. So

1163
00:59:53,280 --> 00:59:55,400
Speaker 5: I'm in there and I'm starting to, like, you know,

1164
00:59:55,640 --> 00:59:57,320
Speaker 5: do all the things I'm supposed to do to get

1165
00:59:57,360 --> 01:00:00,760
Speaker 5: involved with this radio station. And I'm in my dorm

1166
01:00:00,840 --> 01:00:05,320
Speaker 5: room one day and I'm listening to Go See the

1167
01:00:05,400 --> 01:00:07,520
Speaker 5: Doctor by kolm o d. I remember I had that

1168
01:00:07,600 --> 01:00:10,200
Speaker 5: twelve inch final and I hear a knock at my door.

1169
01:00:11,080 --> 01:00:12,840
Speaker 5: It's in the college dorm room, you know. And I

1170
01:00:12,920 --> 01:00:16,800
Speaker 5: opened the door and I see a white guy standing

1171
01:00:16,920 --> 01:00:21,520
Speaker 5: there with a red Felas sweatsuit and a mustache, and

1172
01:00:21,920 --> 01:00:25,400
Speaker 5: he's like, hey, I heard you playing that music. You're

1173
01:00:25,440 --> 01:00:27,400
Speaker 5: into that kind of music. And I was like yeah,

1174
01:00:27,560 --> 01:00:30,360
Speaker 5: and he's like, hey, I'm Dave. And it was Dave Mace,

1175
01:00:31,600 --> 01:00:34,240
Speaker 5: my future partner in the Source, but that was the

1176
01:00:34,400 --> 01:00:38,080
Speaker 5: very beginning. He walks in and we start talking and

1177
01:00:38,120 --> 01:00:41,880
Speaker 5: we're two white guys who are there who both love

1178
01:00:41,960 --> 01:00:45,440
Speaker 5: black music. He was really into go go music in particular,

1179
01:00:45,840 --> 01:00:48,200
Speaker 5: which I knew very little about. I mean I knew

1180
01:00:48,280 --> 01:00:50,480
Speaker 5: like very little, like only like Chuck Brown and the

1181
01:00:50,520 --> 01:00:53,080
Speaker 5: Soul Searchers and the very basics.

1182
01:00:53,200 --> 01:00:55,160
Speaker 3: But what was he from the DNB.

1183
01:00:55,840 --> 01:00:59,720
Speaker 5: He's from DC. Yeah, yep, he's from Yeah, he's from DC,

1184
01:01:00,160 --> 01:01:01,800
Speaker 5: you know. And so we were kind of like sharing

1185
01:01:01,960 --> 01:01:05,600
Speaker 5: with each other, like, you know, showing each other, you know, records,

1186
01:01:05,680 --> 01:01:08,480
Speaker 5: and you know, I think my argument's a little bit

1187
01:01:08,520 --> 01:01:11,439
Speaker 5: more convincing if you're playing somebody wrap records and they're

1188
01:01:11,440 --> 01:01:13,840
Speaker 5: playing new Go Go records. I mean, there's way more

1189
01:01:14,040 --> 01:01:17,160
Speaker 5: records so you can play, you know. But we became friends.

1190
01:01:17,400 --> 01:01:21,120
Speaker 5: And in the beginning, he was working for the school

1191
01:01:21,160 --> 01:01:24,160
Speaker 5: paper selling ads, and he was he had a knack

1192
01:01:24,240 --> 01:01:28,760
Speaker 5: for selling ads, as we soon all learned, and he

1193
01:01:28,920 --> 01:01:31,720
Speaker 5: was selling ads for like the Harvard Crimson, which is

1194
01:01:31,760 --> 01:01:35,440
Speaker 5: like a famous school newspaper. And I was like, hey man,

1195
01:01:35,520 --> 01:01:37,960
Speaker 5: you didn't realize that. If you you don't, you might

1196
01:01:38,040 --> 01:01:39,320
Speaker 5: not know. But if you come down to the radio

1197
01:01:39,360 --> 01:01:42,240
Speaker 5: station you sell ads, they let you keep a commission.

1198
01:01:42,440 --> 01:01:44,960
Speaker 5: He's like a commission because when you were selling ads

1199
01:01:44,960 --> 01:01:46,920
Speaker 5: over there, they didn't let him keep a commission. He's

1200
01:01:47,000 --> 01:01:49,360
Speaker 5: like they really And I was like, yeah, come on down.

1201
01:01:49,440 --> 01:01:52,800
Speaker 5: So I brought him down to the station, and you know,

1202
01:01:53,080 --> 01:01:54,960
Speaker 5: he started doing the same thing I was doing, which

1203
01:01:55,000 --> 01:01:58,720
Speaker 5: is like go through the whole initiation process and so forth.

1204
01:01:59,160 --> 01:02:01,360
Speaker 5: But then pretty quickly, you know, to make a long

1205
01:02:01,400 --> 01:02:04,760
Speaker 5: story short, we kind of teamed up with a couple

1206
01:02:04,800 --> 01:02:08,280
Speaker 5: of other students, not famous people, just other students that

1207
01:02:08,320 --> 01:02:11,520
Speaker 5: were there at the time, and then you know, we

1208
01:02:11,640 --> 01:02:15,800
Speaker 5: started doing this like rap show. I mean it started

1209
01:02:16,000 --> 01:02:16,760
Speaker 5: very small.

1210
01:02:18,400 --> 01:02:20,840
Speaker 3: Did you have to get permission to do.

1211
01:02:21,000 --> 01:02:24,080
Speaker 5: This or yeah, we had to like go through the

1212
01:02:24,120 --> 01:02:26,040
Speaker 5: whole It took about a year. It took about a

1213
01:02:26,120 --> 01:02:28,720
Speaker 5: year for us from from from when I first went

1214
01:02:28,760 --> 01:02:31,080
Speaker 5: down there to us actually getting a rap show. It

1215
01:02:31,160 --> 01:02:33,320
Speaker 5: was it was probably a year later. It took like

1216
01:02:33,400 --> 01:02:35,720
Speaker 5: a whole year. It was probably sophomore year that I

1217
01:02:35,800 --> 01:02:39,680
Speaker 5: actually got the show. And what I did was I

1218
01:02:39,800 --> 01:02:43,120
Speaker 5: went back to Philly and went to Power ninety nine

1219
01:02:43,760 --> 01:02:47,320
Speaker 5: and walked in and saw some old friends, walked right

1220
01:02:47,480 --> 01:02:51,720
Speaker 5: into the studio the b room, like the the not

1221
01:02:51,800 --> 01:02:54,920
Speaker 5: the on air studio, but the production studio, and I

1222
01:02:55,040 --> 01:02:58,040
Speaker 5: took every single one of Lady Bees on air IDs

1223
01:02:58,120 --> 01:03:01,920
Speaker 5: and drops and recorded them so like you're listening to

1224
01:03:02,000 --> 01:03:05,040
Speaker 5: street beat, you know, that kind of stuff. And I

1225
01:03:05,200 --> 01:03:07,600
Speaker 5: went back down to I went back up to Cambridge

1226
01:03:08,120 --> 01:03:10,160
Speaker 5: and I was like, Dave, I got it, and I

1227
01:03:10,200 --> 01:03:12,040
Speaker 5: had a cassette and it was we're gonna call our

1228
01:03:12,080 --> 01:03:16,560
Speaker 5: show street Beat, and so I basically got you know,

1229
01:03:16,640 --> 01:03:19,600
Speaker 5: there were other rap shows that Boston had, like only

1230
01:03:19,680 --> 01:03:21,320
Speaker 5: on college radio, but there was like.

1231
01:03:22,440 --> 01:03:24,880
Speaker 2: She's saying, if it's like, yo, this is chuf Dan,

1232
01:03:24,920 --> 01:03:26,520
Speaker 2: you're checking out the sounds of street Beat.

1233
01:03:26,640 --> 01:03:29,880
Speaker 5: You took all the drops of like not artists, but

1234
01:03:30,040 --> 01:03:33,840
Speaker 5: more so like like official like the official radio guys.

1235
01:03:34,280 --> 01:03:35,920
Speaker 3: Do that guy? Who is that guy?

1236
01:03:36,280 --> 01:03:38,800
Speaker 5: There was some guy do a lot of work? Yeah,

1237
01:03:38,920 --> 01:03:40,640
Speaker 5: there was that guy was getting a ton of work.

1238
01:03:40,680 --> 01:03:43,720
Speaker 5: Back then. There's always somebody like that. But you know,

1239
01:03:43,800 --> 01:03:46,960
Speaker 5: it was like you know, cold Rock in the planet

1240
01:03:47,120 --> 01:03:48,960
Speaker 5: with street Beat, you know, all that kind of stuff.

1241
01:03:50,440 --> 01:03:52,840
Speaker 5: And so that gave us an edge because you know,

1242
01:03:53,000 --> 01:03:55,160
Speaker 5: now we have a more we have a very professional

1243
01:03:55,320 --> 01:03:58,640
Speaker 5: sounding like station radio show, you know, because we have

1244
01:03:58,760 --> 01:04:02,680
Speaker 5: these drops. So I came back. I remember, just by

1245
01:04:03,000 --> 01:04:05,720
Speaker 5: randomly that around the same time I had the twelve

1246
01:04:05,800 --> 01:04:09,680
Speaker 5: inch for Mantronics and just Ice it was around that

1247
01:04:09,800 --> 01:04:12,200
Speaker 5: same time. Whatever. You know, there's a lot a lot

1248
01:04:12,240 --> 01:04:14,240
Speaker 5: of those kind of records. So I was bringing records

1249
01:04:14,280 --> 01:04:16,960
Speaker 5: back that no one in Boston had heard yet, you know,

1250
01:04:17,360 --> 01:04:19,280
Speaker 5: I was I was basically, like you know, the connection

1251
01:04:19,480 --> 01:04:22,640
Speaker 5: to like getting records ahead of everybody just because of

1252
01:04:23,200 --> 01:04:25,640
Speaker 5: really just going to like Sounds of Market, funkal Mart,

1253
01:04:26,480 --> 01:04:27,360
Speaker 5: those kind of places.

1254
01:04:27,640 --> 01:04:30,320
Speaker 3: So you weren't getting service yet you still have to buy.

1255
01:04:30,720 --> 01:04:32,960
Speaker 5: The station did get serviced, but but yeah, but most

1256
01:04:33,000 --> 01:04:33,960
Speaker 5: of the good ones I had to buy.

1257
01:04:34,040 --> 01:04:40,600
Speaker 2: Yes, So what was the general attitude or the atmosphere

1258
01:04:40,720 --> 01:04:44,680
Speaker 2: at Harvard for this music, Like were they open or

1259
01:04:44,960 --> 01:04:45,160
Speaker 2: was it.

1260
01:04:45,400 --> 01:04:49,520
Speaker 3: Just like a small two percent of y'all or really

1261
01:04:49,640 --> 01:04:50,240
Speaker 3: hip hop ds?

1262
01:04:50,800 --> 01:04:52,800
Speaker 5: That's a great question. I mean, I think it was

1263
01:04:52,920 --> 01:04:57,120
Speaker 5: pretty reflective of the general population at that time, whereas

1264
01:04:57,240 --> 01:05:00,479
Speaker 5: hip hop was still an underground form of music.

1265
01:05:00,680 --> 01:05:04,640
Speaker 2: Because you're in college, did you yourself see the license

1266
01:05:04,720 --> 01:05:08,840
Speaker 2: to Ill effect happen at rapid speed?

1267
01:05:09,840 --> 01:05:12,480
Speaker 5: License to Ill was an important inflection point. I think

1268
01:05:12,560 --> 01:05:14,880
Speaker 5: glad you brought that up, because that happened actually right

1269
01:05:15,080 --> 01:05:18,440
Speaker 5: in eighty six, late eighty six, right, so that was

1270
01:05:18,480 --> 01:05:22,160
Speaker 5: when I when I it was it was right around

1271
01:05:22,160 --> 01:05:25,360
Speaker 5: the time when I met Dave, honestly, and the beginnings

1272
01:05:25,440 --> 01:05:29,400
Speaker 5: of what would become the Source was happening. But License

1273
01:05:29,480 --> 01:05:34,760
Speaker 5: to Ill was a huge, huge influence on not just me,

1274
01:05:34,960 --> 01:05:37,960
Speaker 5: but I mean so many people, you know, were influenced

1275
01:05:38,000 --> 01:05:42,960
Speaker 5: by that record. I remember that I was. Actually I

1276
01:05:43,120 --> 01:05:45,840
Speaker 5: was so into it that I like even made it

1277
01:05:46,040 --> 01:05:48,600
Speaker 5: like a focus of one of my freshman year classes,

1278
01:05:48,720 --> 01:05:51,160
Speaker 5: like you got to write a paper about whatever you want,

1279
01:05:51,200 --> 01:05:55,640
Speaker 5: and I wrote about License to Ill. And that was

1280
01:05:55,720 --> 01:05:58,720
Speaker 5: an important record for me also being a white Jewish

1281
01:05:58,800 --> 01:06:02,600
Speaker 5: guy from the city, you know, kind of identifying. But

1282
01:06:02,680 --> 01:06:06,680
Speaker 5: the thing is that you know and you later that's

1283
01:06:06,680 --> 01:06:08,520
Speaker 5: about this. I was about to say that exact thing.

1284
01:06:08,760 --> 01:06:10,520
Speaker 5: Everyone in Philly thought they were Puerto Rican.

1285
01:06:10,560 --> 01:06:12,880
Speaker 3: I don't just festing man out of there, because the

1286
01:06:12,960 --> 01:06:15,600
Speaker 3: Beastie Groove Mike d sound like he was Puerto Rican.

1287
01:06:15,680 --> 01:06:17,400
Speaker 3: You just festing man when you want to hear.

1288
01:06:17,360 --> 01:06:19,960
Speaker 5: You right, exactly, And for some reason, everyone that you

1289
01:06:20,160 --> 01:06:21,880
Speaker 5: you heard that they were Puerto Rican too, right, because

1290
01:06:21,920 --> 01:06:24,360
Speaker 5: everyone in Philly. Everyone in Philly is like, no, nah,

1291
01:06:24,360 --> 01:06:26,520
Speaker 5: they Puerto Rican, They perto Rican. And I'm like, uh,

1292
01:06:27,320 --> 01:06:29,280
Speaker 5: I guess I didn't know. You know, nobody knew because

1293
01:06:29,280 --> 01:06:32,040
Speaker 5: all we had was those Crimson def cham labels with

1294
01:06:32,120 --> 01:06:32,760
Speaker 5: no picture on it.

1295
01:06:32,840 --> 01:06:34,600
Speaker 3: You know, my science teacher is the one.

1296
01:06:35,400 --> 01:06:37,800
Speaker 2: He saw the photo and he's like, hmm, because we

1297
01:06:38,120 --> 01:06:41,920
Speaker 2: brought the album to school and we were we were

1298
01:06:41,960 --> 01:06:45,400
Speaker 2: obsessed with the whole the backwards eat me thing on

1299
01:06:45,480 --> 01:06:48,600
Speaker 2: the airplay wing, Yes, the wing of the album covered.

1300
01:06:49,320 --> 01:06:51,160
Speaker 2: And so when he looks at it and he saw

1301
01:06:51,240 --> 01:06:54,440
Speaker 2: the name Horowitz, he's like, oh, okay, some of my

1302
01:06:54,560 --> 01:06:55,280
Speaker 2: Jewish brothers.

1303
01:06:55,440 --> 01:06:57,720
Speaker 3: I was like, Jewish like white. He's like yeah. I

1304
01:06:57,800 --> 01:07:00,720
Speaker 3: was like, no, man, white boys, ain't that funky?

1305
01:07:01,880 --> 01:07:04,680
Speaker 2: Like literally it took forever, Like when I heard him

1306
01:07:04,720 --> 01:07:07,960
Speaker 2: speak on Soul Train, I was like, okay, mister Parrot,

1307
01:07:08,120 --> 01:07:08,600
Speaker 2: might be right.

1308
01:07:08,680 --> 01:07:13,120
Speaker 3: They what used to get down to mere? What do

1309
01:07:13,160 --> 01:07:15,160
Speaker 3: you want to say? I know this now? I know

1310
01:07:15,320 --> 01:07:15,680
Speaker 3: this now.

1311
01:07:20,920 --> 01:07:24,800
Speaker 2: So how does what we know as the source get created?

1312
01:07:25,200 --> 01:07:28,320
Speaker 2: In terms of it's starting out as a newsletter?

1313
01:07:28,560 --> 01:07:30,960
Speaker 5: So we we eventually, So we started out with Dave

1314
01:07:31,000 --> 01:07:34,680
Speaker 5: and I and two other Harvard students who because they

1315
01:07:34,680 --> 01:07:36,840
Speaker 5: were older and we were younger, and they were kind

1316
01:07:36,880 --> 01:07:40,640
Speaker 5: of like, you know, still like the sceniority over us.

1317
01:07:41,240 --> 01:07:43,760
Speaker 5: But then you know, over time, one of them fell

1318
01:07:43,800 --> 01:07:45,480
Speaker 5: off and the other one fell off, and then eventually

1319
01:07:45,520 --> 01:07:48,640
Speaker 5: it was just me and Dave. That point, we did

1320
01:07:48,760 --> 01:07:51,320
Speaker 5: find that the show was starting to get popular. We

1321
01:07:51,360 --> 01:07:53,720
Speaker 5: would get a lot of phone calls like way more

1322
01:07:53,800 --> 01:07:57,160
Speaker 5: than any you know, classical music fans aren't known for

1323
01:07:57,360 --> 01:08:07,680
Speaker 5: like bringing up the phone lines and make them a blush.

1324
01:08:08,480 --> 01:08:10,880
Speaker 5: So we so we were like the people were in

1325
01:08:11,000 --> 01:08:13,880
Speaker 5: the station were always like mind blown by the amount

1326
01:08:13,920 --> 01:08:17,479
Speaker 5: of calls we were getting. We had competition. There was

1327
01:08:17,600 --> 01:08:20,680
Speaker 5: like two or three other college radio rap shows at

1328
01:08:20,720 --> 01:08:22,919
Speaker 5: the time, so that was who we saw as our competition.

1329
01:08:23,720 --> 01:08:27,519
Speaker 5: Now around this time, I should also mention that I

1330
01:08:27,720 --> 01:08:31,400
Speaker 5: also had a desire to be a rapper and heavily

1331
01:08:31,520 --> 01:08:36,320
Speaker 5: influenced by the Beastie Boys. Of course, a friend of

1332
01:08:36,360 --> 01:08:40,360
Speaker 5: mine from Philly and I started a white rap group

1333
01:08:40,439 --> 01:08:45,400
Speaker 5: called b MOC and we were, yeah, we were you know,

1334
01:08:46,040 --> 01:08:47,560
Speaker 5: we didn't know what the hell we were doing, but

1335
01:08:48,200 --> 01:08:52,479
Speaker 5: we basically somewhere along the line, another friend of ours

1336
01:08:52,520 --> 01:08:56,000
Speaker 5: who I think Amir you know Will Be of DJ

1337
01:08:56,200 --> 01:09:00,840
Speaker 5: of the Goats, who's one of my childhood lifetime friends. Yes,

1338
01:09:00,960 --> 01:09:04,880
Speaker 5: Will Braveman. Yes, I was going to n YU at

1339
01:09:04,920 --> 01:09:08,559
Speaker 5: the time, and we were all in college in different colleges,

1340
01:09:09,560 --> 01:09:13,200
Speaker 5: and Will met a young man by the name of

1341
01:09:13,280 --> 01:09:18,920
Speaker 5: Brett Ratner, and Brett Ratner I wish I never heard

1342
01:09:18,920 --> 01:09:22,200
Speaker 5: of him, but anyway, so what happened was whoever that is. Yes,

1343
01:09:22,280 --> 01:09:24,680
Speaker 5: so Brett Ratner, who now you know everyone knows as

1344
01:09:24,760 --> 01:09:28,080
Speaker 5: a Hollywood guy, me two guy and all that stuff.

1345
01:09:28,880 --> 01:09:33,240
Speaker 5: But anyway, he had learned about our existence, heard one

1346
01:09:33,240 --> 01:09:36,840
Speaker 5: of our demos, was interested in us. So while the sort,

1347
01:09:36,920 --> 01:09:39,960
Speaker 5: while the street beat on w h RB was starting

1348
01:09:40,000 --> 01:09:42,840
Speaker 5: to take off, I was also trying to be a rapper.

1349
01:09:42,920 --> 01:09:45,559
Speaker 5: So I was trying to write rhymes. I was trying

1350
01:09:45,600 --> 01:09:48,599
Speaker 5: to get beats. I was trying to make music.

1351
01:09:49,640 --> 01:09:51,160
Speaker 3: How how were your grades?

1352
01:09:52,960 --> 01:09:55,400
Speaker 5: Well, you know, as the story goes on, as we

1353
01:09:55,479 --> 01:09:58,280
Speaker 5: get deeper into it, you know, like we got through it.

1354
01:09:58,439 --> 01:10:00,880
Speaker 5: But I majored in the Source basically, you know, that

1355
01:10:01,080 --> 01:10:02,920
Speaker 5: was like what I when I was at Harvard. I

1356
01:10:03,040 --> 01:10:06,160
Speaker 5: majored in the Source, no doubt about it. I did.

1357
01:10:06,320 --> 01:10:08,880
Speaker 5: I did get good enough grades to get through. But

1358
01:10:09,000 --> 01:10:11,080
Speaker 5: I wasn't like the top student or anything because I

1359
01:10:11,240 --> 01:10:13,800
Speaker 5: just we were just so focused on the magazine. But

1360
01:10:13,960 --> 01:10:16,280
Speaker 5: that was a little bit later. But so leading up

1361
01:10:16,280 --> 01:10:21,400
Speaker 5: to You're forgiving, thank you, thank you so so leading

1362
01:10:21,479 --> 01:10:23,920
Speaker 5: up to that though, like so I was in This

1363
01:10:24,080 --> 01:10:26,000
Speaker 5: is related to your questions how did the Source start?

1364
01:10:26,080 --> 01:10:28,120
Speaker 5: So basically I was living in New York City in

1365
01:10:28,160 --> 01:10:31,240
Speaker 5: the summer of nineteen eighty eight, I was working for

1366
01:10:31,439 --> 01:10:35,000
Speaker 5: Ted Demi and Fab five Freddy at Yo MTV raps

1367
01:10:35,560 --> 01:10:38,600
Speaker 5: because I wanted again, I wanted to I was so

1368
01:10:39,439 --> 01:10:41,280
Speaker 5: I was just trying to get into the industry no

1369
01:10:41,400 --> 01:10:44,280
Speaker 5: matter what, you know. So I had arranged for a

1370
01:10:44,400 --> 01:10:48,000
Speaker 5: summer internship to work for you OMTV raps. I'm also

1371
01:10:48,080 --> 01:10:49,840
Speaker 5: pursuing my rap career at the same time.

1372
01:10:50,640 --> 01:10:51,519
Speaker 3: How did you get in there?

1373
01:10:51,640 --> 01:10:53,880
Speaker 4: Like like they like white kid walks through the door,

1374
01:10:53,920 --> 01:10:56,479
Speaker 4: They're like, yes youo MTV raps. Like does that that

1375
01:10:56,560 --> 01:10:58,880
Speaker 4: seems like a disconnected It was just like or did

1376
01:10:58,920 --> 01:11:01,479
Speaker 4: it work? I think if any that was or maybe

1377
01:11:01,520 --> 01:11:01,920
Speaker 4: that was the thing.

1378
01:11:01,960 --> 01:11:02,600
Speaker 3: I mean, I don't know, I just.

1379
01:11:04,240 --> 01:11:09,120
Speaker 5: Yo, yeah, I mean you know, look, let's there was

1380
01:11:09,200 --> 01:11:11,760
Speaker 5: always the uniqueness of being white, and sometimes I worked

1381
01:11:11,760 --> 01:11:14,400
Speaker 5: in my advantage being easy to you know, the only

1382
01:11:14,640 --> 01:11:20,400
Speaker 5: white guy in the room. Sometimes Yeah, but that's that

1383
01:11:20,720 --> 01:11:24,080
Speaker 5: was Yeah. In this case, I honestly don't remember. I

1384
01:11:24,120 --> 01:11:26,320
Speaker 5: think I just wrote a lot of like mail, like

1385
01:11:26,400 --> 01:11:29,320
Speaker 5: you know, pre email. I wrote letters to people and

1386
01:11:29,400 --> 01:11:31,320
Speaker 5: I was like, you know, I want to come into

1387
01:11:31,320 --> 01:11:32,920
Speaker 5: New York, d DA da DA, And they're like, Okay,

1388
01:11:33,120 --> 01:11:35,960
Speaker 5: you come work here. I didn't last long there actually

1389
01:11:36,160 --> 01:11:39,679
Speaker 5: because they they didn't treat me well. They they didn't

1390
01:11:39,720 --> 01:11:44,320
Speaker 5: respect my my knowledge of music. They didn't understand, they

1391
01:11:44,360 --> 01:11:47,080
Speaker 5: didn't know they they treated me as you as low

1392
01:11:47,160 --> 01:11:50,080
Speaker 5: as you can get. They they famously they were so

1393
01:11:50,240 --> 01:11:53,080
Speaker 5: sick of me spotting my opinions about rap because I

1394
01:11:53,160 --> 01:11:56,040
Speaker 5: knew more than them. I really did, not not FAB five.

1395
01:11:56,200 --> 01:11:59,599
Speaker 5: But the other guys are working there, they didn't know shit, okay,

1396
01:11:59,640 --> 01:12:01,800
Speaker 5: and I walked in and I knew way more about

1397
01:12:01,880 --> 01:12:03,320
Speaker 5: music than they did. I knew it. I mean I

1398
01:12:03,520 --> 01:12:05,840
Speaker 5: recognized it right away, but they didn't want to hear it.

1399
01:12:06,360 --> 01:12:08,679
Speaker 5: So they basically opened a door. It was like something

1400
01:12:08,720 --> 01:12:10,840
Speaker 5: out of a movie. You open a door and there's

1401
01:12:10,920 --> 01:12:14,479
Speaker 5: a tape. There's a room with like the entire history

1402
01:12:14,520 --> 01:12:16,560
Speaker 5: of you MTV raps to that point, like all the

1403
01:12:16,680 --> 01:12:19,479
Speaker 5: raw footage is sitting on the floor. They say, hey,

1404
01:12:19,520 --> 01:12:21,800
Speaker 5: we got a job for you. Go into that room

1405
01:12:21,960 --> 01:12:24,760
Speaker 5: and watch every single tape and wipe down what's on it.

1406
01:12:25,720 --> 01:12:27,280
Speaker 5: So they shoved me in a closet.

1407
01:12:27,640 --> 01:12:28,520
Speaker 3: What a punishment.

1408
01:12:29,240 --> 01:12:32,639
Speaker 5: Yeah, with hundreds of tapes of the very earliest year

1409
01:12:32,760 --> 01:12:37,200
Speaker 5: of your MTV raps, and uh, I hated it. I

1410
01:12:37,280 --> 01:12:38,120
Speaker 5: also remember, just.

1411
01:12:38,240 --> 01:12:39,920
Speaker 3: Just as I'm in heaven, I'm sorry.

1412
01:12:39,920 --> 01:12:42,040
Speaker 5: I know, I know it sounds it sounds. It sounds

1413
01:12:42,080 --> 01:12:43,439
Speaker 5: like it's not that bad, but I mean, you know,

1414
01:12:43,479 --> 01:12:45,000
Speaker 5: I wanted to be where the action was, you know.

1415
01:12:46,160 --> 01:12:49,000
Speaker 3: Having the peel potatoes in the cartoon, like yes.

1416
01:12:50,439 --> 01:12:55,040
Speaker 5: Potatoes, like an endless job that never with no sunlight,

1417
01:12:55,160 --> 01:12:57,080
Speaker 5: you know, just like in the room. So I also

1418
01:12:57,160 --> 01:12:59,360
Speaker 5: remember I was in the room the day of that

1419
01:13:00,240 --> 01:13:03,840
Speaker 5: the Manifest video from Gang Stars showed up words I

1420
01:13:04,000 --> 01:13:06,360
Speaker 5: Manifest and if you remember that, I think that was

1421
01:13:06,400 --> 01:13:09,559
Speaker 5: their first video. I believe that was Gangstar's first music video.

1422
01:13:10,080 --> 01:13:11,920
Speaker 5: I loved the song. I already knew it because I

1423
01:13:12,240 --> 01:13:16,760
Speaker 5: loved everything on Wild Pitch. And I walk in and like,

1424
01:13:16,960 --> 01:13:19,559
Speaker 5: so if they pop it in and fab five Freddy's

1425
01:13:19,600 --> 01:13:22,439
Speaker 5: in the room, Ted Demi rest in Peace, who was

1426
01:13:22,479 --> 01:13:26,439
Speaker 5: the executive producer of you know OMTV raps, And they

1427
01:13:26,560 --> 01:13:29,200
Speaker 5: play it and I'm like popping my head, going crazy,

1428
01:13:29,280 --> 01:13:31,920
Speaker 5: and I think it was almost like a It was

1429
01:13:31,960 --> 01:13:33,960
Speaker 5: almost like just because I liked it so much, they

1430
01:13:34,000 --> 01:13:36,040
Speaker 5: wanted to not like it, I swear, And so they

1431
01:13:36,160 --> 01:13:38,840
Speaker 5: go and they're like they're like yeah, yeah, I don't

1432
01:13:38,840 --> 01:13:41,479
Speaker 5: really like it. That guy's voice, it's just weird. They're like,

1433
01:13:41,520 --> 01:13:43,519
Speaker 5: I don't even get it, Like why is he dressed

1434
01:13:43,560 --> 01:13:45,960
Speaker 5: like Malcolm X? And I don't even get it, you

1435
01:13:46,000 --> 01:13:47,640
Speaker 5: know if you remember you had like the Malcolm X

1436
01:13:47,720 --> 01:13:48,200
Speaker 5: glasses on?

1437
01:13:48,360 --> 01:13:49,479
Speaker 3: Yeah, remember yeah?

1438
01:13:49,600 --> 01:13:52,360
Speaker 5: Yeah? And so they rejected it. They rejected the video.

1439
01:13:53,360 --> 01:13:57,000
Speaker 5: They ended up playing it way later, like six months later.

1440
01:13:58,200 --> 01:14:00,680
Speaker 5: But at any rate, after all that, I kind of

1441
01:14:00,840 --> 01:14:03,320
Speaker 5: like got turned off and I ended up quitting that job.

1442
01:14:04,200 --> 01:14:07,439
Speaker 5: But in the meantime, I was still getting records and

1443
01:14:07,600 --> 01:14:11,400
Speaker 5: was super super immersed in the music and also making

1444
01:14:11,479 --> 01:14:15,840
Speaker 5: music for whatever it's worth. And then Dave meanwhile, and

1445
01:14:16,000 --> 01:14:17,800
Speaker 5: at this point now we're getting up to the summer

1446
01:14:17,840 --> 01:14:20,519
Speaker 5: of eighty eight, so we had about one year of

1447
01:14:21,720 --> 01:14:25,160
Speaker 5: our rap show under our belt. And Dave stayed in

1448
01:14:25,240 --> 01:14:27,720
Speaker 5: Boston that summer while I was in New York. And

1449
01:14:27,920 --> 01:14:31,479
Speaker 5: Dave had an idea. He was like, hey, man, let's

1450
01:14:31,520 --> 01:14:33,640
Speaker 5: do something to promote the radio show. You know, like,

1451
01:14:33,720 --> 01:14:36,080
Speaker 5: I got this idea, tell me what you think. And

1452
01:14:36,280 --> 01:14:41,040
Speaker 5: he made a one page newsletter called The Source, and

1453
01:14:41,320 --> 01:14:44,280
Speaker 5: it was a yellow sheet front and back, and I

1454
01:14:44,400 --> 01:14:47,880
Speaker 5: received it in the mail and I was impressed. I

1455
01:14:47,960 --> 01:14:50,439
Speaker 5: mean it was very you know, it was very simple.

1456
01:14:50,600 --> 01:14:53,639
Speaker 5: You know, it was just literally like one piece of paper.

1457
01:14:54,520 --> 01:14:58,240
Speaker 5: But I got it right away. It should be noted

1458
01:14:58,320 --> 01:15:01,840
Speaker 5: also that the first rat magazine I ever saw was

1459
01:15:01,920 --> 01:15:05,000
Speaker 5: actually from Philly. It was Mike. When I say rat magazine,

1460
01:15:05,000 --> 01:15:08,599
Speaker 5: I mean you mentioned the Black Gully, but Mike Elliott,

1461
01:15:08,640 --> 01:15:11,879
Speaker 5: do you remember the name of that magazine, Crush magazine.

1462
01:15:12,040 --> 01:15:12,920
Speaker 5: It was called Crush.

1463
01:15:13,479 --> 01:15:15,439
Speaker 2: He had a not a pay per view show, a

1464
01:15:15,680 --> 01:15:19,519
Speaker 2: public access show, right, yes, yes, yes, I remember him

1465
01:15:19,600 --> 01:15:24,240
Speaker 2: always advertising Crush magazine, but I never got it.

1466
01:15:24,600 --> 01:15:25,839
Speaker 3: So you got this newsletter.

1467
01:15:26,160 --> 01:15:28,519
Speaker 5: I had seen one other rat magazine that wasn't word

1468
01:15:28,640 --> 01:15:31,280
Speaker 5: up and write on, which were obviously teeny bopper, and

1469
01:15:31,360 --> 01:15:33,960
Speaker 5: no one respected those. We all knew that Crush was.

1470
01:15:35,160 --> 01:15:37,400
Speaker 5: I mean, maybe they served a purpose. I'm not trying,

1471
01:15:37,439 --> 01:15:40,439
Speaker 5: as you know, they definitely came before me, but you know,

1472
01:15:40,520 --> 01:15:43,160
Speaker 5: they weren't treating the music, you know, in a serious way.

1473
01:15:43,320 --> 01:15:46,120
Speaker 5: Crush was the first publication I saw that was talking

1474
01:15:46,160 --> 01:15:51,519
Speaker 5: about real records. And but again it was very it

1475
01:15:51,640 --> 01:15:53,680
Speaker 5: wasn't well put together. It was it was it was,

1476
01:15:54,000 --> 01:15:56,160
Speaker 5: and it wasn't. It only came out a few issues.

1477
01:15:56,160 --> 01:15:58,880
Speaker 5: I don't think it even really lasted that long. So

1478
01:15:59,000 --> 01:16:01,760
Speaker 5: I had some French point as to what it could be.

1479
01:16:02,040 --> 01:16:04,160
Speaker 5: But that Crush at that time was like I'm the best,

1480
01:16:04,479 --> 01:16:07,880
Speaker 5: the only one. I remember. I had the editor of Crush,

1481
01:16:07,880 --> 01:16:11,080
Speaker 5: who actually came in New York at that time to visit.

1482
01:16:11,560 --> 01:16:14,800
Speaker 5: I met with her. She came to my home at

1483
01:16:14,840 --> 01:16:16,479
Speaker 5: that time because I guess I wanted to write for her,

1484
01:16:16,600 --> 01:16:20,800
Speaker 5: maybe at any rate. So I did receive that one issue,

1485
01:16:22,160 --> 01:16:26,400
Speaker 5: and I thought it had potential. I went back to

1486
01:16:27,000 --> 01:16:32,320
Speaker 5: college in the fall of eighty eight and Dave and

1487
01:16:32,360 --> 01:16:35,720
Speaker 5: I connected and right away we became business partners. And

1488
01:16:36,520 --> 01:16:38,439
Speaker 5: you know, this is the truth. And anyone you know

1489
01:16:38,479 --> 01:16:40,519
Speaker 5: all the rumors about how the Source started and this

1490
01:16:40,640 --> 01:16:43,360
Speaker 5: and that. Dave and I took one hundred dollars each

1491
01:16:43,960 --> 01:16:46,439
Speaker 5: and put two hundred dollars into a bank account, and

1492
01:16:46,560 --> 01:16:48,320
Speaker 5: that was the beginning of the Source. It was Dave

1493
01:16:48,360 --> 01:16:51,479
Speaker 5: and I put in one hundred dollars each, and I

1494
01:16:51,640 --> 01:16:55,000
Speaker 5: became the editor in chief, in charge of all the content,

1495
01:16:55,120 --> 01:16:57,960
Speaker 5: and Dave became the publisher in charge of all the

1496
01:16:58,240 --> 01:17:02,160
Speaker 5: BIS magazine, which includes selling ads, which as I mentioned,

1497
01:17:02,160 --> 01:17:05,519
Speaker 5: he had a particular skill at. And he turned out

1498
01:17:05,520 --> 01:17:08,920
Speaker 5: to be really really good at that. So that was

1499
01:17:09,000 --> 01:17:11,080
Speaker 5: the beginning of the Source. Now, the Source was initially

1500
01:17:11,200 --> 01:17:16,040
Speaker 5: designed to promote our college rap radio show. Uh so

1501
01:17:16,240 --> 01:17:21,280
Speaker 5: we it was all about it was charts, some news,

1502
01:17:21,880 --> 01:17:25,679
Speaker 5: and it was very focused on Boston radio, which Boston

1503
01:17:25,800 --> 01:17:29,519
Speaker 5: community and the hip hop the fledging, very small hip

1504
01:17:29,560 --> 01:17:33,519
Speaker 5: hop community there. The first few issues were kind of

1505
01:17:33,560 --> 01:17:37,000
Speaker 5: along those lines, and then we started distributing them in

1506
01:17:37,280 --> 01:17:41,160
Speaker 5: local Boston rap record stores like Skippy Whites is the

1507
01:17:41,200 --> 01:17:45,519
Speaker 5: most famous one. And that was the very beginning. And

1508
01:17:45,680 --> 01:17:50,280
Speaker 5: then you know, pretty quickly as we started publishing, we

1509
01:17:50,360 --> 01:17:54,000
Speaker 5: published our second issue, which had I think six pages.

1510
01:17:55,240 --> 01:17:57,599
Speaker 5: It was like a four It was like four pages

1511
01:17:57,680 --> 01:17:59,680
Speaker 5: with like one sheet in the middle, so it was

1512
01:17:59,720 --> 01:18:02,200
Speaker 5: like total of six pages. That one had a picture

1513
01:18:02,240 --> 01:18:04,360
Speaker 5: of kras The in the corner.

1514
01:18:04,840 --> 01:18:07,840
Speaker 2: At the time when you're forming this, was there a

1515
01:18:07,960 --> 01:18:11,280
Speaker 2: mission statement or a mantra like were you guys like

1516
01:18:11,439 --> 01:18:19,519
Speaker 2: what was your besides just promoting the radio station. Was

1517
01:18:19,600 --> 01:18:24,400
Speaker 2: there a desire to see like critical think pieces written or.

1518
01:18:25,760 --> 01:18:28,760
Speaker 5: So in good question? So in the beginning, I think

1519
01:18:28,840 --> 01:18:31,439
Speaker 5: we saw ourselves as more of a trade magazine, like

1520
01:18:31,600 --> 01:18:36,280
Speaker 5: that was the show. Yeah, Like the initial incarnation of

1521
01:18:36,400 --> 01:18:40,000
Speaker 5: the source. The first tagline was the voice of the

1522
01:18:40,120 --> 01:18:43,320
Speaker 5: rap music industry. That was how that's how we first

1523
01:18:43,479 --> 01:18:47,439
Speaker 5: framed it. So for the first year or two, I

1524
01:18:47,520 --> 01:18:49,760
Speaker 5: mean maybe year and a half, the first like even

1525
01:18:49,880 --> 01:18:53,400
Speaker 5: ten issues or so or eight issues there was and

1526
01:18:53,479 --> 01:18:55,880
Speaker 5: we weren't every month, and we were doing it. We

1527
01:18:55,920 --> 01:18:57,960
Speaker 5: were totally just running it on our own. We had

1528
01:18:58,040 --> 01:19:02,480
Speaker 5: no education in this. We never took a class on journalism,

1529
01:19:02,560 --> 01:19:04,000
Speaker 5: We never took a class on how to run a

1530
01:19:04,040 --> 01:19:06,680
Speaker 5: business any of that stuff. We just felt it out

1531
01:19:06,720 --> 01:19:09,759
Speaker 5: and did it all, you know, trial and error basically.

1532
01:19:11,439 --> 01:19:15,639
Speaker 5: But pretty soon, you know, initially we were positioning ourselves

1533
01:19:15,720 --> 01:19:18,120
Speaker 5: as the voice of the rap music industry. Now I

1534
01:19:18,240 --> 01:19:21,479
Speaker 5: remember now a year later, the summer of eighty nine,

1535
01:19:21,600 --> 01:19:23,400
Speaker 5: I was back in New York City in the same

1536
01:19:23,560 --> 01:19:26,680
Speaker 5: apartment which is with will with will Be, and it

1537
01:19:26,800 --> 01:19:29,760
Speaker 5: was right by NYU and I got a call and

1538
01:19:30,080 --> 01:19:33,479
Speaker 5: it was now, now it's eighty nine, so everyone knows

1539
01:19:33,520 --> 01:19:35,960
Speaker 5: who Harry Allen is because I'm going to my media

1540
01:19:36,000 --> 01:19:39,519
Speaker 5: assassin that voice. Don't believe the hype, you know that.

1541
01:19:39,800 --> 01:19:42,680
Speaker 5: And so I picked up my phone and there's a

1542
01:19:42,760 --> 01:19:46,000
Speaker 5: message from a voicemail from Harry Allen and he was

1543
01:19:46,080 --> 01:19:50,960
Speaker 5: like calling for Jonathan Scheckter. He's like, I see you

1544
01:19:51,120 --> 01:19:55,280
Speaker 5: calling yourself the voice of the rap music industry. He's like,

1545
01:19:55,400 --> 01:19:58,040
Speaker 5: don't you know there are many voices of the rap

1546
01:19:58,160 --> 01:20:01,439
Speaker 5: music industry. I'm a foioice of the rap music industry.

1547
01:20:01,720 --> 01:20:04,200
Speaker 5: Chuck Dee is a voice of the rap music industry.

1548
01:20:04,600 --> 01:20:08,560
Speaker 5: And I was It wasn't necessarily a bad call, but

1549
01:20:08,720 --> 01:20:10,000
Speaker 5: it was kind of a challenging.

1550
01:20:10,439 --> 01:20:12,559
Speaker 3: It was a very Harry Allen phone call.

1551
01:20:12,760 --> 01:20:15,920
Speaker 5: A heavy Harry Allen type phone call, but he was calling,

1552
01:20:16,520 --> 01:20:19,720
Speaker 5: so it wasn't like necessarily bad. So I called him

1553
01:20:19,720 --> 01:20:23,200
Speaker 5: back and I engaged him in conversation and we made

1554
01:20:23,240 --> 01:20:30,280
Speaker 5: plans for him to write something pretty early on. But yeah,

1555
01:20:30,479 --> 01:20:33,400
Speaker 5: that got me thinking a little bit about who we

1556
01:20:33,479 --> 01:20:36,800
Speaker 5: were and what we were doing. And then following that,

1557
01:20:36,960 --> 01:20:38,679
Speaker 5: I'm kind of compressing a lot of you know, there's

1558
01:20:38,680 --> 01:20:41,679
Speaker 5: a lot of things in between, but basically, at some point,

1559
01:20:41,840 --> 01:20:46,439
Speaker 5: I think in eighty nine, we changed our tag to

1560
01:20:47,160 --> 01:20:50,680
Speaker 5: the Magazine of Hip Hop Music, Culture and Politics, and

1561
01:20:50,800 --> 01:20:53,280
Speaker 5: that was when we made the decision to be a

1562
01:20:53,439 --> 01:20:57,880
Speaker 5: consumer facing magazine and not an industry facing magazine. Now, granted,

1563
01:20:57,920 --> 01:21:01,640
Speaker 5: we were still very small and were doing it all ourselves.

1564
01:21:01,760 --> 01:21:04,880
Speaker 5: I mean when I say ourselves, I mean literally Dave

1565
01:21:04,960 --> 01:21:08,360
Speaker 5: and I were like all hours of the night, you know,

1566
01:21:08,960 --> 01:21:12,080
Speaker 5: doing every single thing that you see in the magazine.

1567
01:21:12,479 --> 01:21:15,720
Speaker 5: I mean we were laying out the magazine on the

1568
01:21:16,000 --> 01:21:19,599
Speaker 5: very first version of of an Apple Macintosh, the very

1569
01:21:19,800 --> 01:21:22,559
Speaker 5: very first you know, well the rectangle you know, take

1570
01:21:24,200 --> 01:21:28,120
Speaker 5: exactly like we were using Quark Express and page Maker,

1571
01:21:28,160 --> 01:21:33,160
Speaker 5: which were the very first desktop publishing software, and like

1572
01:21:33,280 --> 01:21:35,599
Speaker 5: we would it would be like yes, like you would

1573
01:21:35,640 --> 01:21:37,720
Speaker 5: take like, okay, we want to put a picture there.

1574
01:21:38,040 --> 01:21:40,080
Speaker 5: Oh wait, no, move it to the right. So you

1575
01:21:40,200 --> 01:21:42,080
Speaker 5: move it to the right, and then you have to

1576
01:21:42,160 --> 01:21:45,160
Speaker 5: wait for the entire page to rebuild itself. It would

1577
01:21:45,160 --> 01:21:48,559
Speaker 5: take like an hour to do one thing. I mean

1578
01:21:48,640 --> 01:21:51,559
Speaker 5: it was so slow because it was literally and also

1579
01:21:51,680 --> 01:21:54,120
Speaker 5: you had to those it was those hard floppies, so

1580
01:21:54,160 --> 01:21:57,560
Speaker 5: you had to keep like insert disc A, inskirt disc B,

1581
01:21:57,800 --> 01:21:59,320
Speaker 5: insert disc you know what I mean. It was like

1582
01:21:59,479 --> 01:22:03,680
Speaker 5: this incredibly time consuming slow process, but we were doing it.

1583
01:22:04,320 --> 01:22:05,920
Speaker 5: You know, we would get on our hands and knees

1584
01:22:06,040 --> 01:22:10,599
Speaker 5: and sort the magazine. By the time we were mailing out.

1585
01:22:10,680 --> 01:22:12,519
Speaker 5: Now at this point we had a larger mailing list

1586
01:22:13,160 --> 01:22:14,680
Speaker 5: and we would get on our hands and knees and

1587
01:22:14,760 --> 01:22:17,280
Speaker 5: sort the magazine by zip code, put them in a

1588
01:22:17,320 --> 01:22:19,439
Speaker 5: rubber band, and put a sticker with the zip code

1589
01:22:19,479 --> 01:22:22,960
Speaker 5: on that pile of magazines. So it was like literally

1590
01:22:23,080 --> 01:22:25,479
Speaker 5: every little thing that you had to do, we were

1591
01:22:25,520 --> 01:22:26,320
Speaker 5: doing it ourselves.

1592
01:22:26,680 --> 01:22:30,000
Speaker 2: I mean, how were you able to in terms of

1593
01:22:31,360 --> 01:22:35,840
Speaker 2: getting content, Like, did you know all the publicists at

1594
01:22:36,400 --> 01:22:39,519
Speaker 2: def jam or Jive or whoever was hip hop friendly

1595
01:22:39,560 --> 01:22:42,719
Speaker 2: at the time, did you like, how are you able

1596
01:22:42,880 --> 01:22:48,040
Speaker 2: to get FaceTime with them and sort of convince them that,

1597
01:22:49,240 --> 01:22:52,240
Speaker 2: you know, in addition to your black beats and your

1598
01:22:52,880 --> 01:22:57,920
Speaker 2: right ones, that we should also be a priority stop.

1599
01:22:58,840 --> 01:23:01,560
Speaker 5: Early on, I think we were well received by the

1600
01:23:02,000 --> 01:23:05,920
Speaker 5: industry people like publicists and marketing people and stuff like that.

1601
01:23:06,560 --> 01:23:10,320
Speaker 5: I think, you know, there was never any I mean,

1602
01:23:10,360 --> 01:23:11,640
Speaker 5: you know, once in a while we would have to

1603
01:23:11,680 --> 01:23:15,200
Speaker 5: pursue somebody, but for the most part, once we established

1604
01:23:15,200 --> 01:23:18,840
Speaker 5: ourselves with the first maybe five or six issues, like,

1605
01:23:19,080 --> 01:23:21,479
Speaker 5: people wanted to send us records, so we started receiving

1606
01:23:21,520 --> 01:23:24,439
Speaker 5: all the records, all the press kids, and then the

1607
01:23:24,479 --> 01:23:27,240
Speaker 5: harder part was getting you know, interviews, getting the artists

1608
01:23:28,760 --> 01:23:31,720
Speaker 5: and but yeah, that was just basically doing you know,

1609
01:23:32,000 --> 01:23:34,759
Speaker 5: in pre internet days, I was all working the phones,

1610
01:23:35,960 --> 01:23:39,000
Speaker 5: getting people, you know, setting up interviews which are also

1611
01:23:39,160 --> 01:23:44,519
Speaker 5: frequently conducted over the phone, and yeah, and then starting

1612
01:23:44,560 --> 01:23:47,240
Speaker 5: to meet more writers and that kind of thing. And

1613
01:23:47,320 --> 01:23:50,439
Speaker 5: then I should mention, you know, very early on, relatively

1614
01:23:50,479 --> 01:23:54,960
Speaker 5: early on, around eighty nine ninety, we met two other

1615
01:23:55,040 --> 01:23:58,240
Speaker 5: Harvard students. One of them is James Bernard, who was

1616
01:23:58,280 --> 01:24:00,600
Speaker 5: actually a Harvard Law student, and the other one was

1617
01:24:00,800 --> 01:24:03,160
Speaker 5: Ed Young who was an undergraduate but he was a

1618
01:24:03,280 --> 01:24:07,080
Speaker 5: year older than us, and Ed had experience working in

1619
01:24:07,160 --> 01:24:09,760
Speaker 5: the magazine industry. He had taken a year off and

1620
01:24:09,880 --> 01:24:12,680
Speaker 5: worked for The New Republic, which is a like a

1621
01:24:12,840 --> 01:24:19,000
Speaker 5: political sort of magazine. And James was a Harvard law

1622
01:24:19,040 --> 01:24:22,160
Speaker 5: student who was actually in Harvard Law at the same

1623
01:24:22,240 --> 01:24:28,720
Speaker 5: time as Barack Obama. And James was more on the

1624
01:24:28,880 --> 01:24:32,920
Speaker 5: editorial side, so he was, you know, a San Francisco

1625
01:24:33,280 --> 01:24:36,960
Speaker 5: kind of black activist type person who had a lot

1626
01:24:37,000 --> 01:24:40,760
Speaker 5: of political views. He was into the music too, but

1627
01:24:40,920 --> 01:24:43,560
Speaker 5: you know, that was kind of my area of expertise,

1628
01:24:43,640 --> 01:24:47,120
Speaker 5: and James kind of took on the socio political side

1629
01:24:47,120 --> 01:24:50,040
Speaker 5: of the magazine very early, and we kind of like

1630
01:24:50,120 --> 01:24:52,240
Speaker 5: teamed up. So now we got four of US. So

1631
01:24:52,320 --> 01:24:54,000
Speaker 5: now instead of two of us, is four of us

1632
01:24:54,960 --> 01:24:58,519
Speaker 5: and we're still basically doing everything ourselves throughout junior and

1633
01:24:58,600 --> 01:25:00,280
Speaker 5: senior year of college.

1634
01:25:05,400 --> 01:25:09,479
Speaker 2: What was the first glossy non newsletter issue? What was

1635
01:25:09,720 --> 01:25:10,719
Speaker 2: LLL that first issue?

1636
01:25:11,720 --> 01:25:13,519
Speaker 5: I believe there was a picture of LLL with all

1637
01:25:13,560 --> 01:25:16,760
Speaker 5: the girls right surrounded by girls, I believe, so, yeah, yeah,

1638
01:25:16,760 --> 01:25:18,400
Speaker 5: it's like from a video shoot. There's a picture of

1639
01:25:18,680 --> 01:25:21,439
Speaker 5: ll It's kind of a shitty, blurry picture, but yeah, yeah,

1640
01:25:21,560 --> 01:25:24,200
Speaker 5: that was I think our first color cover. I believe

1641
01:25:24,280 --> 01:25:28,360
Speaker 5: that was our first full color, glossy like magazine. Basically, Yeah,

1642
01:25:28,400 --> 01:25:29,280
Speaker 5: I think you're right about that.

1643
01:25:29,640 --> 01:25:31,720
Speaker 3: At what point did you realize this was lightning in

1644
01:25:31,760 --> 01:25:32,400
Speaker 3: a bottle for you?

1645
01:25:33,520 --> 01:25:37,000
Speaker 5: You know, I think throughout our college, the second two

1646
01:25:37,120 --> 01:25:39,680
Speaker 5: years of college for us, which would have been you know,

1647
01:25:39,760 --> 01:25:43,080
Speaker 5: eighty nine to ninety, was when I began it began

1648
01:25:43,160 --> 01:25:45,760
Speaker 5: to be clear that we were we had something that

1649
01:25:45,960 --> 01:25:49,639
Speaker 5: was legitimately like, you know, a product that people would love.

1650
01:25:49,880 --> 01:25:52,960
Speaker 5: And now I should say, like, you know, for me

1651
01:25:53,280 --> 01:25:57,720
Speaker 5: my influence. There was a two very famous newsstands in

1652
01:25:57,840 --> 01:26:02,040
Speaker 5: Harvard Square, really famous like huge nuda stands. I sold

1653
01:26:02,120 --> 01:26:04,880
Speaker 5: like every magazine from the Whole World, and I would

1654
01:26:04,920 --> 01:26:09,040
Speaker 5: go there every week and I would read New Music Express,

1655
01:26:09,120 --> 01:26:12,880
Speaker 5: an Emmy, Melody Maker, two British magazines. I would look

1656
01:26:12,880 --> 01:26:15,560
Speaker 5: at Spin, I would look at Rolling Stone, and I

1657
01:26:15,600 --> 01:26:17,200
Speaker 5: would look at The Village Voice. So those are like

1658
01:26:17,560 --> 01:26:21,640
Speaker 5: my five anchors, all of them to varying degrees. Not

1659
01:26:21,760 --> 01:26:25,280
Speaker 5: Rolling Stone, but Spin, with John Leland was dabbling in

1660
01:26:25,360 --> 01:26:27,960
Speaker 5: hip hop. The Village Voice was kind of the main

1661
01:26:28,160 --> 01:26:32,240
Speaker 5: voice of hip hop journalism. You had Nelson George who

1662
01:26:32,320 --> 01:26:36,000
Speaker 5: started with Billboard obviously, you had Harry Allen, you had

1663
01:26:37,439 --> 01:26:39,880
Speaker 5: who am I forgetting? There's so many great writers from

1664
01:26:39,920 --> 01:26:44,960
Speaker 5: that era, uh, Greg Tait, Yes, exactly. So those these guys,

1665
01:26:45,240 --> 01:26:47,960
Speaker 5: you know, were my who came before me, you know,

1666
01:26:48,040 --> 01:26:51,679
Speaker 5: they were my inspiration. But really it was Rolling Stone

1667
01:26:51,720 --> 01:26:54,000
Speaker 5: that I was looking at, not because I loved what

1668
01:26:54,080 --> 01:26:56,640
Speaker 5: they were covering, although like I said, I did love

1669
01:26:56,760 --> 01:26:59,479
Speaker 5: rock music too, but it was more so because they

1670
01:26:59,479 --> 01:27:02,720
Speaker 5: were the They were the best put together publication. They

1671
01:27:03,120 --> 01:27:06,679
Speaker 5: everyone loves. Everyone knows who's on the cover of Rolling Stone.

1672
01:27:07,280 --> 01:27:10,080
Speaker 5: So I would study Rolling Stone more so from a

1673
01:27:10,200 --> 01:27:13,200
Speaker 5: structural point of view to try to like pick up

1674
01:27:13,240 --> 01:27:15,599
Speaker 5: whatever ideas I could. I would read the other ones

1675
01:27:15,960 --> 01:27:18,200
Speaker 5: more for a content point of view, to try to

1676
01:27:18,240 --> 01:27:22,360
Speaker 5: get references and records, and Nmy in particular was great

1677
01:27:22,400 --> 01:27:25,160
Speaker 5: because Tim Westwood, who later became a good friend of mine,

1678
01:27:25,439 --> 01:27:27,760
Speaker 5: would have a chart every week that was so far

1679
01:27:27,840 --> 01:27:30,879
Speaker 5: ahead of America it was crazy, Like he would get records,

1680
01:27:31,080 --> 01:27:33,599
Speaker 5: put them on a chart, and he would list ten

1681
01:27:33,680 --> 01:27:36,080
Speaker 5: records that no one in New York or Affiliate or

1682
01:27:36,120 --> 01:27:38,760
Speaker 5: Boston had ever even heard yet. So he was so

1683
01:27:38,880 --> 01:27:41,040
Speaker 5: far ahead of the curve. So that was a great

1684
01:27:41,360 --> 01:27:45,800
Speaker 5: influence on kind of all those things were influences for me.

1685
01:27:46,760 --> 01:27:48,720
Speaker 5: But then once we started, you know, putting some of

1686
01:27:48,760 --> 01:27:51,799
Speaker 5: those things into practice with some of these early issues

1687
01:27:51,800 --> 01:27:54,479
Speaker 5: of The Source, we'd get a little bit better. We'd

1688
01:27:54,479 --> 01:27:57,519
Speaker 5: add more pages, we'd add more color. There was one

1689
01:27:57,680 --> 01:28:00,600
Speaker 5: very important issue where we put we put Malcolm X

1690
01:28:00,680 --> 01:28:03,439
Speaker 5: on the cover right in the midst of you know,

1691
01:28:03,560 --> 01:28:06,320
Speaker 5: when when that when he was like, you know, a

1692
01:28:06,439 --> 01:28:10,719
Speaker 5: major figure in hip hop culture, you know, through Public

1693
01:28:10,880 --> 01:28:14,519
Speaker 5: Enemy and all the other artists talking about him. So

1694
01:28:14,600 --> 01:28:16,680
Speaker 5: we were doing things like that to try to you know,

1695
01:28:16,760 --> 01:28:18,840
Speaker 5: we wanted to get attention, but we also felt that

1696
01:28:19,000 --> 01:28:22,280
Speaker 5: that was reflecting what was happening in the in the culture.

1697
01:28:23,320 --> 01:28:28,000
Speaker 2: So the ice Cube Issue ten, Issue of the Source

1698
01:28:28,560 --> 01:28:32,840
Speaker 2: is where I believe the myth of the Source, the

1699
01:28:32,960 --> 01:28:36,000
Speaker 2: legend of the Source, the idea of the Source, and

1700
01:28:36,120 --> 01:28:40,720
Speaker 2: the Source as we know it, all five of those variations.

1701
01:28:42,640 --> 01:28:45,280
Speaker 3: No, I think that's when it came alive with.

1702
01:28:46,040 --> 01:28:49,639
Speaker 2: So you have to know that at the rate where

1703
01:28:49,680 --> 01:28:54,760
Speaker 2: you're giving the albums ratings, yeah, that that was going

1704
01:28:54,840 --> 01:28:57,160
Speaker 2: to spark something in the industry.

1705
01:28:57,840 --> 01:29:00,280
Speaker 3: How are you guys like for that summer issue? All right?

1706
01:29:00,320 --> 01:29:03,000
Speaker 2: For those who don't know, I think issue ten was

1707
01:29:03,040 --> 01:29:07,040
Speaker 2: ice Cube on the cover. This is like late spring

1708
01:29:07,200 --> 01:29:11,519
Speaker 2: of nineteen ninety and they're pretty much going to review

1709
01:29:12,640 --> 01:29:15,160
Speaker 2: every album that will come out in the summer of

1710
01:29:15,240 --> 01:29:22,639
Speaker 2: nineteen ninety. Yes, and the opinions. Again, before the Source,

1711
01:29:23,320 --> 01:29:25,680
Speaker 2: you just got blurbs and mentioned you really didn't get

1712
01:29:25,760 --> 01:29:30,720
Speaker 2: much on like quality. So it's not like if right

1713
01:29:30,800 --> 01:29:33,960
Speaker 2: On magazine is talking about Michael Jackson's Off the Wall record,

1714
01:29:34,439 --> 01:29:38,519
Speaker 2: they're going to offer anything really critical to how important

1715
01:29:38,520 --> 01:29:40,000
Speaker 2: this is. It'll just be like, hey, as a new

1716
01:29:40,080 --> 01:29:41,960
Speaker 2: or a single, don't stop to you done and rock

1717
01:29:42,040 --> 01:29:42,200
Speaker 2: with you?

1718
01:29:42,439 --> 01:29:42,880
Speaker 3: No, no, no, no no.

1719
01:29:43,000 --> 01:29:45,000
Speaker 2: He's going to on tour with his brothers, Like you

1720
01:29:45,240 --> 01:29:49,880
Speaker 2: just basically got like bullet point facts. You never got opinions,

1721
01:29:50,560 --> 01:29:54,200
Speaker 2: and this is the first time that we're seeing opinions.

1722
01:29:54,920 --> 01:29:57,840
Speaker 2: First of all, we learned what five mics were. And

1723
01:29:57,920 --> 01:30:00,759
Speaker 2: that's the issue where I believe, and I'm going off memory,

1724
01:30:00,800 --> 01:30:03,120
Speaker 2: this is how the devoter I was. I know that

1725
01:30:03,360 --> 01:30:09,240
Speaker 2: Edutainment by BDP got five. I know that America's most

1726
01:30:09,280 --> 01:30:10,720
Speaker 2: wanted ice cube got five.

1727
01:30:12,320 --> 01:30:13,200
Speaker 3: Yes, I know that.

1728
01:30:14,800 --> 01:30:18,280
Speaker 2: Eric being Rockiem's let the Rhythm hit Him got five

1729
01:30:19,479 --> 01:30:25,040
Speaker 2: and Edutate I said, Editainment right, yes, Edutainment Americans. Oh

1730
01:30:25,080 --> 01:30:28,439
Speaker 2: oh people, uh, tribe, people's instinctive travels in the past

1731
01:30:28,479 --> 01:30:31,839
Speaker 2: of rhythm. It's weird enough because even with those four records,

1732
01:30:32,720 --> 01:30:35,360
Speaker 2: I could see rock Kim and BDP like, okay, okay,

1733
01:30:35,400 --> 01:30:36,800
Speaker 2: they've released another classic record.

1734
01:30:36,880 --> 01:30:37,240
Speaker 3: I see.

1735
01:30:37,920 --> 01:30:40,080
Speaker 2: I didn't know much about Tribe, and I was happy

1736
01:30:40,080 --> 01:30:42,799
Speaker 2: because I was like anyone under that day La soul umbrella.

1737
01:30:42,840 --> 01:30:46,599
Speaker 2: I'm happy to see that there's more zaniness coming from

1738
01:30:46,640 --> 01:30:50,200
Speaker 2: that corner of the world. And of course I instantly

1739
01:30:50,280 --> 01:30:52,519
Speaker 2: knew that the cute thing was classic, because you know

1740
01:30:52,640 --> 01:30:56,160
Speaker 2: that's that was like I had it. However, the most

1741
01:30:56,240 --> 01:31:00,439
Speaker 2: shocking review of that whole issue where you guys, I

1742
01:31:00,479 --> 01:31:02,120
Speaker 2: think went through maybe twenty records.

1743
01:31:02,160 --> 01:31:02,600
Speaker 3: I don't know.

1744
01:31:04,320 --> 01:31:09,400
Speaker 2: You guys gave Fear of a Black Planet a very

1745
01:31:09,600 --> 01:31:13,320
Speaker 2: simple three and a half stars, which by that point

1746
01:31:14,080 --> 01:31:18,960
Speaker 2: every critic was just go goa over anything public of

1747
01:31:19,080 --> 01:31:23,479
Speaker 2: me did. And I never thought I see the day

1748
01:31:23,520 --> 01:31:27,520
Speaker 2: where someone would offer, well, wait a minute, let's reconsider

1749
01:31:27,600 --> 01:31:33,439
Speaker 2: that and gave like actual You know, I'm very much

1750
01:31:33,560 --> 01:31:39,080
Speaker 2: influenced until maybe last ten years. I was very much

1751
01:31:39,160 --> 01:31:44,040
Speaker 2: influenced by what a reputable critic would say about an album.

1752
01:31:44,760 --> 01:31:48,559
Speaker 2: When I saw that, I was like, yo're they're trying

1753
01:31:48,560 --> 01:31:52,040
Speaker 2: to make a statement here, like it's not burning a bridge,

1754
01:31:52,120 --> 01:31:54,920
Speaker 2: Like three and a half is not bad, but it wasn't.

1755
01:31:55,520 --> 01:31:58,280
Speaker 2: It wasn't the high praise that America's most warned got

1756
01:31:58,400 --> 01:32:00,840
Speaker 2: or that sort of thing, and like, but you guys

1757
01:32:00,960 --> 01:32:02,919
Speaker 2: were just fearless.

1758
01:32:03,880 --> 01:32:05,320
Speaker 5: Do you think which do you think was a better

1759
01:32:05,360 --> 01:32:08,800
Speaker 5: album in retrospect nation, I mean, Fear of a Black

1760
01:32:08,840 --> 01:32:10,360
Speaker 5: Planet or America's Most Wanted?

1761
01:32:10,680 --> 01:32:13,200
Speaker 2: Oh come on, stop playing the first three songs on

1762
01:32:13,280 --> 01:32:15,960
Speaker 2: a mirror. Here's the funny thing. Here's the funny thing.

1763
01:32:16,120 --> 01:32:18,680
Speaker 2: So now now that I know, soup the nuts on

1764
01:32:18,880 --> 01:32:22,240
Speaker 2: how that album got made. Yes, I do know that

1765
01:32:22,600 --> 01:32:26,200
Speaker 2: the true all star lineup of the Bond Squad, meaning

1766
01:32:27,280 --> 01:32:30,840
Speaker 2: both both Sockles, Sadler and.

1767
01:32:32,800 --> 01:32:33,840
Speaker 3: Chuck. Yeah.

1768
01:32:34,520 --> 01:32:37,479
Speaker 2: So it's almost like I really considered America's most wanted

1769
01:32:37,920 --> 01:32:41,840
Speaker 2: the first three songs, even though that entire album is

1770
01:32:41,960 --> 01:32:46,679
Speaker 2: mind blowing for me. It's almost like it's I consider

1771
01:32:46,760 --> 01:32:49,760
Speaker 2: the first three songs almost its own world, and then

1772
01:32:49,800 --> 01:32:51,600
Speaker 2: when you get to once Upon in the projects to

1773
01:32:51,640 --> 01:32:53,880
Speaker 2: the rest, I considered that like another album.

1774
01:32:54,040 --> 01:32:56,880
Speaker 5: But I could see that, I could see that.

1775
01:32:57,280 --> 01:32:59,880
Speaker 3: You're absolutely I mean, you're you're right.

1776
01:33:00,360 --> 01:33:03,680
Speaker 2: I think had we not receive Terror Dome and Fight

1777
01:33:03,800 --> 01:33:08,559
Speaker 2: the Power previously, then we could see it as, yes, just.

1778
01:33:08,600 --> 01:33:11,280
Speaker 3: As equal to nation and millionaires.

1779
01:33:11,280 --> 01:33:14,040
Speaker 2: But you guys kind of taught me that, like retrospect

1780
01:33:14,160 --> 01:33:19,960
Speaker 2: soundtrack songs making appearances on an album long after the fact,

1781
01:33:20,000 --> 01:33:23,120
Speaker 2: that it doesn't count. But I mean it, It wasn't

1782
01:33:23,200 --> 01:33:27,799
Speaker 2: snark whatsoever, but that rating let me know how serious

1783
01:33:27,960 --> 01:33:34,040
Speaker 2: you guys were about music journalism. Did you guys realize

1784
01:33:34,120 --> 01:33:39,280
Speaker 2: at that point that you are about to enter a

1785
01:33:39,680 --> 01:33:42,600
Speaker 2: very very slow game of chicken with the industry in

1786
01:33:42,720 --> 01:33:46,519
Speaker 2: terms of, like, now there's expectations of what my mic

1787
01:33:46,560 --> 01:33:47,559
Speaker 2: should be there' should be.

1788
01:33:48,920 --> 01:33:52,839
Speaker 3: You know, like set a standard, yes, set a standard

1789
01:33:52,880 --> 01:33:53,920
Speaker 3: that we never had before.

1790
01:33:54,320 --> 01:33:57,080
Speaker 5: Right, Okay, So I I first of all, thanks for

1791
01:33:57,120 --> 01:34:00,559
Speaker 5: your compliments. I understand and agree with what you're saying

1792
01:34:00,640 --> 01:34:05,040
Speaker 5: in that we were the first publication really to be

1793
01:34:05,280 --> 01:34:07,320
Speaker 5: critical of rap, but not in a but in a

1794
01:34:07,520 --> 01:34:10,479
Speaker 5: meaningful way and coming from a place where we we

1795
01:34:10,640 --> 01:34:14,040
Speaker 5: loved wrap, you know, we wanted to it was really

1796
01:34:14,160 --> 01:34:15,520
Speaker 5: it wasn't really that complicated.

1797
01:34:15,640 --> 01:34:15,880
Speaker 3: It was.

1798
01:34:16,080 --> 01:34:18,080
Speaker 5: It was once we came up with the idea for

1799
01:34:18,160 --> 01:34:21,040
Speaker 5: the ratings. And I don't remember exactly what issue that was.

1800
01:34:21,120 --> 01:34:22,639
Speaker 5: It could have that could have been the first issue

1801
01:34:22,640 --> 01:34:23,880
Speaker 5: where that happened. I don't recall.

1802
01:34:24,080 --> 01:34:26,519
Speaker 2: I think the l issue was the first issue with

1803
01:34:27,520 --> 01:34:29,880
Speaker 2: before mis it was like records or broken it.

1804
01:34:30,240 --> 01:34:32,040
Speaker 5: It was like an exploding record. Yeah. And then it

1805
01:34:32,120 --> 01:34:35,439
Speaker 5: became Mikes. Yeah. And around that time I also met

1806
01:34:35,680 --> 01:34:40,400
Speaker 5: another early Source staffer named Reginald C. Dennis. He was

1807
01:34:40,439 --> 01:34:44,200
Speaker 5: a Harlem based hip hop head who showed up in

1808
01:34:44,280 --> 01:34:47,799
Speaker 5: a three piece suit when he came for his first interview.

1809
01:34:48,760 --> 01:34:50,600
Speaker 5: I was wearing like a like a T shirt and

1810
01:34:50,720 --> 01:34:52,880
Speaker 5: jeans and a baseball hat and like you know, in

1811
01:34:53,040 --> 01:34:56,080
Speaker 5: walks like this, guy were in a suit, and uh,

1812
01:34:56,400 --> 01:34:58,960
Speaker 5: we hit it off, and because you know, we we

1813
01:34:59,120 --> 01:35:03,360
Speaker 5: bonded over rap music and we hit it off, and

1814
01:35:03,520 --> 01:35:07,880
Speaker 5: Reggie became kind of our first music editor, and that

1815
01:35:08,360 --> 01:35:13,400
Speaker 5: most of the ratings happened under his tenure. I mean,

1816
01:35:13,439 --> 01:35:16,479
Speaker 5: I was the editor in chief and James Bernard was

1817
01:35:16,600 --> 01:35:20,639
Speaker 5: like an important managing editor. Also, I should mention Chris Wilder,

1818
01:35:20,800 --> 01:35:24,880
Speaker 5: my lifelong friend, another Philadelphia guy. He's the guy that

1819
01:35:25,000 --> 01:35:26,639
Speaker 5: kind of really brought me. He's the guy that brought

1820
01:35:26,680 --> 01:35:29,000
Speaker 5: me to Rubber Park. He was the guy that introduced

1821
01:35:29,040 --> 01:35:33,160
Speaker 5: me to hip hop culture in a real way. He

1822
01:35:33,360 --> 01:35:35,760
Speaker 5: was part of our staff as well, another editor there.

1823
01:35:36,920 --> 01:35:39,400
Speaker 5: And during that time, that was when you know, okay,

1824
01:35:39,479 --> 01:35:41,800
Speaker 5: so we moved nineteen ninety It's a great turning point

1825
01:35:41,800 --> 01:35:44,920
Speaker 5: because that was when we basically graduated from college. We

1826
01:35:45,040 --> 01:35:48,080
Speaker 5: moved the business in New York City. I remember literally

1827
01:35:48,200 --> 01:35:50,920
Speaker 5: listening to America's Most Wanted on the drive from Boston

1828
01:35:50,960 --> 01:35:53,439
Speaker 5: to New York, like that was like the newest album

1829
01:35:53,560 --> 01:35:59,040
Speaker 5: at that moment. And we moved into five ninety four Broadway,

1830
01:35:59,200 --> 01:36:02,240
Speaker 5: which was right up Broadway in Houston in New York City.

1831
01:36:02,880 --> 01:36:05,639
Speaker 5: Before I without even realizing, we were in the perfect

1832
01:36:05,800 --> 01:36:09,120
Speaker 5: perfect place for the magazine. I mean, the reason we

1833
01:36:09,240 --> 01:36:13,519
Speaker 5: chose that building was because Bill Stephanie and Hank Shockley

1834
01:36:13,760 --> 01:36:17,280
Speaker 5: were actually friends of ours. I had met Bill Stephanie

1835
01:36:17,320 --> 01:36:20,879
Speaker 5: at some point along the way, and they had Soul Records,

1836
01:36:20,960 --> 01:36:23,680
Speaker 5: which was kind of post public Enemy.

1837
01:36:24,000 --> 01:36:27,519
Speaker 2: Sounds of urban listens, correct, and they were always good

1838
01:36:27,560 --> 01:36:29,400
Speaker 2: for an acronym that's correct.

1839
01:36:29,479 --> 01:36:31,240
Speaker 5: Yes, and they were. And Bill, as you know, it

1840
01:36:31,320 --> 01:36:34,320
Speaker 5: was one of the greatest guys of all time. And

1841
01:36:34,479 --> 01:36:36,800
Speaker 5: so he brought us in and he's like, hey, you know,

1842
01:36:36,920 --> 01:36:40,040
Speaker 5: there's His office was in the same building, so he said, hey,

1843
01:36:40,120 --> 01:36:41,760
Speaker 5: you know, there's room in this building. I know, though,

1844
01:36:41,800 --> 01:36:45,760
Speaker 5: where's the location five ninety four Broadway Broadway in Houston.

1845
01:36:45,680 --> 01:36:49,200
Speaker 3: The same place where October ninety four happened.

1846
01:36:49,600 --> 01:36:54,800
Speaker 5: All of it happened, Yes, for Broadway yep, So basically yes,

1847
01:36:54,880 --> 01:36:57,880
Speaker 5: So that was nineteen ninety so we moved the business there.

1848
01:36:58,120 --> 01:37:02,120
Speaker 5: In the beginning, we had one room and it was

1849
01:37:02,560 --> 01:37:06,640
Speaker 5: about nine ten people, and we had like literal it

1850
01:37:06,720 --> 01:37:08,320
Speaker 5: was like something out of a cartoon. It was like

1851
01:37:08,760 --> 01:37:11,200
Speaker 5: there was like one room with like six phones and

1852
01:37:11,320 --> 01:37:13,920
Speaker 5: nine people and they're like the cords would be crossed

1853
01:37:13,920 --> 01:37:15,800
Speaker 5: in the middle of the room, and there was nowhere

1854
01:37:15,880 --> 01:37:17,560
Speaker 5: to hide. It was like you were just everyone was

1855
01:37:17,600 --> 01:37:20,439
Speaker 5: hearing everything, and it was just kind of like a chaos.

1856
01:37:20,640 --> 01:37:23,360
Speaker 5: And then after a few months of that, we upgraded

1857
01:37:23,400 --> 01:37:25,560
Speaker 5: to like a little bit of a bigger space with

1858
01:37:25,720 --> 01:37:29,080
Speaker 5: like several rooms, and then at some point we divided

1859
01:37:29,080 --> 01:37:30,919
Speaker 5: it intot of like business and editorial.

1860
01:37:32,000 --> 01:37:34,360
Speaker 2: I was going to say, uh, one of your one

1861
01:37:34,400 --> 01:37:38,360
Speaker 2: of your star players bringing to this show. Dream Hampton,

1862
01:37:38,800 --> 01:37:44,519
Speaker 2: of course, has recently created possibly one of the most

1863
01:37:44,960 --> 01:37:49,280
Speaker 2: mind blowing, blowing ist documentaries I've seen as of late,

1864
01:37:50,120 --> 01:37:53,080
Speaker 2: entitled It Was All a Dream, where I mean essentially

1865
01:37:53,920 --> 01:37:56,280
Speaker 2: her years as a n why she used student she

1866
01:37:56,439 --> 01:38:01,120
Speaker 2: basically just always kept eight camera and no matter where

1867
01:38:01,280 --> 01:38:04,479
Speaker 2: she was, and she has all of these magic moments.

1868
01:38:04,520 --> 01:38:08,679
Speaker 2: And there's a moment where she is in the office

1869
01:38:08,720 --> 01:38:12,799
Speaker 2: of what I assume the storied Mind Squad or whoever

1870
01:38:14,040 --> 01:38:18,320
Speaker 2: you know the source starting ten and literally like just

1871
01:38:18,400 --> 01:38:21,680
Speaker 2: to peep in that world for you know, it's all

1872
01:38:21,760 --> 01:38:23,519
Speaker 2: of fourteen fifteen seconds.

1873
01:38:23,600 --> 01:38:28,080
Speaker 3: But I always wondered, you know, what that environment was like.

1874
01:38:28,560 --> 01:38:30,160
Speaker 5: I had the same reaction I saw A dream was

1875
01:38:30,200 --> 01:38:32,000
Speaker 5: kind enough to show me a screening of the film,

1876
01:38:32,720 --> 01:38:36,599
Speaker 5: and yeah, it was I had never seen that footage.

1877
01:38:36,840 --> 01:38:40,040
Speaker 5: That was my first time seeing that footage of it

1878
01:38:40,200 --> 01:38:42,160
Speaker 5: was like, I think it was around ninety two ninety

1879
01:38:42,200 --> 01:38:45,400
Speaker 5: three ish, and she's in the office with a camera.

1880
01:38:45,520 --> 01:38:47,760
Speaker 5: I remember that she was around with a camera, but

1881
01:38:47,800 --> 01:38:50,479
Speaker 5: I had never seen the footage until very recently. But

1882
01:38:50,600 --> 01:38:53,120
Speaker 5: it is a great film. I definitely highly recommend that

1883
01:38:53,240 --> 01:38:54,000
Speaker 5: people watch.

1884
01:38:53,880 --> 01:39:00,040
Speaker 3: It once word gets around. How do you guys know who.

1885
01:39:01,840 --> 01:39:05,839
Speaker 2: Is reputable in terms of like their their writing skills

1886
01:39:06,080 --> 01:39:08,400
Speaker 2: or their their knowledge of the music.

1887
01:39:09,240 --> 01:39:11,600
Speaker 5: So some people already had a name because they had

1888
01:39:11,640 --> 01:39:13,960
Speaker 5: written for other places, and that would be you know,

1889
01:39:14,200 --> 01:39:17,320
Speaker 5: the names I mentioned, like Nelson, George, Harry Allen. Then

1890
01:39:17,360 --> 01:39:21,320
Speaker 5: there were people that came up organically because either they

1891
01:39:21,360 --> 01:39:24,000
Speaker 5: were friends of a friend or they literally just showed

1892
01:39:24,080 --> 01:39:28,080
Speaker 5: up at our office one day. I don't recall Bones Malone.

1893
01:39:30,120 --> 01:39:32,439
Speaker 5: Malone is an example of someone who showed up, but

1894
01:39:32,479 --> 01:39:36,160
Speaker 5: he had already had some some some bylines in I

1895
01:39:36,240 --> 01:39:38,240
Speaker 5: think in Spin or possibly other places. He had a

1896
01:39:38,400 --> 01:39:41,800
Speaker 5: very distinctive writing style. Bones wrote, you know, with his

1897
01:39:41,880 --> 01:39:47,120
Speaker 5: own language, basically if you remember Dream Dream, I don't

1898
01:39:47,160 --> 01:39:50,080
Speaker 5: recall how Dream showed up, but she did show up

1899
01:39:50,160 --> 01:39:52,760
Speaker 5: at some point. I don't remember how she entered our world,

1900
01:39:53,360 --> 01:39:57,760
Speaker 5: but there she was, this brilliant woman, and we needed

1901
01:39:57,800 --> 01:40:00,599
Speaker 5: women voices to be honest, and we were pretty much

1902
01:40:00,600 --> 01:40:05,680
Speaker 5: a very male heavy operation, and I knew in my

1903
01:40:05,800 --> 01:40:08,959
Speaker 5: heart that we needed more women, and so I immediately

1904
01:40:09,000 --> 01:40:12,720
Speaker 5: assigned her her first writing for us, which was to

1905
01:40:12,840 --> 01:40:15,400
Speaker 5: review h W A hose with attitude.

1906
01:40:15,840 --> 01:40:18,960
Speaker 3: I remember, yeah, and so one and a half mics.

1907
01:40:19,439 --> 01:40:23,759
Speaker 5: She gave it like one mic or something. Yes, exactly exactly,

1908
01:40:24,120 --> 01:40:27,880
Speaker 5: But that was necessary. That was a necessary step because

1909
01:40:27,880 --> 01:40:29,880
Speaker 5: we had to put it in. We put in perspective

1910
01:40:29,960 --> 01:40:31,639
Speaker 5: and dream. You know, who could be a better person

1911
01:40:31,720 --> 01:40:34,679
Speaker 5: than Dream to do that? You know, we were lucky

1912
01:40:34,760 --> 01:40:39,040
Speaker 5: that she came along because she, you know, one of

1913
01:40:39,080 --> 01:40:42,439
Speaker 5: a kind voice. Uh. And then along the way, I

1914
01:40:42,520 --> 01:40:44,439
Speaker 5: I you know that we're talking about those days. I

1915
01:40:44,560 --> 01:40:50,080
Speaker 5: need to mention Mattie c who is you know, was

1916
01:40:50,200 --> 01:40:53,719
Speaker 5: my very close friend prior to even the very earliest

1917
01:40:53,760 --> 01:40:57,360
Speaker 5: days of the Source. Matt actually coincidentally knew both me

1918
01:40:57,520 --> 01:41:02,000
Speaker 5: and Dave May's just by chance. And then when the

1919
01:41:02,080 --> 01:41:06,000
Speaker 5: Source was starting, he in a lot of ways, I mean,

1920
01:41:06,240 --> 01:41:10,240
Speaker 5: as I think back on, it represented really the core

1921
01:41:10,400 --> 01:41:14,600
Speaker 5: of the mind squad taste in music. Maddie C was

1922
01:41:14,760 --> 01:41:18,320
Speaker 5: the essence of like our taste in music because him

1923
01:41:18,320 --> 01:41:20,320
Speaker 5: and I were very often aligned in our taste, but

1924
01:41:20,400 --> 01:41:24,320
Speaker 5: not always. But Maddie C was ahead, so far ahead

1925
01:41:24,360 --> 01:41:29,480
Speaker 5: of the curve in understanding hip hop and having good taste.

1926
01:41:29,760 --> 01:41:32,320
Speaker 2: And what are the sides of the tug of war

1927
01:41:32,560 --> 01:41:37,360
Speaker 2: rope in terms of like who's more esoteric, who's more

1928
01:41:37,400 --> 01:41:38,519
Speaker 2: three VHI and rising?

1929
01:41:38,800 --> 01:41:42,000
Speaker 3: And who's more Life is too short? And how do

1930
01:41:42,080 --> 01:41:43,400
Speaker 3: you know how to be objectionable?

1931
01:41:44,000 --> 01:41:45,479
Speaker 5: You know, that's a great question. I mean one of

1932
01:41:45,520 --> 01:41:49,080
Speaker 5: the earliest challenges we had was dealing with regionalism. We

1933
01:41:49,160 --> 01:41:51,840
Speaker 5: referred to it earlier when you had your experience. You know,

1934
01:41:52,120 --> 01:41:55,280
Speaker 5: there were so many examples the only so to.

1935
01:41:55,280 --> 01:41:58,000
Speaker 2: Say, the two short reviews are probably a good example

1936
01:41:58,080 --> 01:42:00,400
Speaker 2: of albums that are now deemed classic.

1937
01:42:00,880 --> 01:42:05,360
Speaker 5: Now, yes, we made a trash yeah through lens.

1938
01:42:05,600 --> 01:42:06,960
Speaker 3: Yeah, So how how does that?

1939
01:42:07,439 --> 01:42:10,800
Speaker 5: We were always accused of being New York centric because

1940
01:42:10,920 --> 01:42:12,880
Speaker 5: quite frankly, we were. I mean, you know, I was

1941
01:42:12,920 --> 01:42:15,320
Speaker 5: from Philly, but you know, we were East Coast centric

1942
01:42:16,240 --> 01:42:19,479
Speaker 5: people in terms of our taste in music. But very

1943
01:42:19,560 --> 01:42:21,360
Speaker 5: early on, if you look at when we were still

1944
01:42:21,400 --> 01:42:24,479
Speaker 5: the voice of the rap music industry. We actually were

1945
01:42:25,400 --> 01:42:29,759
Speaker 5: running columns from Houston, Los Angeles, San Francisco.

1946
01:42:30,600 --> 01:42:32,960
Speaker 3: Atlanta, San Francisco.

1947
01:42:33,160 --> 01:42:35,800
Speaker 5: Yeah, we were Seattle. I mean we were always We

1948
01:42:35,920 --> 01:42:39,800
Speaker 5: were one of the first media entities to recognize that

1949
01:42:39,880 --> 01:42:41,719
Speaker 5: there was hip hop in other parts of the United

1950
01:42:41,760 --> 01:42:45,439
Speaker 5: States besides New York and LA. And another one that

1951
01:42:45,560 --> 01:42:48,040
Speaker 5: was doing it was you m TV Raps. So even

1952
01:42:48,080 --> 01:42:49,680
Speaker 5: way after I had left you oom TV Raps and

1953
01:42:49,720 --> 01:42:52,080
Speaker 5: now I'm doing the source full time, we were kind

1954
01:42:52,120 --> 01:42:56,840
Speaker 5: of the only national hip hop media you know, uh

1955
01:42:57,640 --> 01:43:03,479
Speaker 5: platforms that existed, but there was there was an ongoing

1956
01:43:03,600 --> 01:43:07,799
Speaker 5: tension that existed between East and West coast different tastes,

1957
01:43:07,840 --> 01:43:10,080
Speaker 5: you know, too short. It is a great example. Here's

1958
01:43:10,120 --> 01:43:14,479
Speaker 5: another example. Nwa who I Love from the first second,

1959
01:43:14,560 --> 01:43:18,280
Speaker 5: I mean the first easy E record, you know, everything

1960
01:43:18,400 --> 01:43:21,000
Speaker 5: Dre did. I was like the biggest Doctor Dre fan ever,

1961
01:43:21,800 --> 01:43:24,720
Speaker 5: but in a weird way, we were playing a lot

1962
01:43:24,760 --> 01:43:27,439
Speaker 5: of that on a radio show. We were playing, you know,

1963
01:43:27,560 --> 01:43:30,040
Speaker 5: all the Doctor Dre stuff. I went back to Philly,

1964
01:43:30,080 --> 01:43:34,040
Speaker 5: I remember in eighty nine. Straight Out Compton came out

1965
01:43:34,040 --> 01:43:37,200
Speaker 5: in eighty eight, So sometime late eighty eight, early eighty nine.

1966
01:43:37,560 --> 01:43:41,040
Speaker 5: I think it was actually Christmas break of late eighty

1967
01:43:41,080 --> 01:43:43,080
Speaker 5: eight early eighty nine. I was back in Philly and

1968
01:43:43,160 --> 01:43:46,639
Speaker 5: I walked into either with Sounds of Market or Funkal

1969
01:43:46,720 --> 01:43:51,519
Speaker 5: Mart and Todd one remember him, he was like one, yes, yes,

1970
01:43:51,640 --> 01:43:53,720
Speaker 5: he was a very famous or not famous, but you know,

1971
01:43:53,880 --> 01:43:57,360
Speaker 5: like a well known Philly DJ and record guy. Basically,

1972
01:43:58,000 --> 01:44:01,479
Speaker 5: I walk in and I'm like, I was now the source,

1973
01:44:01,520 --> 01:44:04,559
Speaker 5: had some momentum, and now I had my own radio show,

1974
01:44:04,680 --> 01:44:06,559
Speaker 5: so I was kind of feeling myself a little bit.

1975
01:44:06,680 --> 01:44:08,760
Speaker 5: I walk in and I'm like, hey, man, I don't

1976
01:44:08,760 --> 01:44:12,840
Speaker 5: see Nwa anywhere. Where's Nwa? And he goes, Nwa, man,

1977
01:44:12,920 --> 01:44:16,600
Speaker 5: that shit is garbage. I'm like what, I'm like, yo,

1978
01:44:16,760 --> 01:44:19,040
Speaker 5: people love that. He's like, no one here, no one

1979
01:44:19,120 --> 01:44:22,240
Speaker 5: in Philly likes that shit, nobody likes that shit. That

1980
01:44:22,360 --> 01:44:25,800
Speaker 5: shit is straight garbage. And I'm like, okay, damn. I

1981
01:44:25,960 --> 01:44:30,280
Speaker 5: was shocked. Meanwhile, it took like a whole year later

1982
01:44:31,439 --> 01:44:34,200
Speaker 5: and every single car is playing straight at Compton, you know.

1983
01:44:34,479 --> 01:44:37,960
Speaker 5: But it was like the bubble was so strong still

1984
01:44:38,000 --> 01:44:41,160
Speaker 5: around New York and LA and Philly that like it

1985
01:44:41,280 --> 01:44:44,200
Speaker 5: took a whole year extra for like that to get

1986
01:44:44,240 --> 01:44:47,599
Speaker 5: penetrated by something as great as the NWA album.

1987
01:44:47,840 --> 01:44:49,960
Speaker 3: You know, yeah, the ads and Dodillboard.

1988
01:44:50,160 --> 01:44:53,080
Speaker 2: I used to religiously read Billboard from like eighty six

1989
01:44:53,160 --> 01:44:57,879
Speaker 2: to maybe a ninety three. But whenever the any ruthless

1990
01:44:59,160 --> 01:45:02,640
Speaker 2: ad would in Billboard magazine, I would just dismissed it

1991
01:45:02,640 --> 01:45:04,479
Speaker 2: because I was like, yo, they got eight ball jackets

1992
01:45:04,640 --> 01:45:05,559
Speaker 2: and Jerry Crows.

1993
01:45:05,640 --> 01:45:08,240
Speaker 3: They looked like my cousins in La. This has to

1994
01:45:08,280 --> 01:45:08,679
Speaker 3: be whack.

1995
01:45:08,960 --> 01:45:09,120
Speaker 5: You know.

1996
01:45:10,040 --> 01:45:12,280
Speaker 2: I'm thinking that I don't want to get caught up

1997
01:45:12,360 --> 01:45:16,040
Speaker 2: in the Toddy t versus Dougie fresh.

1998
01:45:18,439 --> 01:45:19,360
Speaker 3: Right that sort of thing.

1999
01:45:19,479 --> 01:45:24,439
Speaker 2: And it wasn't until Tik's number one rule was like

2000
01:45:24,600 --> 01:45:29,000
Speaker 2: he rejected no hip hop. He was never biased against anything.

2001
01:45:29,720 --> 01:45:33,160
Speaker 2: So the fact that Hammer's rhyming over the apache break

2002
01:45:33,200 --> 01:45:36,600
Speaker 2: and turned his mother out, Reek was like, I assure you,

2003
01:45:37,520 --> 01:45:40,120
Speaker 2: this is like public Enemy level of production, Like you'll

2004
01:45:40,160 --> 01:45:43,479
Speaker 2: love this, just give it a chance. And finally during

2005
01:45:43,560 --> 01:45:45,760
Speaker 2: lunch break he played the first three songs straight out

2006
01:45:45,800 --> 01:45:46,200
Speaker 2: of Compton.

2007
01:45:46,240 --> 01:45:49,400
Speaker 3: I was just like, what the hell is this? Like

2008
01:45:49,920 --> 01:45:52,400
Speaker 3: literally in lunch rooms, So it was word of mouth

2009
01:45:52,479 --> 01:45:53,040
Speaker 3: for a lot of us.

2010
01:45:53,280 --> 01:45:55,840
Speaker 5: It took a long time for Philly. For Philly and

2011
01:45:55,960 --> 01:45:58,600
Speaker 5: New York. So but we had to be ahead of

2012
01:45:58,640 --> 01:46:00,360
Speaker 5: the curve on this. So it kind of to answer

2013
01:46:00,360 --> 01:46:04,559
Speaker 5: your question, we were. We had you know, the natural

2014
01:46:04,680 --> 01:46:06,760
Speaker 5: tastes of the people in And I also want to

2015
01:46:06,800 --> 01:46:10,439
Speaker 5: mention Reef rob Tulou was another important uh figure in

2016
01:46:10,520 --> 01:46:15,040
Speaker 5: the source now to Reef Chimo Do rest in Peace.

2017
01:46:15,200 --> 01:46:17,840
Speaker 5: An incredible photographer. We can talk about him as well.

2018
01:46:18,560 --> 01:46:23,200
Speaker 5: Took so many iconic hip hop photos including Tupac and

2019
01:46:23,360 --> 01:46:26,560
Speaker 5: Biggie and Nas and all these incredible legends that we

2020
01:46:26,680 --> 01:46:29,360
Speaker 5: all the pictures that we all know to be the

2021
01:46:29,600 --> 01:46:34,479
Speaker 5: representative pictures of these artists as Chimo Do. So we were,

2022
01:46:34,600 --> 01:46:39,840
Speaker 5: you know, we just organically kind of attracted writers, photographers

2023
01:46:40,680 --> 01:46:45,240
Speaker 5: and artists and producers and DJs and executives and you

2024
01:46:45,320 --> 01:46:48,880
Speaker 5: know even even Reggio say came into the office and

2025
01:46:49,040 --> 01:46:52,280
Speaker 5: at Rest in Peace. He was also an early writer

2026
01:46:52,439 --> 01:46:55,760
Speaker 5: for us. He was a very you know, headstrong, like

2027
01:46:55,880 --> 01:46:59,439
Speaker 5: you know, uh, smart guy who had a lot to say.

2028
01:47:01,520 --> 01:47:04,400
Speaker 5: Chay O Cooker who's gone on to become you know,

2029
01:47:05,080 --> 01:47:08,439
Speaker 5: successful screenwriter in Hollywood. A number of people like that

2030
01:47:09,400 --> 01:47:10,160
Speaker 5: have gone through us.

2031
01:47:11,040 --> 01:47:13,280
Speaker 3: So yeah, we'll say right now, shout out to chay

2032
01:47:13,800 --> 01:47:14,519
Speaker 3: Nice nice.

2033
01:47:15,680 --> 01:47:18,439
Speaker 5: So yeah, So so anyway, there's there's you know, we

2034
01:47:18,600 --> 01:47:22,240
Speaker 5: we as far as like get to your question about

2035
01:47:22,280 --> 01:47:25,559
Speaker 5: like inside the magazine, how who liked sort of dela

2036
01:47:25,800 --> 01:47:29,400
Speaker 5: versus too short or stuff like that. I mean it's

2037
01:47:29,439 --> 01:47:33,240
Speaker 5: hard to say exactly. I mean I think Maddie and

2038
01:47:33,360 --> 01:47:37,360
Speaker 5: myself and Reef kind of took on the more New

2039
01:47:37,479 --> 01:47:41,800
Speaker 5: York centric stuff and then Reggie and James kind of

2040
01:47:41,880 --> 01:47:47,000
Speaker 5: took on the more down South and West Coast stuff.

2041
01:47:47,160 --> 01:47:50,640
Speaker 5: That was sort of the general breakdown. But like our

2042
01:47:50,720 --> 01:47:53,360
Speaker 5: ground zero for Maddie and myself would be like the

2043
01:47:53,439 --> 01:47:55,400
Speaker 5: Brand Nubian album nineteen ninety, you.

2044
01:47:55,439 --> 01:47:56,760
Speaker 3: Know, like let's talk about it.

2045
01:47:57,200 --> 01:47:58,720
Speaker 5: Yeah, that was our ground zero.

2046
01:47:59,080 --> 01:48:04,719
Speaker 3: Yeah review, Yes, I heard, I heard of Brand Nubian.

2047
01:48:05,560 --> 01:48:08,840
Speaker 2: I believe that I saw a feel so good video

2048
01:48:09,160 --> 01:48:14,479
Speaker 2: on your TV raps maybe once or twice. But the

2049
01:48:14,680 --> 01:48:19,160
Speaker 2: review it's almost to the point where And I also

2050
01:48:19,240 --> 01:48:23,960
Speaker 2: said this about Illmatic, I wondered if the review of

2051
01:48:24,080 --> 01:48:30,519
Speaker 2: the album winds up being like its own headliner, Like,

2052
01:48:31,080 --> 01:48:35,480
Speaker 2: is the reception of the sources perspective of an album.

2053
01:48:36,840 --> 01:48:38,439
Speaker 3: Bigger than the album itself?

2054
01:48:38,760 --> 01:48:42,080
Speaker 2: Because when I saw those five mics for all for one,

2055
01:48:43,240 --> 01:48:45,639
Speaker 2: and I've read the first line it said brand Nubian

2056
01:48:45,920 --> 01:48:49,520
Speaker 2: is New York. And the way that I was positioned,

2057
01:48:50,720 --> 01:48:53,040
Speaker 2: I accepted it because I was like, oh, okay, so

2058
01:48:53,200 --> 01:48:55,160
Speaker 2: this album is a paradigm shift.

2059
01:48:55,280 --> 01:48:58,559
Speaker 3: This album is now how the next generation of New

2060
01:48:58,600 --> 01:48:59,960
Speaker 3: Yorkers are going to look talk.

2061
01:49:00,600 --> 01:49:03,320
Speaker 2: And they broke down the language and the slang and

2062
01:49:03,400 --> 01:49:05,519
Speaker 2: the skins and all that stuff. And you know, I

2063
01:49:05,560 --> 01:49:08,479
Speaker 2: didn't know too much about you know, the five percent

2064
01:49:08,640 --> 01:49:09,040
Speaker 2: nation and.

2065
01:49:09,120 --> 01:49:11,600
Speaker 3: None of that's you know what I mean like, And

2066
01:49:13,000 --> 01:49:16,880
Speaker 3: because I was told it was a classic, I just

2067
01:49:18,000 --> 01:49:20,720
Speaker 3: accepted it that it's a class you know what I mean?

2068
01:49:20,880 --> 01:49:25,679
Speaker 2: Like, That's that's how impressionable a seventeen year old receiving

2069
01:49:27,000 --> 01:49:30,320
Speaker 2: the information. Did you guys know at the time that

2070
01:49:30,520 --> 01:49:33,760
Speaker 2: that was going to be I think of all the reviews,

2071
01:49:33,880 --> 01:49:36,679
Speaker 2: the Brand Ubian getting five mics was the thing where

2072
01:49:36,960 --> 01:49:40,480
Speaker 2: suddenly I started to hear like of the whole regionalism

2073
01:49:40,640 --> 01:49:43,719
Speaker 2: thing and they don't respect our music and that sort

2074
01:49:43,760 --> 01:49:47,560
Speaker 2: of thing or not they don't respect our music, But like,

2075
01:49:48,840 --> 01:49:52,920
Speaker 2: suddenly it matters what you guys think as opposed to

2076
01:49:53,640 --> 01:49:55,719
Speaker 2: because I don't know if the lure of brand Nubian

2077
01:49:55,760 --> 01:49:59,559
Speaker 2: would have kicked off if it were just a all right,

2078
01:49:59,600 --> 01:50:00,519
Speaker 2: they got a you.

2079
01:50:00,560 --> 01:50:03,200
Speaker 5: Know what I mean, like, yeah, Brand Nubian. I mean

2080
01:50:03,240 --> 01:50:05,320
Speaker 5: if you were around New York City in that year,

2081
01:50:05,680 --> 01:50:08,519
Speaker 5: I mean they that album leaked. You know, that was

2082
01:50:08,560 --> 01:50:10,760
Speaker 5: one of the things that was an example of bootlegging,

2083
01:50:10,960 --> 01:50:13,720
Speaker 5: you know, in those days when cassettes were bootlegged.

2084
01:50:13,920 --> 01:50:15,160
Speaker 3: Sow Far in Advance was it?

2085
01:50:16,000 --> 01:50:18,320
Speaker 5: We had that cassette so far, I mean the only

2086
01:50:18,360 --> 01:50:20,320
Speaker 5: one I think the rivals it ISNAS and we can

2087
01:50:20,360 --> 01:50:24,920
Speaker 5: tell that story also. But basically Brand Nubian was red

2088
01:50:25,080 --> 01:50:28,679
Speaker 5: hot in New York. I remember literally when Dante walked

2089
01:50:28,760 --> 01:50:34,920
Speaker 5: into a new music seminar party and they performed oh

2090
01:50:34,920 --> 01:50:38,160
Speaker 5: actually either they yeah, I think they performed wake Up

2091
01:50:39,040 --> 01:50:43,000
Speaker 5: or one of their early singles, and I'm like, what

2092
01:50:43,160 --> 01:50:45,040
Speaker 5: is this because I had that funky groove on it,

2093
01:50:45,120 --> 01:50:49,640
Speaker 5: it had that Parliament I think sample. But anyway, it

2094
01:50:49,800 --> 01:50:53,760
Speaker 5: was that record was so big in New York City

2095
01:50:53,920 --> 01:50:58,560
Speaker 5: during that nineteen ninety period. Like every nightclub, you know,

2096
01:50:58,600 --> 01:51:00,280
Speaker 5: if you go to like especially, I would have out

2097
01:51:00,280 --> 01:51:03,280
Speaker 5: a lot in the downtown New York club scene listening

2098
01:51:03,320 --> 01:51:08,320
Speaker 5: to people like Stretch, Armstrong and many others, and those songs.

2099
01:51:08,360 --> 01:51:11,160
Speaker 5: I mean you would hear like three four album cuts

2100
01:51:11,160 --> 01:51:14,360
Speaker 5: a night, you know, in one session from Brand Nubian

2101
01:51:14,479 --> 01:51:16,400
Speaker 5: that was so influential.

2102
01:51:16,000 --> 01:51:19,280
Speaker 2: So long before its release. Yes, you guys had it

2103
01:51:19,360 --> 01:51:21,600
Speaker 2: for release five to six months ahead.

2104
01:51:21,400 --> 01:51:23,880
Speaker 5: Something like that, something like that. Yes, I remember, Maddie

2105
01:51:23,960 --> 01:51:25,760
Speaker 5: was the it was the keeper of that cassette and

2106
01:51:26,400 --> 01:51:30,479
Speaker 5: the only other you know, not the only but we got.

2107
01:51:30,520 --> 01:51:33,160
Speaker 5: We frequently got records, you know, because back then, for

2108
01:51:33,240 --> 01:51:37,600
Speaker 5: those pre internet days, we would get a cassette and

2109
01:51:38,360 --> 01:51:40,160
Speaker 5: you know we would because we had such a long

2110
01:51:40,240 --> 01:51:42,639
Speaker 5: lead time. I mean, we might be working it's if

2111
01:51:42,680 --> 01:51:45,800
Speaker 5: it's you know, if it's August and now the issue

2112
01:51:45,800 --> 01:51:48,320
Speaker 5: we're working might not come out until like October first

2113
01:51:48,439 --> 01:51:51,040
Speaker 5: or something. You know. It was like so far ahead

2114
01:51:51,600 --> 01:51:54,519
Speaker 5: that we had to be always thinking in that frame.

2115
01:51:54,640 --> 01:51:56,120
Speaker 5: So we have to be thinking, like what are people

2116
01:51:56,200 --> 01:51:58,559
Speaker 5: going to like? Whoever you put on the cover has

2117
01:51:58,640 --> 01:52:01,160
Speaker 5: to be who's hot, like two to three months from now. Basically,

2118
01:52:01,720 --> 01:52:04,040
Speaker 5: so because it took because the reason was we had

2119
01:52:04,080 --> 01:52:06,120
Speaker 5: to finish all the work, send the issue off to

2120
01:52:06,200 --> 01:52:08,679
Speaker 5: get printed. It took it took a couple of weeks

2121
01:52:08,680 --> 01:52:10,320
Speaker 5: to get printed, and then it had to get distributed

2122
01:52:10,360 --> 01:52:12,680
Speaker 5: to all the distributors, and it was like a two

2123
01:52:12,760 --> 01:52:14,600
Speaker 5: month lead time before it actually ended up on the

2124
01:52:14,640 --> 01:52:18,240
Speaker 5: newsstand at least. So because of that, we had that

2125
01:52:18,360 --> 01:52:21,760
Speaker 5: always that challenge, and the publicist knew that, so they

2126
01:52:21,800 --> 01:52:24,639
Speaker 5: would give us the cassettes. But that's when things would leak.

2127
01:52:25,040 --> 01:52:27,840
Speaker 5: So there was a big period, you know, in the

2128
01:52:27,960 --> 01:52:31,160
Speaker 5: early nineties when a lot of big albums, namely Brand

2129
01:52:31,240 --> 01:52:36,920
Speaker 5: Nubian and Illmatic in particular, got leaked real crazy. I

2130
01:52:36,960 --> 01:52:39,479
Speaker 5: didn't leak either of them, but I did hear both

2131
01:52:39,520 --> 01:52:41,400
Speaker 5: of them very early on. You know, should I tell

2132
01:52:41,400 --> 01:52:42,400
Speaker 5: the omatic story or.

2133
01:52:42,640 --> 01:52:46,920
Speaker 3: Tell the Ematic story? Yeah, all right, y'all. That was

2134
01:52:47,040 --> 01:52:49,200
Speaker 3: part one of Jonathan Schechter's story.

2135
01:52:49,680 --> 01:52:52,160
Speaker 2: Of course, we know you wanted the story about how

2136
01:52:52,720 --> 01:52:55,400
Speaker 2: NAS got his five mics in the Source. Come back

2137
01:52:55,479 --> 01:52:57,720
Speaker 2: next week for that story, and he'll also give you

2138
01:52:58,479 --> 01:53:01,400
Speaker 2: some stories about how the Source played a huge role

2139
01:53:01,920 --> 01:53:04,559
Speaker 2: in Biggie's career shortly after.

2140
01:53:05,120 --> 01:53:06,960
Speaker 3: And also, you know, he's going to talk about how

2141
01:53:07,000 --> 01:53:10,160
Speaker 3: he left the publication that he birthed, and he reveals

2142
01:53:10,200 --> 01:53:13,800
Speaker 3: what he's been up to now. I'm still celebrating great music.

2143
01:53:14,360 --> 01:53:17,200
Speaker 2: This whole interview was damn near four hours, and you know,

2144
01:53:17,439 --> 01:53:19,559
Speaker 2: so we try to preserve all of it. So come

2145
01:53:19,640 --> 01:53:23,160
Speaker 2: back next week, look into your feed and enjoy part

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Speaker 2: two of our conversation with Jonathan Schechter of the source

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Speaker 2: magazine all Right.

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Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. For more

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Speaker 1: podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

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Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.