Old-school rap enjoys a revival
By Brian Bergstein
The Associated Press
LOS ANGELES — A circle
formed in the crowd of rap enthu
siasts and slowly widened as a DJ
played the mechanical beats of
Herbie Hancock’s “Rockit.”
Eyes darted around the ring be
fore an athletic 19-year-old guy
who goes by the name of Juice,
wearing a tank top and nylon
pants, finally stepped in. Juice
swayed his arms and began to
step left, then right, then left
again, in time with the rhythm.
Suddenly, his legs shuffled,
kicked, dipped, fluttered, twirled
and kicked again, and with one
athletic move, he dropped to the
floor and spun around on his
back.
It was like recalling a lost rite of
an ancient civilization. He was
breakdancing.
Remember breakdancing? That
hip-hop pastime of the early
1980s when kids everywhere
were spinning on their parents’
linoleum floors and exuberantly
trying the Moonwalk?
Breaking is making a come
back, part of a recent surge in in
terest in rap’s innocent early days
among the generation raised on
harder, harsher “gangsta” rap.
Performers who’ve been out of the
big time for almost 15 years now
find themselves playing reunion
shows at clubs that don’t book
contemporary hip-hop acts.
They’re the pioneers of rap and
they’re finding a whole new gen
eration of fans.
“Once again we have a whole
crop of kids 20 and under that are
discovering breaking, discovering
graffiti, and rap, and saying, ‘Yo, I
can be a part of this, I can con
tribute,”’ said longtime rap pro
ducer Fred Brathwaite, better
known as Fab 5 Freddy. He was
the original host of “Yo! MTV
Raps".
“The young crowd is really em
bracing the history of it all, be
cause it was so pure,” he said.
“Nobody that invented the stuff
was really thinking about making
a lot of money. They were really
just trying to have fun.”
The Wild Style Reunion Jam
drew about 350 people, mostly
hip-hop fans in their late teens
and 20s. They watched a screen
ing of “Wild Style,” the seminal
1983 movie about rap and hip
hop culture, and heard some of
rap’s earliest stars perform.
Grandmaster Flash was on hand,
along with Buzy Bee and leg
endary breakdancer Crazy Legs
from the Rock Steady Crew.
The show’s promoter, Tony
Harris, 25, says old-school rap is
one in a long line of musical
forms to enjoy a retro revival in a
culture endlessly fascinated with
its recent history.
But there’s another reason for
this nostalgia trip: Many hip-hop
fans, turned off by the violence
and negative images in much of
contemporary rap, like old-school
for its boastful exuberance and
emphasis on clever rhymes.
“The essence of it is, let's have
a good time, let’s party, let's cre
ate, let’s vibe with it, without all
the extra stuff thrown in just to
make it sell,” said 38-year-old
Curtis Brown, known as Grand
master Caz, who got started in rap
in 1974 and now is enjoying a sec
ond career performing and pro
moting old-school culture.
Frank Nunez, 19, who came to
the Hollywood Athletic Club for
the Wild Style Reunion Jam from
suburban Montebello, especially
likes breakdancing because of the
feeling he gets when he steps into
a circle and shows off his moves.
His friend, Juice, who’s so seri
ous about breaking that he has a
tight blue helmet to wear when he
spins on his head, adds: “It’s an
element of hip-hop that never
should have died. It’s the art of
the streets.”
Grandmaster Caz celebrated his
22 years with the Cold Crush
Brothers at a July show at Wet
lands, a club in lower Manhattan.
Other old-school names like Doug
E. Fresh and KRS-One were also
there.
Caz feels that unlike most rock
or country musicians, who em
brace their elders, few modern
hip-hop artists show respect for
the old-school performers who in
vented the genre.
“There’s nothing wrong with
making money by selling records.
Believe me, I'm in this to sell
records,” said Caz, who still lives
in the Bronx, near where he and
other early hip-hop artists started.
“But when it dictates the process
Groups like the Beastie Boys
kept alive many classic elements
of early hip-hop with references
in their lyrics and musical sam
ples. That has made it easy for
some hip-hop fans in their teens
and 20s to feel connected to mu
sic that was big when they were
babies.
Even so, that doesn’t mean they
can breakdance. Fortunately for
them, Crazy Legs gives lessons.
As a boy in the South Bronx in
the late 1970s, Ritchie Colon
wanted nothing more than to be a
baseball player. But that took
money and equipment. So like
many of his friends who were left
to their imagination, they made
their tattered neighborhood into a
playground.
Ritchie invented so many
breakdancing moves and did
them so well they called him
Crazy Legs. He showed his stuff in
“Flashdance” and other movies,
and still has a large following, es
pecially overseas. He answers the
phone himself at the Rock Steady
Crew headquarters in Jersey City,
N.J.
“This is called a continuous
backspin," he tells a class of 12 as
he introduces a move on the Wet
lands floor one Monday night.
“Some people call it the wind
mill, but it’s not. I know because I
made it up.”
Many of the teen-agers in the
class seem preoccupied with get
ting the moves down exactly
right. Legs reminds them they
shouldn’t be afraid to let them
selves go with the music, because
breaking is a celebration. Each
turn in the circle should be its
own show, its own good time.
“There’s always an intro and an
ending,” he says. “So no matter
what you do, end up nice.”
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