Editorial
Reflections on the Relationship Between the Dance Hall DJ & the Hip-Hop Rapper
Some of the most significant trends in contemporary mainstream pop were reggae innovations including the dancehall sound system, dub, and track remixing.
Most importantly, there would be no rap music today without U-Roy, Big Youth and the other Jamaican deejays who exported the practice of toasting to the hip hop scene in the Bronx and Brooklyn in the Seventies. One of the reasons I've never been terribly fond of rap music is that U-Roy was rapping a long time before Kurtis Blow, the Furious Five or Run DMC.
Back the Seventies, African American music promoters began sponsoring dance parties in lofts and empty warehouses in Brooklyn & the Bronx. Those promoters simply did a one night rental of an empty space, hired one or two deejays and charged the general public 5 bucks at the door. It was illegal to serve liquor at these dance parties, so folks usually brought their own bottles to the dance party. Many of the deejays began spin reggae dance music in addition to their usual musical fare of soul, funk and disco. Pretty soon a few Jamaican born deejays started spinning at these dances, and began featuring live toasters to rap over their reggae dub plate music. It was only a matter of time before the African American deejays hired on their own American toasters to rap over dub plates of funk and soul music...And hip-hop music was born.
One of the first American toasters to break into the Brooklyn/Bronx party scene was Shinehead, a Jamaica born deejay who moved to New York and he obtained American citizenship as a teenager. But prior to the rise of Shinehead, several native born Jamaican toasters were touring & playing dance party gigs in the Bronx & Brooklyn. Those Jamaican dancehall toasters became a crucial influence upon the African American funk community.
Jazz poet Gil Scott Heron was an early influence the hip-hop/rap scene
Prior to the rise of hip-hop, jazz poet Gil Scott Heron developed his own singular style of jazz rapping... And Scott-Heron, in turn, was influenced by the Last Poets, a militant collective of black consciousness poets who used jazz music as a backdrop at their poetry recitals in the Sixties. A handful of American rappers were influenced by Scott-Heron & the Last Poets, but it was the omnipresent Jamaican dancehall music played at dance parties in Brooklyn and the Bronx that had the biggest influence on the budding hip-hop scene.
Blondie and other NYC punk groups played a big role in bringing reggae & hip-hop music to the ears of white American youths.
The New York downtown punk club scene also played a crucial role in introducing both Jamaican dance hall toasting & hip-hop to a white audience in America. Blondie's 1980 hit
Rapture was a tribute to Grandmaster Flash. Grandmaster Flash returned the favor by sampling
Rapture on his mega-hit single,
Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel. Another Blondie hit
The Tide Is High was a cover of a Jamaican ska era hit by John Holt & the Paragons.
The Tom-Tom Club song
Genius of Love was actually sampled by Grandmaster Flash & the Funky 4 plus 1 on their hit single
It's Nasty. Another Tom Tom Club song
Wordy Rappinghood had a hip-hop influenced rap vocal. Nearly all of the Tom-Tom Club songs had reggae influenced one-drop drumbeats in the background.
The Tom Tom Club dabbled in both reggae music and hip hop music
The original Jamaican toaster,U-Roy, had better lyrics and a more refined delivery than any American rapper. Only only a trio American hip hop groups come close to the political consciousness and lyrical sophistication of the original Jamaican toasters and dub poets. Those groups were Public Enemy, Arrested Development and Digable Planets. The rest of the American hip hop scene was consumed by slackness rappers, bling boyz and gangsta wannabes.
Eminem for all of his supposed lyrical and rapping prowess would be blown away by old school Jamaican toasters like U-Roy, I-Roy, Papa Levi or Charlie Chaplin in a rap throw-down.
I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that the hip-hop scene in the UK has developed into a far more sophisticated scene than their American counterparts. Brilliant artists like Massive Attack, Neneh Cherry, Ghostpoet, Dizzee Rascal & M.I.A. have expanded the artistic vision of hip hop over the two decades, while the American hip hop scene has stagnated, a victim of it's own bling-oriented myopia.