Vh1 Hip Hop Honors 2009=DEF JAM!!!
This year, our 6th Vh1 Hip Hop Honors deals entirely with Def Jam and there 25 years of Hip Hop Music. Here’s what it was like when I first met the now super producer Rick Rubin and Def Jam was just about to be born.
I remember like it was yesterday, being at the night club The ROXY in downtown Manhattan on 18th & 10th ave in the early 80’s when Africa Bambattaa dropped a record that stopped me in my tracks! It had a pleasingly aggressive sound, a grimy attitude, a dope beat. The pattern of the lyrical flow was different as were the lyrics themselves, all something I hadn’t heard before. So I turned on my heels as I still do when I hear something that grabs me, all to rare these days, and I headed over to Bam perched up on the DJ platform to ask, “what is that record your playing”? He said, “It’s called ‘It’s Yours’, and the guy who made it is standing right over there”. He was gesturing to a group of several people talking, all of them young and black except one. It looked to me like Bam was pointing to the white guy, who had long hair and a sizable beard and I said to myself, “I know he didn’t mean the white guy, so let me go back to Bam and ask again”. Bam again said, “he’s right over there”, and pointed directly to the long haired bearded white guy. Looking at Bam, then at the white guy and back at Bam he nodded his head is if to say, ‘yeah, the White Guy’! So over to the white guy I go to introduce myself.
“I’m Fab 5 Freddy and Africa Bambattaa said, that’s your record playing”? “Wow”, he said excitedly, “your Fab 5 Freddy, a pleasure to meet you”, as he stuck out his hand excitedly and we shook. He went on to tell me that he’d hooked up with famed Bronx Zulu Nation DJ the original Jazzy Jay who connected him with T La Rock, a known Bronx rapper and they made that record.
It was hard at that exact moment to fully articulate why I liked that record so much but up to that point, most of the relatively few rap records released at that time, 1984, didn’t honestly sound and or feel like the music you’d hear cut, scratched, mixed and rapped over at the places or “Jams” where you’d hear real Hip Hop music. Labels like Sugarhill who were perhaps the biggest in rap music then were simply getting bands to re-play the popular music early Hip Hoppers loved, but minus the cutting, scratching and that nuanced level of discomforting but flavorful aggression that was a big part the scene. Rick’s, “It’s Yours” record had those missing elements.
I was at a crossroads of sorts in my creative life and had begun to demo a few tracks as I was seriously thinking of giving rapping a shot as I was growing a bit restless with making art and exhibiting my paintings in established galleries which was still my main thing at that time. My “Change The Beat” record was a favorite of every DJ around and I was testing those waters to expand my horizons. So I told Rick I was in the studio making demo’s and was feeling what he was doing musically and he eagerly invited me to come and visit him at his then office, which actually was his dorm room at NYU in New York City’s west village. A few days later after several call’s from Rick I payed him a visit.
The dorm room was small, like what I’d imagined a prison cell to be like. It was sloppy, cozy and dominated by a dozen crates of records stacked high, two turntables and a mixer on what I’m sure was his desk and these 2 massive speakers, the size of refrigerators. We talked, he played some records, I ran down a few raps I was working on and we planned to discuss working together some more, but I’d soon get an offer to direct my first music video, “My Philosophy”, for the then new artist KRS-ONE and that, changed my creative course. (Peep that video in the video section!)
It’s surreal to now think back and realize that was the true beginning of Def Jam which Rick launched with that one record. “It’s Yours”. He would soon after link up with Russell Simmons who was running his RUSH artist management company which then had most of the biggest rappers doing it on his roster. People like, Kurtis Blow, Whodini and Run DMC. Once he partnered with Rick Rubin they would change the course of rap music history by signing acts like, LL Cool J, The Beastie Boys and Public Enemy to name a few.
For those of you who’ve seen any or all of the five previous Vh1 Hip Hop Honors shows we’ve done then you know the format is to honor about 6 artist that have left indelible and innovative marks on Hip Hop music and culture. The previous honorees have included Ice T, Easy E, Rakim, KRS ONE, Kool Herc, Ice Cube, Notourious B.I.G., Tupac, Grand Master Flash & The Furious 5, MC Lyte, Slick Rick, Salt & Pepper as well as Public Enemy, LL and the Beaties Boys among a bunch of others. This year the entire show is focusing on Def Jam for having been around for 25 years while steadily and still producing relevant acts and music from all over the country from cats like, Jeezy, Rick Ross and Kanye West.
This years show airs Oct 13th on Vh1 and we’ve also changed the venue from The Hammerstein Ballroom on 34th street in Manhattan to BAM, The Brooklyn Academy Of Music. At the moment we are tweaking all the elements that comprise our show and as co-executive producer this years show is proving to be no easier especially considering the shrinking talent pool of big name, relevant and lyrically gifted artists appropriate to grace that stage and do justice to the many amazingly gifted rap legends that have made Def Jam Hip Hops greatest record label.
The commercials and marketing will be hitting you from all angles shortly so check back in to this site as I’ll be giving you some exclusive info and behind the scenes looks at what certainly is the greatest spectacle of REAL Hip Hop culture televised anywhere!
FAB 5 FREDDY
