Travels with Bub - a glance back

...to one of my recent favorites, the Hush Tours Hip Hop Bus Tour Led by Pioneers of Rap. We did this in early January and, while I was initially skeptical (being a casual lover of hip-hop and mostly only the cheesy stuff they play on the radio), it was one of the most fun afternoons spent in NYC. We met the bus in midtown and picked up our tickets (about $50 for about 3-4 hours, lunch stop is not included) and wait with the mostly foreign crowd (how did so many Germans and Aussies find this tour?). Bub, who is a hip-hop conniseur, is jumping from one foot to the other in anticipation to find out who our mystery tour guide is going to be. Finally, after lots of build up, they announce that Kurtis Blow is our guide. Of course, I have no idea, and Bub, in between shouts of joy, explains he was one of the first hip hop artists to get mainstream radio play with "The Breaks". Kurtis Blow now is a minister and sort of hip hop historian and does these tours pretty frequently. So we head up the East Side and up to Harlem - coincidentally, James Brown is lying in state at the Apollo - then the Bronx, and Kurtis is telling all these stories about b-boys and DJs and block parties, and the "break" in the music that eventually led to hip-hop (the DJs took that 30-second break and extended it, eventually to the length of an entire song, and then the MCs started rapping over it). His description of the evolution of the MC was really funny; supposedly the DJ was king and the MCs proclamations were, at first "uh, red Cadillac in the parking lot, your lights are on" at block parties.

And part of it was a little sad, because you can tell Kurtis thinks hip-hop is lost now - he makes a point of noting that he never cursed in his songs - and how some guys are rich (i.e., his old buddy Russell Simmons, who he wistfully said "doesn't pick up the phone much these days"). But he's just a joyful guy - most evident when they cranked "The Breaks" at the end of the trip and he rapped and we all sang along - and I now know more about KRS 1, Sugarhill Gang, Kool Mo D, and other hip hop pioneers I never knew about before...