Thursday 17 August 2023

Kool & The Lads

My one contribution to the 50 Years Of HipHip #content nonsense: the t-shirt I got Kool Herc to sign when I saw him DJ Liverpool back in 2000. This was not long after I'd read Style Writing From The Underground and become obsessed with 1970's New York tags, so it was worth sacrificing a fresh tee for. Herc was much shorter than he looked in Beat This: A Hip-Hop History and tried to fool us by playing Fusion Beats Vol 2 and pretending he was doing the mixing on it himself, but he put on a very entertaining show with loadsa classic breaks, and was a convivial raconteur on the mic with anecdotes about his old parties. Mercifully, for such a Real Hip-Hop™ night, we were spared the sight of a buncha annoying breakdancers homoerotically rolling round on the dancefloor together and gurning at each other.
Dan Greenpeace was the support DJ and played a blinder of a set. It woz the night I first heard Spoonie Gee's Spoonie Is Back, Kev-E-Kev & Ak-B's Listen To The Man, Mad Skillz' Ghost Writer and Big Scoob's Kryptonite. Add some classics like Special Ed's I Got It Made and The Beatnuts' Off The Books and Watch Out Now, and you had an upper-echelon Rap connoisseur experience in a Scouse backstreet bar. Greenpeace also played the Cage song his Bad Magic label released on 12" which is surely the only Cage song a DJ could play in such a set. All in all, one of the best No Fakin' club nights alongside Edan's first Liverpool show in 2002 or 2003.

It was a What Everyone Wants blank tee Kool Herc tagged for me and I would kill for a plug on that brand's deadstock t-shirts. Best blank tees in British high Street history or wot? Perfect fit for a lanky lithe bastard like me, sold for £2.99 a pop, and came in a multitude of colours. What Everyone Wants became a citizen of British high street Hades in 2003, but I'd copped so many of their blank tees on my travels that I was still rockin' fresh ones when Sean Price dropped Onion Head.

10 comments:

Yohan said...

That second picture contains about as many women as I would suspect, but it does sound like a killer set. Never even knew about that Kev-E-Kev x Ak-B's "Listen To The Man", like it a lot.

Contemplating on seeing Rakim live somewhere next year, supposed to a a 25 year anniversary tour of The 18th Letter. You reckon he'll do his classic songs too or should I expect him to specifically tour that album?

Kelvin Mack10zie said...

I'd hope he'd be savvy enough to do his old songs because the best thing about The 18th Letter was the 2nd disc with all the Eric B. & Rakim songs on it.

Was definitely an 85/15 ratio of blokes to birds at the Herc show 😄

Yohan said...

Thought When I B On The Mic was on The 18th Letter, turned it was on The Master. I think I only liked 2 songs off The 18th Letter but it has easily been over 10 years since I listened to it.

Spartan said...

Much like Chatwins, I wasn't even aware there were What Everyone Wants stores.

Kelvin Mack10zie said...

I've only been in a Chatwins once and the deli counter looked rank as fook.

I've probably listened to The 18th Letter first disc less than 10 times. That second disc, however, got endless play - might be the best Best Of disc in rap history.

L.A said...

That was a great night.

D said...

Few things more real hip hop than European cracker in an army cap as seen in second pic, guaranteed he has made an album W graffiti font title

Kelvin Mack10zie said...

Hah. That's semi-famous Scouse skater Howard Cooke. He's not a Real Hip-Hop type, more a Real Sk8er Boi Type.

Fred said...

D should have just wrote "Few things more real hip hop than Europeans" and that sentence would have been accurate already.

Not sure I have any contribution to that whole 50 years of HH thing. Used to have a picture of me and an ex-girlfried posing with Tek & Steele after I took her to a Smiff'N'Wessun show in 2008 in Paris but I can't find it anywhere ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Kelvin Mack10zie said...

K.I.M, man, K.I.M.