Interview with Kool DJ Blue 

                                                  

Kool DJ Blue

                                                       

                                   conducted by Sir Norin Rad (The Intruders / Germany)


SIR NORIN RAD:"From which part of Harlem are you originally?"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"So...I grew up on 1932 Second Avenue. That was between 99th street & 100th street and Second Avenue.  Right across from Metropolitan Hospital and Washington Projects."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Could you please break down the geographical difference between the Eastside and the Westside of Harlem?"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"East Harlem starts from anything after Madison Avenue. From the east side of the street of 5th Avenue all the way to The FDR. That's all East Harlem. Anything from Lennox Avenue all the way to Broadway...12th Avenue....that's all the Westside of Harlem. Then you got your Uptown of course....going up to Convent Avenue & 131st street......which they called Sugar Hill, they called it the Wild Wild West all the way up to 155th street. You had DJs like Master Don (RIP) who had the Westside and The Crash Crew and a lot of other DJs up on the Westside. Then you have the Eastside where you had DJ Kid Flash, you had DJ Dollar Bill, you had crews like The Crusaders and myself, Kool DJ Blue. Ski Jump who was with me when I DJed for the Gangster 5 MCs. DJ Louie Lou who was the DJ for Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. God bless his soul! He had passed away. A lot of times when they speak about Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde they don't mention him which I thought was kinda sad but I always mention him anyway. Then you got Spanish Harlem which starts from 110th Street all the way to 96th Street or something like that. They're on the Eastside."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What was your first encounter with Hiphop? Where and when did it take place?" 

KOOL DJ BLUE:"Well, I started in 1979. I think I was 15, my first encounter with a DJ was my brother Lep Ski. He started it, he had equipment and everything and I would see him doing it and I started liking what he was doing on top of the fact that he had this here voice. They called him "The Golden Voice of the People's Choice - DJ/MC Lep Ski". So I would go out there and I would see him playing music. Now he had his own system and anytime he'd leave the house I would be on his system until he recognized that somebody was messing with his system.  So he knew it was me. Anytime he walked out he'd say, "Don't touch my system!" But I would touch it anyway. Once I looked out the window and I'd see him going down the block I would touch it anyway until I got busted! But I didn't know I got busted until later on when I realized how he knew that I was still messing with his system. All he had to do was come and put his hand on the amplifier and he would realize that it's warm. So I was busted all the time! In Washington Projects was my first encounter with playing music on my own. What happened was...my brother Lep Ski went out to play some music and I would just stand by his side. So he went to go mingle in the crowd but he told me,"Here you can take over!" So of course now I'm nervous!  I'm like maybe 13 or 14 like that there.  I said to him, "What am I supposed to do?" Now he looks at me like I'm crazy. He says,"You know what to do. You been doing it every time I left the house!" So he pulled out a couple of records and I jammed them! The crowd, you know, went wild to see this young little kid behind a DJ system and keeping everybody dancing. So that was my first encounter with Hiphop. As things went on....as 1979 got into the 1980s...I started playing music outside in Johnson Projects where I encountered DJs like DJ Louie Lou....Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde used to come over..... DJ Ronnie Green and a lot of other DJs. By that time I had my own system 'cause my brother got mad with me and said, "Listen,  you wanna be a DJ you get your own system!" Me and MC Priest...who was my MC at the time... MC Priest he also encouraged me to do it. He said,"Listen man, if you go ahead and do this I'll be your MC!" So when I started, it started out with DJ Blue and MC Priest. May he rest in peace! I said to him,"If I do that don't you back out on me!" 'cause MC Priest he would start something and then he don't finish it. So after that we started playing music outside like Johnson Projects, Jefferson Projects, Wagner Projects and the more you play outside, the more people get to know who you are , they like what you are doing and stuff like that. I went to Julia Richman High School and that's where I met DJ Master Don and he told me, "Come on down to the Ponderosa!" He was like the house DJ of the Ponderosa. I think it was on 144th and 143rd Street and St. Nicholas Avenue or something like that. It was a restaurant...like a bar & grill. It's not there anymore. Like I said our name started growing and then going to school with DJ Master Don.....we had a school boat ride......and our names had gotten so big by the time of that boat ride that we had to take a vote on who was gonna do Julia Richman Boat Ride. The principal didn't want no ruckus over the fact that here are these two DJs that have been out there and have been doing their thing and got a name for themselves and now it's starting to be a problem with the students where they want DJ Blue or they want DJ Master Don & The Death Committee. Well, opposed to having a big problem the principal said, "We're not going to have neither one of the DJs!" Although Master Don got a lot of votes and I got a lot of votes, it just became a tie. So they said,"We're not gonna have neither of them!" and they went with DJ Spivey & The Magnificent Seven. Grandmaster Dee of Whodini went to Julia Richman, too. He also jammed in Julia Richman and he came by and said, "Hey, Blue! Can I get on those turntables?" And I was never the one to  say, "Nah, nah!" I said, "Go ahead! Get on, enjoy yourself! Pick whatever records you got and enjoy yourself!" I never treated anybody like I was more better. I was always like, "Come on in!" So as time went on I got connected with Kid Flash who became my brother-in-law and he hooked me up with Mike & Dave (Mike & Dave Productions)."

DJ/MC Lep Ski

SIR NORIN RAD:"From Lincoln...."

KOOL DJ BLUE:"Right. Mixmaster Mike & Disco Dave. Then you also had DJ Mr. Freeze and DJ Kenny Sex. DJ Mr. Freeze promoted a lot of my parties as well."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Where would these parties take place at?"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"With Mixmaster Mike & Disco Dave they would have parties at Randy's Place...that's like on 125th Street.....they had some at Celebrity Club and they would promote them at the schools like I.S. 201 and they promoted this one party "East versus West" or something like that. To my knowledge at that time it was said that whoever win get paid, whoever don't win don't get paid. It was all cool and everything, it was all in fun. They promoted that party where you had a lot of DJs......like DJ Pernelli-O and them (The P-Brothers Disco) , DJ White Flash, The Magnificent Seven.... a lot of them....I don't remember right now because I don't have the flyer in front of me but it also was DJ Blue & The Gangster 5 MCs. Then they promoted another party called "Battle Of Harlem's Best".....that was on Old Terrace Ballroom...I think it was an old masonic building or something like that...right on 125th Street off of 5th Avenue. That was also one of the biggest parties that they had given. A lot of their parties were also given in the Lincoln Projects. At that particular party at the Old Terrace Ballroom it was DJ Blue & The Mafia Family which consisted of MC Al Capone, MC Joe Ski- RIP, and MC Kool Joe- RIP. Those were the MCs that I DJed for. D.J. Blue & M.C. Priest had parted ways by that time. M.C. Priest stayed with the Gangster 5 M.C.'s. At this party we stepped out a midnight blue stretched limousine and everybody was like,"Look who pulled up in a limousine?!?" At that particular party at the Old Terrace Ballroom I remember it well, all of us were wearing godfather hats. M.C. Kool Joe had on a black godfather hat, he stepped out the car holding the left turn table and stood to the left. Joe Ski also wore a black godfather hat, he stepped out to the right, holding the right turn table. Al-Capone wore a white godfather hat, he stepped out holding his personal mic and stood to the left. I wore a blue godfather hat with my set of headphones and I walked up the middle as the crowd parted."

May 24th, 1980: DJ Blue & The Gangster 5 MC's participate in the "East vs West Battle" at the legendary I.S.201 in Harlem

SIR NORIN RAD:"What caused you to move on from MC Priest to the Gangster 5 and from them to the Mafia Family?"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"It started out as DJ Blue & MC Priest. After a while Priest started seeing his girlfriends and stuff like that. Then we had a party at a place called We Are Somebody which was at 110th Street & Avenue which was an old film studio. People like DJ Mr. Freeze jammed there...MC Priest stepped down from rapping at that party. But then he came and started hanging out with Ski Jump (legendary Harlem B-Boy / MC), Prince Haji and a kid by the name of Kendu. They got together and became the Gangster Five MCs. There was fifth guy, I don't remember his name off hand. They would join forces with me and that's when we went to the I.S. 201 party with Mixmaster Mike & Disco Dave that I told you about. We did that, then once again everybody went their own separate ways. Later on I was introduced to MC Al Capone who was cousin with MC Joe Ski and MC Kool Joe. They needed a DJ so when we got together they was called the Mafia Family so then we called ourselves DJ Blue & The Mafia Family. "

SIR NORIN RAD:"Do you recall how that "East vs. West Battle" at I.S. 201 went down? How well did your crew perform in that battle?"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"Oh well, listen! They did a routine with a song that was called "Gangster Boogie" (by the Chicago Gangsters). What happened was they said, "Listen Blue, we gonna start off with "Gangster Boogie"!" First of all, Ski Jump would say an introduction in terms of who he was and they would go down to  the next MC, then to the next MC and by the time they got to the fifth MC they would all say, "We are the Gangster 5 MCs!" and that's when I was to supposed to drop the "Gangster Boogie" beat. Instead of them saying "Gangster Boogie!", they would say "Gangster Five!" So that record was like hot! Then from there so that they could go off and do their thing I dropped "Groove To Get Down" by T-Connection. Well, of course they also had steps and all that stuff and each one of them went off on the mic and did their thing. The crowd was loving it! But how it turned out the Eastside did win!"

September 20th, 1980: Kool DJ Blue & The Mafia Family participate in the "Battle Of Harlem's Best" contest at the Old Terrace Ballroom

SIR NORIN RAD:"Please describe your method of acquiring new breakbeats back then!"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"Wherever you can find records, that's where you go get them. It was Cheap Records on 23rd Street between Lexington Avenue and Park Avenue. I shopped there. I shopped at Downstairs Records at 43rd Street or something like that. It's been so long.....Al Ski worked there and anytime I went there I said,"Okay, Al Ski! What new you got?" He'd be like,"Blue, check this out!" He would throw the beats on and he'd say, "This just came in!" So when he played those beats for me I'm registereing in my mind like,"Okay, okay...." I'm listening to it, seeing what kinda beats he's going through and I would say, "I want it." So he would put it to the side and he'd throw the next one on.  Whatever he had I would get, on top of the fact that I was also registered with those record pools. I was registered with Mojo Records. The director of Mojo Records was a man called Stan...I don't recall his last name.  Howie Dee  turned me on to Mojo record pool and I got in with that so of course when you're in that you get all kinds of records. Stuff that wasn't even out yet! So every week you gonna get records and you have to do a write-up on those records to see how well they do in the clubs........Like would you play this record? Would you not play this record? Would you promote it? There were records that were like not that good but you could make that record good depending on what you mix it with. In order to get into a record label you had to be a house DJ somewhere. That's the way it was supposed to be but with these directors...as long as you were paying dues it was like, "Listen, we need the DJs to come in." So, say you didn't have a club you was jamming in...as long as you were jamming in the park you were a active DJ they would be like, "Yeah, come on in!" because when they give you the records they give you paper work with it that you have to write up to say how well these records do. Those were the terms and conditions of being in a record pool, you know? By the time you came in to pick up your next shipment of records...if your paper work wasn't in they wouldn't let you pick up that shipment of records for the week. So you had to stay up on that paper work. It wasn't just spinning records you had to fill out this here questionnaire. Let's say they gave you 15 records.....there were 15 records in your bin....when you go to the record pool you have a bin with your name...."DJ....whoever you are" and you might have anywhere fom 5 to 15 records which means now you have to do paper work for each record. If you came in one week and you didn't have it they may say, "Alright, I'mma let you pick up your shipment today but now you know you owe me a double package!" Cause that's how the record pools stayed up. They had to get that paperwork to who they was dealing with."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did you have certain beats that made you stand out from your competitors? From the other DJs that were rocking in the parks in Harlem at that time?"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"Well, what made you unique back then..you know, back in the days DJs would cover the label of the records that they were playing. So you wouldn't know what it was. We all would do the same thing...shopping for different records...it could be some type of western music but if it had a so many seconds or minutes beat you would take that and you would say,"Okay, they (the other DJs) don't know what the rest of this record is. I'm gonna jam this and mix it with this or with that. " So anytime you could come up with something that nobody else got and then turn into something special that always made you different from the next DJ.  What happens is partygoers they go and they hear these beats over and over again though they still like them like "Before I Let Go" (by Frankie Beverly & Maze)....now you can play that record and I don't care who you are you play that record at any party and people gonna be like,"Yo!" and they gonna party and you will still get the crowd pleased because that's a record they can identify with but anytime you get a beat and you turn it into something that's what makes you stand out. The crowd would say, "I haven't heard that before!" and they would remember that, especially if you made them dancing off of that. They would remember that and if they ever heard it again...I guarantee you..they would say,"I heard that beat before and the first person I heard play that record was DJ Blue."  

SIR NORIN RAD:"Would you say that there were people in Harlem who came to the parties specificially to hear new beats being spun by the DJs in the park?"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"Well, you gotta remember you had the MCs who were hyping things up so half of the time the crowd was into the MCs doing their thing and they may not even recognize that record right then and there. It's only until that MC would say something like, "You're listening to the sounds of Kool DJ Blue! Hit it!" and then you'd drop the beat and then they would give you that minute and let you cut that beat up. That's what made them hyped off of that record especially if it was something new."

SIR NORIN RAD:" What made you pick the name Kool DJ Blue?"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"My mother used to call me Baby Blue. So when I was younger before I got into the DJ thing she would always call me, "Baby Blue, come here!" Of course it's from that little nursery rhyme..."Baby Blue go blow your horn..." That's where it probably came from. As I got older and started doing music it was DJ Blue, right? Then the way I would play music was too kool. I wasn't the Flashes of the world, I wasn't the Theodores of the world......Did I scratch?  Yeah, I scratched and stuff like that but it was more of a smooth type of way of jamming that record to the point where it became Kool DJ Blue."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Which influence did the Boogie Down Bronx have on you?"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"Well, one thing about my MC Priest. Priest was dating a girl from the Mill Brook projects (South Bronx) and he was hanging out in the Bronx. So we would go up there to hear different DJs like C.C. & Company which was MC Money Mike's crew, Grandwizard Theodore and stuff like that. Getting from borough to another we didn't have no car and back then...I got to be honest....if we didn't jump the turnstile we walked because basically the Third Avenue Bridge was right there. We would walk right across the bridge. As a DJ or MC of course you are always listening to other DJs and MCs. I looked at it as a learning lesson. I'm not better than you, you're not better than me. If you can move the crowd, you can move the crowd. However, there was a little twist in there and it was all in good fun. We would go to different places and of course we didn't carry no equipment. So if we see a DJ there we would ask, "Hey, can we get some? Can we get a little bit of that?" And they either let you or they don't for several reasons because they don't want nobody coming in there and after they been rocking and they get the crowd and then they let you get a little bit of those turntables or that mic and then you kinda make it look like you're better than them. They was often kinda staying away from that. One incident...I remember we went to Mill Brook projects and MC Money Mike and his crew was down there. They was playing music in the park and Priest said to me,"Yo Blue, let's go over there and see if we can get on!" So we made our way through the crowd, I went to the DJ...stuff like that....MC Money Mike was rapping on the mic...so Priest said, "Hey, Money Mike! What's going on?" We didn't know each other like that but Priest asked, "Yo, can I get some of that mic?" Money Mike said, "No!" (laughs) He said, "No!" So Priest said, "Yo, check this out! I can't get none of that? I mean, come on man! You know we're out here doing this." Money Mike said, "No." So Priest said, "I tell you what. Let my DJ battle your DJ and I'm gonna battle you!" Priest was good for doing crap like this. He'd done this with Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde when we went over to Schomburg and battled them for the first time. So Priest said,"I tell you what, Mike. Let's battle over this mic. If you win I'll never rap again but if I win you don't touch this mic no more tonight. " He gambled but Money Mike wouldn't challenge him because..and I don't wanna put him down but from what I have heard...he didn't have too much. He would go, "This is Money Mike, y'all!" Then he would spell his name out or whatever the case was and then he'd go into "Throw your hands in the air!" He didn't have too much coming behind that so I guess Priest already knew he had him beat anyway. Back then they walked around with their little books of rhymes and stuff like that there, you know? So he already knew what time it was. He also did the same thing with Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde and DJ Louie Lou over at Schomburg...I think it was Schomburg. Did Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde let Priest get on? Yeah, they let him get on. Now, did Priest win? No, but he put up a hell of a fight. Why? Not that he wasn't good, it was just that Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde had their crowd there already. Was the crowd fair?  They was very fair, they gave Priest his props 'cause Priest did do his thing but Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde they still won that battle."

MC Priest (The Gangster Five)

SIR NORIN RAD:"How did these MC battles go down in Harlem back then? Was verbally abusing your opponent and threatening him part of it like it is today?"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"It was definitely a whole different genre from what it is today. They were talking about fly girls....at that time the word "fly girl" came out....they talked about how beautiful the fly girls was, how they (the MCs) dressed, how they would talk to the fly girls, they talked about the O.J.'s (luxury car service)  in terms of, "I pick you up in a fly O.J." The MCs talked about how good they was on the microphone. They would never talk about nobody's mother or their family and they were never talking about killing and stuff  like that. That's why it's so crazy today to hear how they talk more about death...like dying is not a problem, almost like they are rapping about they live to die. No! They got it twisted. I say, "Bring the party back!  'Cause back in our days when we was  jamming we was more into the music, into the dressing.....like the Cortefiels, the Playboys, the British walkers, the Kangols. You get out of the O.J and you're looking dapper. That's how you roll up in a party! You go up in there, you're looking to talk to some female, get your little dance on and stuff like that. That's why I'm trying to tell you, "Bring back the party 'cause y'all so caught up in doing all this gangster stuff  that y'all forgot that Hiphop is about the party!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"That's a powerful statement!" 

KOOL DJ BLUE:"Yeah, you know, me and DJ Dollar Bill battled and we are still friends today. There was no animosity, we did that battle to entertain the people."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Please describe how that battle went down!"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"That battle took place in East River. There was a park over there....between East River projects and Wilson projects just next to the FDR Drive. It was me, MC Priest, DJ Mr. Freeze and it was DJ Dollar Bill. We got on the turntables and the way it went down was he would take a certain record and cut it up and also do some scratches and mix it with other records. Then after that he would stop and then MC Priest would say something about me like, "A lady had a baby that's pretty and brand new. The doctor slapped him on his ass and called him DJ Blue!" And then he'd go,"DJ Blue!" Now anytime he said, "DJ Blue!"I would cut it after what he would say, right? And then he would say,"You go on and on and on and on! The beat don't stop till the break of dawn!" and I would drop that record "Scratching" (by the Magic Disco Machine) and cut it up. Then I started getting faster.....BAM, BAM, BAM and then DJ Mr. Freeze got on and he would work one turntable side and I would work one turntable side and we would still hit that BAM every time. That was backspinning. He would backspin...BAM....I would backspin...BAM. Then after he let go I kept working both sides of the turntables and then the crowd just said, "Yo, DJ Blue got it!" 

SIR  NORIN RAD:"So what was your stomping ground back then?"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"Being that I was from Johnson projects, Johnson Park became my stomping ground. That was the home, that was the home of DJ Blue. Then from Johnson I would go over into Jefferson and jam. Then after meeting DJ Kid Flash and all that I went to Wagner projects and I started rocking more in Wagner because that was the home of DJ Kid Flash, DJ Kid Swift....DJ Mr. Freeze would jam there although DJ Mr. Freeze was from Jefferson and we would do that right there on 124th Street Park. I even played in Brooklyn, New Lots one time... It was a bit scary because around that time Brooklyn and Queens they was all known for systems that looked like housing projects. They would have like five big speakers on the right and five big speakers on the left looking like towers and stuff like that. But they didn't have no music (in terms of breakbeats). They had Brass Construction, Crown Heights Affair, El Coco, MFSB but they didn't have what Harlem and the Boogie Down (Bronx) had. So when I went out there I played that record "Walks like sex, it talks like sex".......I played that in Brooklyn and they looked at me like, "What the hell is this record?!?!" So to get them back into their comfort zone I threw on "Cocomotion" by El Coco and they got back into doing the Hustle because you can't take Hiphop and bring it to an environment that isn't ready."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Could you describe the process by which crowds were drawn to the parks?"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"You see this the thing about the projects...you didn't have to put out no flyers or nothing like that, if they heard some music and if it was louder than a boom box they knew somebody brought a system out somewhere and it would just automatically draw a crowd. Now if you're doing it right there in the Wagner projects people would be like, "Yo, they got the music out!" So now they gonna come it's just a matter who it is that got the music out. They won't know until they actually come out and then they start telling their friends and everybody always made their way up to the DJ. Then they would see who it was..whether it was Kool DJ Blue, whether it was DJ Kid Flash, whether it was DJ Kid Swift....whoever it was they would know once they got up there and then they was out there. Sometimes the MC would be testing his mic, "One, two...one, two." and if they heard a beat drop after that "One, two, one, two" and they heard the MC going off people would just come. So no matter what project you went to all you had to do was bring your set out. Once you brought that set out people would come."

January 9th, 1981: Kool DJ Blue & The Mafia Family perform at Twin Disco

SIR NORIN RAD:"What do remember about East Harlem B-Boys going off at the park jams? Like the Floormasters, the Crusaders or the Executioners?"

KOOL DJ BLUE:"Listen, anywhere were there was music and it was outside and you were playing all the Hiphop records they would show up. That was their thing! Once you played "Apache" and stuff like that..."It's Just Begun" by The Jimmy Castor Bunch. Once the beginning of "It's Just Begun" came out, the B-Boys would start forming because they knew what time it was and then they would go off. After "It's Just Begun" you played "Apache" that was the continuation to let them continue to get theirs off. After "Apache" you played "Shaft In Africa" (chuckles).....mmmh, yeah I mean listen, man.....you better believe by the time you finish playing "Shaft In Africa" people was sweating!!! It was over!"




                                                               

                                       Interview with B-Boy Puppet Master (The Shaka Zulus)

                                                         

                                                             B-Boy Puppet Master (The Shaka Zulus)


                                      conducted by Sir Norin Rad (The Intruders/Germany)


SIR NORIN RAD:"Where were you born and raised at?"

PUPPET MASTER:"I was born in the Bronx.....176th Street & Bathgate Avenue. That's in the 1960's. I kinda got two histories because I grew up in the Bronx till the age of thirteen and then in 1973 my mother moved to Harlem.....149th Street between Broadway and Riverside. I basically continued growing up over there but I always went back and forth to the Bronx because my grandmother lived in the Bronx, so I had family in the Bronx. It was always going back and forth to the Bronx. I even went to high school in the Bronx."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Which high school did you attend over there?" 

PUPPET MASTER:"Oh, that was Samuel Gompers. 1974, 1975 I went to Samuel Gompers on Southern Boulevard. At that time it was an all boys school. Most of the schools at that time in the Bronx and Manhattan were either all boys or all girls schools. Mostly vocational and technical schools. In my first year there I met Afrika Zambu through Tyrone Butler aka Pase 161 from Soundview. Zambu was Bambaataa's first DJ partner. Back in the 1970s everybody had a second DJ. It was Grandmaster Flash and Disco Bee, it was Kool DJ Herc and DJ Timmy Tim and at that time it was Afrika Bambaata and Zambu."

SIR NORIN RAD:"From what I have heard huge parts of the Bronx were divided into different gang territories in the early 1970s and you told me you joined a gang called the Peacemakers. How did that come about?" 

PUPPET MASTER:"That's true. 1971 I joined the Peacemakers. I was eleven so I was a Baby Peacemaker. You had the Baby Peacemakers, The Young Peacemakers...and the Peacemakers. From 1968 to 1973 it was all gang culture, you know?"

SIR NORIN RAD:"What was it that one had to do in order to join the Peacemakers?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Sometimes you had to go through the Apache Line. Sometimes you might have to fight a 1 on 1,  a 2 on 1 or a 3 on 1. It depends on who the person was. If the person looked kinda shakey then they would tell him, "Do the Apache Line!" If the brother looked like he could hold his own it wasn't no Apache Line it was just, "Come on in!" With me it wasn't no Apache Line, I fought the vice president and the warlord and they let me in."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What did it mean to be a Peacemaker? Did you have to wear specific colors?"  

PUPPET MASTER:"Yeah, we all wore colors. Ours was the peace sign on the back. When the Peacemakers first started in 1971 it was a peace sign and it may have the crossed swords or  crossed 44s (guns) 'cause actually a peacemaker is a 44 pistol. A peacemaker, you know?  So yeah, we had colors, a top to bottom rocker and our symbol was the peace sign."


 

Colors of the Peacemakers

SIR NORIN RAD:"How many divisions did the Peacemakers have back then?"

PUPPET MASTER:"We had altogether 36 divisions. We had Peacemakers in the Bronx. Marmion Ave & Tremont...that's where our club house was at......Lambert, Uptown....Gun Hill Road, Edenwald Projects. We als had Peacemakers in Harlem....Douglas Projects, 145th, 144th, 143rd, 142nd Street & Broadway all that was Peacemakers' turf (territory) back then."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Talking to Kusa from the Zulu Masters I heard that what actually got him into Breaking was watching the Black Spades doing  their specific dance at Bronx River. Did the Peacemakers also have dancers among them? Would they dance at their club house or at parties?  What did their dance look like?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Yes, there was dancing going on. We would have Peacemaker parties or sometimes even when the Black Spades gave a party we would come to their party. Or the Black Spades would come to a Peacemaker party. They were our allies. Yeah, they would be dancing and there would be the gestures, you understand, the waving of the hands. They might do a little spin, kick a leg out...it wasn't going on the floor at that time."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did the Peacemakers also have an anthem? I was told that the anthem of the Black Spades was James Brown's "Soul Power". Whenever they would gather before a rumble they would listen to that song and chant, "Spade Power!" instead of "Soul Power!""

PUPPET MASTER:" Right, right. Ours was Funkadelics "Standing On The Verge Of Getting It On" and then we also had "Potential" (by Jimmy Castor). We would say,"Makers, maker, maker, maker, make" to the rhythm of the bass in the beginning of that song."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Do you recall a DJ by the name of Lay Lay who was down with the Fun City Crew? Many Puerto Rican B-Boys from such crews as The Bronx Boys or Rockwell Association told me that they went to his jams and that he was a Peacemaker once, too."

PUPPET MASTER:"Oh you're talking about Peacemaker Lay Lay. Peacemaker Lay Lay was the warlord of the Peacemakers. Peacemaker Lay Lay was an original. First of all I'd like to say,"May Allah be pleased with him!"  because this brother passed away about three or four years ago.  He was the warlord of the Peacemakers, the supreme warlord of the Peacemakers. Later on he formed Fun City. Fun City is an extension, like a subdivision of the Peacemakers. They were still Peacemakers, they just called it Fun City Crew. You understand? Like the Casanovas...most of the Casanovas were Black Spades. I know DJ Lay Lay very well, he used to play in the park over there..... 129 school yard by the pool."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Mapes...."

PUPPET MASTER:"That's right! Mapes Pool!!! He had that thing packed!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"So I guess you also know his partners DJ Stuff and DJ Apache?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Yes, yes. All this was in the area of  Southern Boulevard, Mapes, Marmion...... Our clubhouse was two blocks down from Mapes pool."

SIR NORIN RAD:"....and the Peacemakers always had Lay Lay's back whenever he would throw a party, correct?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Oh, for sure! For sure! Whenever Lay Lay came out, we were always there. Matter of fact Prince Whipper Whip used to MC for Lay Lay at one time. Me and Prince Whipper Whip grew up together. He also lived on 149th Street between Broadway and Riverside in 1974, 1975, then he moved to the Bronx on Valentine Avenue and became Prince Whipper Whip."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Do you recall the first time you saw people going off?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Okay, so now we are talking about 1973/74. My brother Mike used to go to a lot of Kool Herc parties and he used to come back telling me about this and that. How he had seen this guy doing this, how had seen this guy doing that and he would do some moves in our house and stuff. But then as I got a little older and as I started to go out, my first jam that I went to was Over The Dover."

SIR NORIN RAD:"DJ Smokey!"

PUPPET MASTER:"Right, DJ Smokey was playing there and that's where I saw B-Boys going off! They wasn't actually doing floormoves, they was rocking on the top. But then the following year I went to another party on 183rd Street & Webster Avenue......the P.A.L.....a Herc joint and they played "Shaft In Africa" and I saw this guy start spinning on the floor. That was the first time that I ever saw somebody spin on the floor! I used to call it The Spinning Top 'cause the way he did it. He used to spin...where he started from he spun so fast that he winded up on the same spot and then he spun back up with his arms crossed."     

SIR NORIN RAD:"Could you please describe the atmosphere at those parties?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Ah man! First you can hear the music when you come off the train station 'cause when you come off the train station on 174th Street the movie theatre is right there. So right away you felt the vibe! Then you came down the steps, the movie theatre was The Dover and then to the left was a little door, you had to walk up the steps one flight and that's where Over The Dover was. Smokey was there and the guys were doing their thing! Man, listen! The vibe was very, very positive! You could feel the energy! By the time you got off the train and you got to the door towards the steps...you felt the energy." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"How would the beats affect your soul at those jams?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Ah man, when you heard "Sex Machine" I mean "Give It Up Or Turn It A Loose"......goosebumps!!!! It gave you goosebumps! Especially when I started going over to Bambaataa joints because the way he was playing his music and his system...you could hear all the bongos and the drums and all those instruments. He had a bad system!!! I mean Herc had the Herculoids system and it was real nice but Bam??? Ahhhhh man!!!!!! The vibe I described at Over The Dover....."


SIR NORIN RAD:"Yeah?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Bam's vibe was ten times that! It was ten times that! Because...let me tell you...going to Bronx River, Bronxdale, just that side of town itself was crazy. A lot of people back then was kinda scared to go to Bronx River. One thing I gotta say and shout outs to Bronx River, Bronxdale, Soundview, Monroe, Lafayette everybody over there, they always showed me much love because they had respect for the B-Boy game. I used to always come out of Harlem and burn the shit out of cats, you understand? And they had respect for the game. It wasn't all about they jumping you or whatnot, if you was nice with your skills you could hang. If you got burned back then you had to leave the party because they would snap on you all night."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What caused you to go there? Was it because of your cousin Rodney B aka Puppetmaster #2? I'm asking this question because Cholly Rock (The Zulu Kings) told me that in the mid 1970ies Afrika Bamabaataa was like a mysterious figure to most people in the Bronx, not too many outside of the Soundview section knew who he was and as you said many were also scared to go to Bronx River."

PUPPET MASTER:"That's true!!! Yeah, it was that mysterious, dangerous type of vibe that
emanated from that place (laughs). But yes, my cousin Rodney B was from Lafayette. But also my best friend when I went to Samuel Gompers High School, Tyrone Butler, we used to write graffiti on the trains together.....he was from Soundview, him and his brothers Craig and Mike, they were all B-Boys. He more or less introduced me to Bronx River 'cause he started talking about Baby Huey and Yellow Sunshine and this and that and all these B-Boy joints. He had given me a 8-track......that's how far back that was.....he gave me a 8-track, not a cassette, a 8-track with B-Boy joints on it. So I used to listen to that, I used to practice in the house and then one day he showed me a ticket...it was on a Friday or Saturday......it was a ticket, not a flyer, a actual ticket....and the ticket said,"DJ Afrika Bambaataa versus Tommy The Turntable Magician" and it said,"Zulu Nation!".  I was just getting hyped because of the way it sounded. I said, "Damn!" and back then it only costed 1.50 $ to get in. So I go to the party and that's my first time.....I went off by myself...first Pase (Tyrone) went off  and then I went off by myself. From there I started going to (JHS) 123, Ronnie's Disco Inferno, Bronx River Center, in the summertime in the back of Bronx River, Rosedale Park....... just that whole area, I stayed on that side of town coming from Harlem and like I said they always showed me love. Actually, I was the only one from Harlem coming to the Bronx and burning the shit out of cats and wasn't getting in no static."   

SIR NORIN RAD:"Which definitely means a lot since Bronx River was notorious for being a tough place."

PUPPET MASTER:"Correct. Now like I said before if you came to Bronx River and you knew people or people knew you from back in the days or if you carried yourself in a certain way, nobody would mess with you BUT if you came to Bronx River and you didn't know nobody and you looked like an easy prey....you know, the wolves are always out!!! Sometimes you might leave without your coat, sometimes you might leave without your sneakers, you understand? Walking through Bronx River especially when they were jamming in the back in the summertime you could hear James Brown or Baby Huey as soon as you walked towards it in the projects. The vibe was just......oh my god!!!!!! Big ups to all the Zulu Kings.....big ups to Squirpy (Shaka), Ahmed, Artie J (Aziz)...of course Cholly Rock...all of them were top notch B-Boys so if they gave you your respect then that's what it was!"  

SIR NORIN RAD:"What made you pick up that name Puppet Master?"

PUPPET MASTER:"(chuckles) There used to be a cartoon...The Lone Ranger.....that used to come on and there was a villain called The Puppet Master.... that was an influence. Back then I was a little double jointed, you understand? The way that I danced, I was able to do certain contortions and spins and fold myself up and spin out of it and come up on my toes. I would also act like I pulled myself up by my shirt, like as if I was controlled by a puppet master or I would let my arm hang and swing like a puppet on a string. That's where I got the name Puppet Master from and it stuck to me. And then my cousin Rodney B....I taught him, he started practicing with me.....he used to go to 123 with Popeye and Wade (B-Boys of the Shaka Zulus) and all of them. He was a little younger than me but he knew Wade because he lived on their side of town an he would go,"I'm Puppet Master #2!!" I said,"Okay, alright! You're Puppet Master #2!" But he became a pretty good B-Boy."    

B-Boy Puppet Master and his cousin Rodney B aka Puppet Master #2 (The Shaka Zulus)

SIR NORIN RAD:"From what I have heard so far in the beginning of B-Boying most B-Boys would do certain routines like James Bond would do....."


PUPPET MASTER:"The Get Smart!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Right, the Get Smart...."

PUPPET MASTER:"Everybody had their signature moves. James Bond had his Telephone routine...Me I had a number of signature moves...I had my spins, I would dig the grave......"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Damn!"

PUPPET MASTER:"I would measure you up, do The Robot and measure you up. Then I would measure the ground, get my shovel, dig the grave, right? Do a nice move and then... BOOM!!.....lay you in the grave. Then I would cross my arms and rise from the grave. Other B-Boys would also do The Rise From The Grave but mine had a whole story attached to it. I would measure you up like I had a measuring tape, then measure the ground, dig the grave, then I'd jump into the grave but with my arms crossed, lay you in the grave and then I would rise from the grave. We all had signature moves, like Ahmed (The Zulu Masters), he had the Jerry Lewis and he would do the motorcycle. Everybody had their signature moves. Squirpy (aka Shaka of the Zulu Masters)....I don't know if you have ever seen the Shaw Brothers, the karate movies, where they would jump up in the air and then turn around and it's like a backkick in the air. Squirpy was good at that 'cause Squirpy looked like he could jump like maybe 4 or 5 feet up in the air and turn around and do the kick and land on the ground. Artie J (Aziz of the Zulu Masters) was nice!!! All these brothers over there was nice with it. "    

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did you also have a routine which entailed those Puppet-On-A-String type moves?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Yes, yes! If it was major competiton that's when I would bring out the Puppet Master moves."  

                                                                      

One of the Puppet Master's evil puppets (from the Lone Ranger cartoon series)

SIR NORIN RAD:"How did you become acquainted with all the Zulu Masters from Bronx River?"

PUPPET MASTER:"I saw all of them at 123. At that time they had on their snow suits with two stripes. It was winter time, they had on their snow suits with two stripes and those goggles and stuff and I had on the bubble jacket. That's actually the first time I saw the whole Zulu tribe. That's after I went to Bronx River, at 123 I saw everybody."

SIR NORIN RAD:"I see. Do you recall how you got introduced to the Shaka Zulus? Did that happen through Rodney B?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Yeah, because like I said they all lived in the same neighbourhood.  He knew Popeye, he went to school with him. He knew Wade, he knew all of them. The Shaka Zulus were the younger crew that came after the Zulu Kings. "

SIR NORIN RAD:"What do you remember about your time with the Shaka Zulus?"

PUPPET MASTER:"We all used to link up. You know, at that time none of us was really down with a specific crew. We was more like....how would you say...outlaw B-Boys, we didn't belong to no crew, we were just nice with our shit. Sometimes I would come to a party and I would see Wade (founder of the Shaka Zulus). We would all be standing there and we would see other B-Boys going off so I would tell Wade to go get'em, to go and eat them up.  Then Wade would come out and I'd jump in and eat them up. Then Rodney B. would jump in and eat them up. We were just forming a bond! We were looking for anybody that didn't belong in that neighbourhood and was trying to B-Boy. We would go off and burn the shit out of'em. That's more or less how Wade formulated the Shaka Zulus. It was a coalition! It was a coalition because we wasn't really down with no crew. We was just nice with our shit and we would come to the parties and dance! And I used to see Wade at all the parties.....123, Ronny's Disco Inferno, Bronx River and then we started to hang out. You know, me and Wade we got real tight. I was caught in the Blackout in 1977, I was stuck over there in the Blackout and the following day Kool Herc was in the back of the center and that's when I challenged Ahmed to a B-Boy battle in the back of Bronx River Center. Everybody that was there said it was one of the baddest battles in the history of B-Boying. A lot of people said that Ahmed came out a little bit over me, you know, but listen...history was already made when we did our thing. That was a hell of a battle! You can ask anybody that was there...Wade was there, Cholly Rock was there, all of the Zulus was there. People were climbing trees, climbing poles." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"So this battle took place outside, right?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Right, outside of the center in the back they had a little stage where Bambaataa used to set his equipment up and there was a little circle and that's where we all used to dance. And let me just say this for the record...it wasn't no cardboard, it was strictly concrete!!  It was strictly concrete and Pro-Keds sneakers. It wasn't no elbow pads, no helmets, nothing like that, you had to know what you was doing."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Do you remember the songs that were played during that
battle between you and Ahmed?"


PUPPET MASTER:"Oh, that was "Get Into Something".....Herc played "Get Into Something" by the Isley Brothers, then he played Baby Huey and to top it off he went to "Apache"...we went off to three or four records....that was one hell of a battle! It was me, Reggie Wells, Theron...they was from over by Crotona. They happened to be there and they helped me out. (laughs) Wade was on my side and Cholly Rock and them was on the other side.  Squirpy, Ahmed, Artie J they was all on the other side but when the smoke cleared and all was over they all came to me and shook my hand."

Ahmed (The Zulu Masters)

 
SIR NORIN RAD:"Did you ever officially join the Zulu Nation?"

PUPPET MASTER:"After that battle Ahmed told me to come to Bam's house the next day.  So I came to Bam's house the next day, it was a a long line of people standing in front of Bam's door to sign that book. I came there, I stood in the back of the line. Ahmed saw me, he called me towards the front. I signed the book and they gave me a card and that's all it was." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"Which other DJs used to play breakbeats for the B-Boys at 123 besides Afrika Bambaataa?"

PUPPET MASTER:"At any given time you'd go to 123 you could hear Mario,  you could hear Kool Dee, you could hear Tex. Even Breakout came to 123 a couple of times."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Speaking of Mario what were the most notable B-Boys out of Bronxdale that would dance at his parties?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Oh, those were some good brothers! First and foremost I'd like to say,"Rest In Peace!" to my man Stearling. He passed away maybe about six or seven years ago. He was a good brother! Stearling, Cleamont, Cookie all of them were from Bronxdale. Mike G, you had Lil Black Jack over there from the third section of Bronxdale. All of them was good to me. Like I said I used to go with a girl over there in Bronxdale. That's where we used to hang! You had B-Girls...Maggie, Lilo...those were DJ Tex's sisters. And then in Bronx River there was Trina." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"What kind of snacks and drinks were being consumed at those parties? I hope that's not a stupid question but I have always wondered about this."

PUPPET MASTER:"Nah, nah, that's not a stupid question. Before you got to the party you better get yourself a beer or a Malt Duck or that Nighttrain or whatever. White Castle was right across the street from 123. Anytime you wanted something to munch on or something to drink you would get your stuff from there. Bronx River...I never saw them selling no punch or nothing you always had to go to the store before you got there but as things progressed....with  places like the Audubon Ballroom, Ronnie's Disco Inferno, Hunts Point Palace... there you could buy a punch or get some water. Back in the early days you had to BYOBB - bring your own brown bag. Everybody went to White Castle for munchies after the party."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What exactly are the "munchies"?

PUPPET MASTER:"Oh, being at a party sometimes we would be smoking Chunky Black. Chunky Black was the weed that we were smoking at the time. So we had Acapulco Gold, we had the Chunky Black, we had the Panamanian Red, you understand? Smoking all that entailed getting hungry a.k.a the munchies. After we was puffed we would get the munchies so we would go to White Castle or whatever was open and get a cubano sandwich or a Murder Burger. You know, something like that."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Who was Voodoo Master Herb?"

PUPPET MASTER:"He was a B-Boy from Harlem.....145th Street. Actually, he was a Peacemaker, he was a Harlem Peacemaker and he started to hang out in the Bronx with me. There were only like maybe three cats from Harlem that I used to bring with me to Bronx River. Voodoo Master Herb was one of them. 1974, 1975 there wasn't too many cats from Harlem going over there unless they knew people. I was the only one that I know of....me and the other three cats that I used to take....that would go to Bronx River, in the heart of Zulu country. Back then that was unheard of."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Who were the other two persons from Harlem that you used to take to Bronx River with you?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Ant Man and Kev. Ant Man was a B-Boy, Kev wasn't."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What are your top 5 breakbeats of all time?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Ahhhhh! Top 5! Top 5! Number one....Baby Huey "Listen To Me", number two.....from James Brown.."Give It Up Or turn It Aloose", number three was "Apache", number four....Dynamic Corvettes "Funky Music Is The Thing".....number five is King Gerrsson "Doing The Do" ("Mandamentos Black"). Those are my top 5 records, especially "Doing The Do"! When Bam used to throw that on, we didn't know what the fuck that was but the beat was banging!!!!

SIR NORIN RAD:"So I guess you would say that Afrika Bambaataa was the DJ who had the illest breakbeats back then?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Yeah, he would play super crazy beats that you had never ever heard before. Crazy beats!!!! All the crazy beats you would hear at Bam's joints!  You would hear all the regular beats like "The Mexican", "Give It Up And Turn It Aloose" at other parties but when you went to Bambaataa you heard some exotic shit."

SIR NORIN RAD:"How would prepare yourself for jam while you were still at your house? What kind of clothes and cologne would you put on?"

PUPPET MASTER:"I knew I would be B-Boying so I would have on some Lee jeans, some Pro-Keds, probably a mockneck....shortsleeve 'cause I knew it would be getting hot in there. If it was really cold outside I would put on a longsleeve mockneck or a wool mockneck and I would have on either a bubble jacket or a Cortefiel coat. For a hat I would have on a wool Kangol, in the summertime I had a summer Kangol." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"Which cologne was popular back then?"

PUPPET MASTER:"Back then everybody was rocking that Royal Bain de Champaigne or Royal Copenhagen. Some might throw on Grey Flanell but everybody used to rock Royal Bain de Champaigne and Royal Copenhagen 'cause they sold them at A.J. Lester's on 125th Street."

SIR NORIN RAD:"How important was it to be original as a B-Boy? Was it okay to bite somebody else's moves?"

PUPPET MASTER:"You might get stomped out for doing that! That's true! You might get stomped out for biting somebody's moves. You had to come up with your own original shit, you know!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Okay, and how important was it to match the music with your moves back then? This is one of the questions that I ask every original B-Boy as I have noticed that nowadays many so-called B-Boys totally ignore the beat when they go off. That wasn't accepted during your era, was it? You also didn't go off to just any type of beat, right?" 

PUPPET MASTER:"Oh no, no, no!! See, the beat counts!! The nastier that drumbeat the better your moves will look! Back then the beat always counted. How can you B-Boy to a whack beat??? That's counterproductive! You gotta have a nice heavy beat, you understand? Bongos, drums, guitars....all that!!! I come from back in the days and the beat always counts. I understand what you're saying 'cause sometimes I watch these guys on youtube and their moves don't match the beat.  They're out of step! They're out of step! You had to be on time, on step with the beat! There's a lot of science that went into that. We didn't know about science at the time but we was calculating the rythm of the beat to our movement. Everything was insync with the beat, even when we did a freeze it was insync with the beat, when we came back up it was insync with the beat! That's it!  Going against the beat ain't really B-Boying."















 

                                   Interview with B-Boy Wil Ski (The Seven Deadly Sins)




                                                   

WIL SKI (THE SEVEN DEADLY SINS)

                                        conducted by Sir Norin Rad (The Intruders/Germany)

SIR NORIN RAD:"From which part of the Boogie Down Bronx are you originally?"

WIL SKI:"Kingsbridge Road & Morris Avenue. That's where Tracy 168 (legendary BX Style Writer) was from as well."

SIR NORIN RAD:"How old were you when you encountered B-Boying for the first time and what got you into it?"

WIL SKI:"I was about 16. We used to breakdance out in the streets...like block parties and we used to also battle in the hallways. My brother hasn't been mentioned....I don't know why my brother has never been mentioned... a lot of things have not been mentioned about us. He was the one who brought it (the dance) to us. He used to go to school where Flash, Caz and others use to hang around at and ended up learning from them. He use to come home like everyday with 12 inch records and use to be in his room practicing on his Technics turntables and Gemini mixer with a speaker at the window making tapes and we use to watch him. Every now and then he would play back the tape he had recorded and would bust a move here and there and so one day we asked him if he would teach us. He was like, "You're sure you wanna take a chance doing this? You might get hurt." We were intrigued by what we would see him do so we were like," Hell yeah . .!!!" So he began showing us the basics and we would practice while he would be DJing. He was the one that formed The Seven Deadly Sins."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What's your brother's name?"

WIL SKI:"His DJ name was Cool Sky." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"Who were the members of the Seven Deadly Sins?"

WIL SKI:"It was seven of us. It was me, Lil Lep...at the time his name was Ray Ski, my other brother Reggie....we used to call him Reggie Reg. Then we had Benny B, we had P-Man, we had Sin Bad, we had Lil Flip Rock and my other brother Cool Sky. Then we had Fastbreak and Johnny Dee as our substitutes. Whenever one of us was missing Fastbreak was right there. We also had a mascot, my little sister Crystal Dee. May she rest peace! She was 6 years old and she was the mascot of the Seven Deadly Sins."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Who was the president of The Seven Deadly Sins?"

WIL SKI:"The president of our crew was my brother, Cool Sky. The best B-Boy of the Seven Deadly Sins was Lil Lep, my partner. Whenever we battled against other crews we would let the other five (B-Boys of our crew) start it all because they weren't as skilled as we were and then me and Lil Lep would take over after that." 

B-Boy Ray Ski a.k.a Lil Lep (The Seven Deadly Sins)

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did your crew have something like a hang out spot?"

WIL SKI:"Yes, we used to go to Lil Lep's sister's house. We used to get high there, smoke some weed. Back then we also used to drink a vine called Night Train. We used to drink that with a little bit of weed and that's all she wrote. If we had to battle we would take it to the building next door which was my building or we would take it to the Family Force building which was basically the last stop for a lot of B-Boys from all over the Bronx who tried to battle us."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What's the story behind the Family Force building?"

WIL SKI:"The Family Force were the older guys from our block, they were like basically our bodyguards. They used to hang out in that building. So whenever we would be outside and people would come and want to battle us, we used to go into their building...the Family Force building..and we used to battle right in the hallway." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"Where did you get your music from when these battles took place?"

WIL SKI:"We would have a boombox. My brother (Cool Sky) would bring his boombox with his mix tapes...we would throw it on and get busy!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"On what kind of a floor would these battles take place?"

WIL SKI:"Marble floor....That's another thing. When we started breakdancing in the late 1970ies/ early 1980ies we never practiced or had any battles on cardboard! We did that on the hallway marble floor or on the concrete street! We never did that cardboard stuff. That came afterwards. We would scrape up our elbows and have calluses on our shoulders from doing windmills."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Would your brother DJ Cool Sky also throw parties in the streets back then?"

WIL SKI:"Yeah, we would close the block down, we would get permits. You know back then...especially in the summer....there was a block party everyday!  Everyday there was a block party somewhere or a house party somewhere. Most battles took place in the streets..at those block parties but when individuals like Crazy Legs and Lil Crazy Legs (The Rock Steady Crew)....they heard of us, we didn't know who they were........they came to us. They saw us out there, they asked about us, we told them who we were, they told us who they were and they told us that they wanted a battle. So we battled, we took it to the hallway being that they came to our block. Other individuals would do the same thing. They would come to our block and we battled."     

SIR NORIN RAD:"How were the winners of these battles determined back then? I guess back then there were no judges involved, were they?"

WIL SKI:"No, there were no judges but there was always a crowd, you know? Whenever there was a battle they would come. Whoever was out in the streets at that time we would let them know, "We're about to battle so and so." Then we'd go to the hallway and we'd do what we got to do. They (the crowd) would call it. Whoever they thought was the best they would call it."

SIR NORIN RAD:"How did that battle against Crazy Legs and Lil Crazy Legs go down? Who took that one?"

WIL SKI:"I would say in that battle we basically came out on top. They had nice moves, especially Lil Crazy Legs......and, you know, we had ours! We always ended up like a tie. It would never be like a blowout or something like that. Nah! It was always like, "Damn! Next time we gotta do better!"  I guess they would think the same way. Next time they'd come they would have better moves and we would have better moves."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So you battled them more than once?"

WIL SKI:"We battled twice! We battled in the block parties one time...in Bainbridge Ave & 196th. We first battled in the Family Force building though, then we battled in Bainbridge."

Lil Crazy Legs (The Rock Steady Crew)

SIR NORIN RAD:"What were some of the block party locations on your side of the Bronx were B-Boying took place regularly?"

WIL SKI:"Most block parties that were real big were on Decatur Avenue, Bainbridge Avenue, Marion Avenue....Those were like the most favourite spots for block parties. "

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did your brother Cool Sky also DJ at those spots?"

WIL SKI:"Yeah, he would DJ there, too. He played on our block, too, on Morris Avenue."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What were some of the other DJs that played breakbeats for the B-Boys in that area?"

WIL SKI:"We had DJ Lil Chase, we had..DJ Will Rock...I think it was Will Rock...DJ Ronnie Ron."

SIR NORIN RAD:"In which year did the Seven Deadly Sins start?"

WIL SKI:"1979....in the summer of 1979."

SIR NORIN RAD:"I must say that I really dig that name. Who came up with it?"

WIL SKI:"My brother Cool Sky. His real name was Victor."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did he dance under the name of Cool Sky?"

WIL SKI:"Nah, when he started the crew he didn't breakdance. He just used to teach us. He was our DJ but he taught us how to dance. He laid the foundation down, put it that way and we took it from there."

SIR NORIN RAD:"I see. Now what kind of relationship did the Seven Deadly Sins have with the Floormasters who later on became the New York City Breakes and appeared in that famous movie "Beat Street" in 1984? Lil Lep became a part of them, right?"

WIL SKI:"Well, the Floormasters....we all went to school together. Pex, Chino, Matthew aka Glide Master who died in a car accident....we all went to school together. They weren't into breakdancing. It just so happened that they would go to parties and they would see us doing what we were doing and then they would imitate us in their block. One time we went by, we would see them doing that and we were like, "Oh shit, look at these guys doing it!" So we went over there and we were like, "We didn't know you was into this!" and they were like, "Nah, we're just practicing. Getting into it."  We gave them little lessons and they took it from there but we never thought that they would end up making a crew in the long run."  

SIR NORIN RAD:"Around which time did your crew the Seven Deadly Sins disband?"

WIL SKI:"I would say around 1981/82. Around 81/82 I turned into rapping and I turned into crime. The other individuals they went about their bussiness, they weren't showing up no more. So you know, it just like died as far as the Seven Deadly Sins was concerned. Lil Lep ended up getting with the Floormasters because he got bored by just being by himself or whatever and so he started practicing with them, teaching them little moves here, little moves there. "

SIR NORIN RAD:"What did the B-Boys of your era (late 1970s- early 1980s) wear?"

WIL SKI:"Back then most of our footgear was Adidas. Shelltops! Shelltops Adidas....all different colors! Lees (jeans).....different colors. It was always sweatshirts..if it was in the winter you had on a long sleeve sweatshirt with the colors in the back, in the summer you had on a short sleeve sweatshirt."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What about BVDs ?"

WIL SKI:"Yeah, BVDs, Paris.....first Paris.......that was the first ones....Paris. Then Paris went out of style and we would start wearing BVDs." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"How important was the aspect of Toprocking during your era?"

WIL SKI:"That was very important because that's the start of the battle. You start on top, you know you start from there. You do little moves...like me and Lil Lep used to have routines. I would do my moves like I would make a move like I shoot him and he would drop into one of our other members arms and they would throw him up and he would fly up, go down to the floor and start there....doing his breaking moves, going into his windmills or whatever he is going to do. But Uprocking was very important, that was very important!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Thank you! Could you please also describe the importance of the music to the B-Boys of your era?"

WIL SKI:"The breakbeats were very important. The beats were what made you do your moves. Like I said you start on the top then you go down to the floor but everything is always based on the music. You go according to the beats! Most of the times when we were going to battle we would know the DJ. So we would go to the DJ and let him know, "We're about to battle this crew. Put on this beat or put on that beat! Start like this!" and they would do what we asked them to do. But music played a very important part!" 

SIR NORIN RAD:"That was the time when DJs still had to have a strong soundsystem to rock a party. I was told that you could hear the beats from several blocks away when DJs set up in a park back then."

WIL SKI:"Hell yeah!!  You had to have the high power speakers. The baddest ones was Kool  Herc & The Herculords. You had to have a high power soundsytem so the B-Boys would FEEL the music. You gotta feel it, if you don't feel it you can't dance the way you want. You gotta feel that shit!! You have to have your heart beat to the music. That's what hypes you up!!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"So what would go through your mind back then when you and your crew were in the streets and all of a sudden you started hearing those funky breakbeats ?"

WIL SKI:"We would be like,"Where is this beat coming from???" We would follow it. "It's over here!!! Let's go!" So everybody would rush to that spot. It was crazy!!! It was crazy back then!!! You'd hear the music and you'd just follow it and once you'd follow it you would see crowds and before you know it you would be right where the jam was at."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So flyers weren't always needed to draw huge crowds to a party?"

WIL SKI:"You also had flyers to let you know what was going on. Most of the flyers were for clubs like Harlem World or the T-Connection. You'd see the flyers..."Oh, Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five are going to be at the T-Connection!" or "Grandwizard Theodore & The Fantastic Five are going to be at Harlem World!"but when it came to block parties or house parties you'd just follow the music. You'd just follow the crowd. You would bump into people, "Yo, where's the jam at?"  "It's over here in Bainbridge & 196th!" "Oh, word?!?" "It's in the house or in the street?" "No, it's in the basement!" "Oh shit! Word?!?!" So you would go there and once you heard the music you would follow it."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So did you also attend those parties at the T-Connection and check out all these various DJs with their MC crews?"

WIL SKI:"Hell yeah, that's how I started rapping. Listening to them, going home and visualizing myself  doing what they was doing and I would start writing my rhymes down and then I would throw on one of my brother's tapes and practice. He didn't know that I was doing that. He thought I was just breakdancing but I was transforming." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"I have spoken to a B-Boy called Lil Boy Keith....."

WIL SKI:"I know exactly who he is. Lil Boy Keith from the Zulu Kings. They were the first B-Boy crew."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Yes, and he told me about a very large Puerto Rican B-Boy crew called TDK...."

WIL SKI:"The Disco Kids...."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Right, and they would throw parties in abandoned buildings. Creating their own little club houses. Are you familiar with them?"

WIL SKI:"Yeah, we would go to their jams, too!  We would do the same thing. We would steal the power from the light poles in the streets and run it into the basement of an abandoned building. You know how many times police ran up into our houses and surrounded the whole place and took my brother's equipment and records?  Ah man, everybody running, trying to get away. -That's how it was back then. Everywhere! Creston, Morris, Davidson.......there were a lot of abandoned buildings there....Decatur....we would get in there, get into the basement, clean it up real good, run the power in there from a light pole and let the people know, "Yo! We're throwing a jam! We're charging 1$ for guys and 1$ for girls." Have you ever heard of this guy....I forgot his name...he's a known DJ today...from the Bronx...his nickname when we was growing up together was Poochie....he started DJing and he started imitating Flash and he was nice! He's black but lightskin."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Are you talking about Kid Capri?"

WIL SKI:"Kid Capri! His name is Poochie. I had him throwing house parties for me and he was from Kingsbridge Terrace and I also used to live down there at the time. So when I wanted to throw a house party I would go to him. I would let him know,"We're charging 1$ for guys and 1$ for girls and we gonna give the girls one joint for free." So basically you're really selling your weed to the girls, you know what I'm saying? (we're both laughing)" 

SIR NORIN RAD:"What would you do with the furniture in these buildings?"

WIL SKI:"If it was a house party in somebody's apartment we would take out all the furniture from the living room and put it into the room connected to it. You gotta take everything out. It gotta be completely empty. The DJ equipment would be in the kitchen and the windows would be open. If it was to the front or to the back, it didn't matter, you would hear the music."  

SIR NORIN RAD:"I guess the DJ would play all these legendary breakbeats at these parties like "Apache" or "It's Just Begun"?"

WIL SKI:"Hell yeah!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"What about other types of music?"

WIL SKI:"They would throw on Hustle music, Disco music. Yeah, you know they would throw that on because you got different crowds. You got people who wanna hear that and wanna dance to that. So the DJ gotta throw both in and you may throw on a little Salsa. Throw on a little Salsa so the DJ can get a little break and the B-Boys and MCs can get their shit together, get their heads right. You already know when the music shuts off and you hear the Masters Of The Ceremonies, the MCs doing their introduction. You already know what's coming!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"What about slow music? I was told that at Kool Herc's parties there would always be one segment of the party where the DJs would throw on slow joints, they would dim the lights and the guys would do the 500 with the girls."

WIL SKI:"Yo, you're giving me a flashback! Word! When that shit comes on, B-Boys turn into lovers (chuckles). The slow jams gotta play a role, too in the jam. It ain't gonna be just B-Boy music all night. You gotta have that, you gotta have slow jams, you gotta have Hustle music, you gotta have a little Salsa, you know? Even Jamaican music! You gotta have a variety of music at your jam. Mind you, a party in the street might start at 9.30 / 10.00 o'clock. Sometimes they started even earlier and they won't end till 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning. It only ends when the police comes, "Hey, hey, you gotta break that shit up!" Most parties in the streets didn't have permits."
  SIR NORIN RAD:"When you were brought up as a child did you learn how to dance Salsa? Did that influence your B-Boy skills?"

WIL SKI:"I was brought up with dancing Salsa but I wasn't too thrilled with that. You know, I was raised around it but I wasn't going for that. We also danced the Hustle."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Is it true that back then there was always the danger of having to deal with stick up kids or with people who tried to step to you at jams? Was that something that played a role at those jams in your part of the BX?"

WIL SKI:"Everywhere! Not just Kingsbridge (Ave)....wherever you went, wherever there was a party whether it was in the streets, whether it was in a house, whether it was in a school...wherever there was a party there were stick-up kids. That's why a lot of us ended up getting strapped (carrying weapons)."   

SIR NORIN RAD:"You have mentioned Jimmy Lee (founder of the Rock Steady Crew) quite often in our previous conversations. What is your relationship with him?"

WIL SKI:"That's my boy! I go see him I take care. I just finished speaking to him before I had this interview with you. That's my boy right there!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"So I guess you met him long before that battle against Crazy Legs and Lil Crazy Legs took place?"

WIL SKI:"That's correct! I battled him, too."

SIR NORIN RAD:"How did that battle go down? Please elaborate!"

WIL SKI:"We bumped heads.....Jimmy Lee was originally a member of TBB (The Bronx Boys). He like most guys from 183rd street was affiliated with TBB. I hung out there, too. So when Jimmy Lee was with TBB I ended up battling him. TBB was close to us so we would always bump heads and whenever we bumped heads we would battle. Didn't matter where it would be at. It could be Fordham Road...if we bumped heads there, we would take it to a side street and we'd battle! Even with no music!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Damn!!!! How did these battles start?"

WIL SKI:"It was probably words like,"Yo! What's up, man?!? Claiming you do this, claiming you do that. What you wanna do?!?! You wanna do this right now or what!?" You know, and we would take it from there. Mom would be tight when we got home. Clothes all messed up. "What were y'all doing???" Remember like I said we weren't doing it on cardboard, we were doing it on concrete. So when we got home our pants would be ripped, our shirts all messed up, dirty. "

SIR NORIN RAD:"Where did that battle against Jimmy Lee take place at?"

WIL SKI:"We battled on Davidson Ave off of Fordham Road." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"You mentioned that the legendary Style Writer Tracy 168 lived very close to you. Did he know you and your crew?"

WIL SKI:"Of course. Yes, most definetely."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did you write as well? I have heard that many Puerto Rican B-Boys were also Writers like Spy (Crazy Commanders) would write Space 1000 and he would go bombing with Trace 2 (The Bronx Boys)."

WIL SKI:"No, I didn't write but a lot of members from the Seven Deadly Sins like Benny B and P-Man they use to do Graffiti.  They used to go bombing, throwing up their names and stuff like that but I wasn't a Writer."

B-Boy Wil Ski (The Seven Deadly Sins)

                                                      

                                Interview with DJ EZ Mike (Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five)



                                                    

DJ EZ MIKE

                                          conducted by Sir Norin Rad (The Intruders / Germany)


SIR NORIN RAD:"From which part of the Bronx are you originally?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"I'm originally from the South Bronx. I grew up on...well the main street that we normally talk about is Hoe Avenue, Faile Street and Bryant Avenue off of Southern Boulevard by Aldus Street. That's where I originally grew up at. This is the heart of the South Bronx where there is the police station......they made a movie about it called "Fort Apache"..which is the police station,  the original police station by Simpson Street."

SIR NORIN RAD:"How did you get involved with B-Boying?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Well, I always danced. We just did it in my neighbourhood at little house parties but then I would go to a Kool Herc party and I would witness people breakdancing. But the form of B-Boy I was and the type of breakdancing I was doing was different from what you see today. The dance changed as the years went on. We didn't do windmills on the floor because we didn't dirty our clothes. We dressed very nice. So it had a lot to do with hand movements, facial gestures and footwork. I guess they call it Up-Rocking today."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So that means at that time the dance involved a lot of finesse and funkyness and you had to shine through your personality?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Exactly! You had to have your own aura about yourself, your smoothness and your classiness with it. One of the main differences between then and now is you had to dance to the whole song. It was no two moves and then go standing to the side. If the record was ten minutes long you had to dance ten minutes and save your best moves for the break part."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Songs like "Get Ready" by The Rare Earth or "Listen To Me" by Baby Huey that were really long."

DJ EZ MIKE:"Very long songs! Very long songs! And you had to dance to the whole song....throughout the whole song you had to add some nice moves but as I said you saved your best moves for the break."

SIR NORIN RAD:"To what kind of Kool Herc party did you go? Was it in a club like the Twilight Zone, The Hevalo or The Executive Playhouse? Or was it outside?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"It was in a park and then it was inside of a school, in the gym part of a school. But at first it was the park, outside...."
    
SIR NORIN RAD:"Were you impressed by what you saw at Kool Herc's parties? Like his B-Boys goin' off?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Well, I went there to burn somebody. I wasn't impressed with nobody else. I thought I was the best. It was me, this guy named Mean Gene who is Grandwizard Theodore's brother, this dude named Profile a.k.a. Black Jerry...his name was Jerry, another guy by the name of Bumpy Face Melvin. So we had a little crew already. We were neighbourhood dancers but we went to that party. We went there to show our stuff."  

B-Boy / DJ Mean Gene

SIR NORIN RAD:"So Black Jerry is the same person as Profile?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Exactly! Same person! And look at his name PROFILE.... that speaks for itself about the way we danced because he was really our lead dancer. He was so smooth and his name was Profile. So how do you profile? If you look at the word "profile" how do you do that? He did it dancing. I already knew how to dance but he had profile with his dance!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Where was Profile from?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Black Jerry/Profile...he lived in the South Bronx but over by Forest Projects. Over in that area...like not exactly in the projects but that area."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So you are saying that you had a little crew back then consisting of you, Profile, Bumpy Face Melvin, Mean Gene ......"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Yes, also before he became Grandmaster Flash.....Flash!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Oh shit!"

DJ EZ MIKE:"You know that's my best friend, right?"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Yes! Did your crew have a specific name or did you just go out and attend parties together?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"We would attend parties together and dance. We would rehearse dance steps, routines....We didn't have a name, we really didn't have a name. We just was dancers who loved dancing."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Were you already called EZ Mike back then when you were a B-Boy?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"No, they used to call me Black Mike." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"What about Flash? Did he have a B-Boy name?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Flash! His name was Flash!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"What kind of clothes did you wear back then? I guess you wore Cortefiel coats, Playboy shoes, Overlaps, Italian knits......" 

DJ EZ MIKE:"Exactly! So you didn't dirty that up. That was very expensive clothing back then. We didn't wear sneakers and jeans. So again when you go back to the word PROFILE it kinda speaks for itself and the way we danced. And you gotta remember it's all similar to.....if you notice the B-Boys that came later on they dressed accordigly to the way they danced. You know, the Shelltoe Adidas, the jeans......We dressed accordingly to our time, to the way we danced and they did the same according to theirs."  

SIR NORIN RAD:"So would you say that your era of B-Boying was the one from 1972-74?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Exactly! That's the correct time frame because I danced until I turned 16 which was in 1974." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"How would you describe Bumpy Face Melvin's dancing style?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Oh my God! I would have to say he was Profile number 2. I would have to say that! Like he was so smooth with his dance moves. Him and Black Jerry/ Profile they were very talented dancers with their footwork, their hand movement.....I would have to give Melvin that. He was great!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Where did you draw your inspiration from as far as dancing is concerned? Did it come from watching James Brown, the Nicholas Brothers and Soul Train?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"I woul have to attribute my style of dancing to James Brown because I always danced like James Brown when I was eight and nine years old. So I always liked the idea of dancing. I used to imitate James Brown when I was a kid and people would pay me to do it."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So by the time B-Boying started evolving into a dance that was done mainly on the floor you transitioned into DJing is that correct?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Correct because we weren't as athletic like that. The way some of these guys started doing it.....jumping through smoke rings and doing backflips and stuff like that. We were doing it like.....like I said... PROFILE...we took to that style of dancing. By the time the dance started changing we were like, "Ok, that's a bit much!" A guy that I was battling did a backflip and when he did the backflip he kicked me in my face!!  It was an accident but how you get kicked in your face dancing? I didn't understand that. It was almost like dancing became a hazard."

SIR NORIN RAD:"When you and Bumpy Face Melvin and them were practicing together back then did you also practice routines or did you rather focus on your own individual moves?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"No, we had routines! If you look at Kid & Play when they do that thing back to back and their foot hit each other...we was doing that back then in 1972!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"The late Phase 2 (RIP) mentioned that in the early 1970ies there were clubs like The Tunnel or The Puzzle in the BX  were cats would be dancing at. I also read that Kool Herc went to these clubs before he started DJing himself. Would you go there as well?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"You see those clubs.....you gotta remember, they didn't have clubs like that where you could go to in 1971, 1972 when you were just 13, 14 years old. We had nowhere to go...no clubs because we were too young to get in...... not until the DJ stuff really kicked off. Then, you know, we started being able to go in clubs and DJ. Most clubs served alcohol and we were underage. We would go to Walton High School gym, JHS 123 gym....stuff like that."  

SIR NORIN RAD:"So what were some of the venues that you would go to where people would be dancing against each other?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"James Monroe High School, JHS 123, Roosevelt High School, Stevenson High School...quite a few high schools." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"I'm impressed! So at all these high schools there would be parties were B-Boys danced back in the early 1970ies?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Correct. That's correct to say!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"I have been told that during the early days of B-Boying battles wouldn't go down like they do nowadays. Cats would dance with their opponent right in front of them. So they would be dancing at the same time and react to each other's moves unlike today where B-Boys jump into a circle, do their moves, get out and have their opponent responding to them subsequently. Is that something you experienced as well on your side of the Bronx?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Yes, exactly! He can't stand there and watch you! He had to be doing his stuff. You had to have footwork, facial expressions, hand gestures and you can't do that by yourself!!!  You're battling somebody! Every now and then depending on what you do you get a "Uuuuuuh!!!" from the crowd and you don't wanna get too many "Uuuuhs" by what your opponent does because if they say "Uuuuuh!" that much based on what he does you're losing!  And again it was very important to dance to the whole song because you could lose the battle if you're getting too tired before the break......you couldn't perform your signature moves then. So if your energy is gone and mine is still there I'll beat you! So we would dance ten minutes straight....off of one song! You can't stop! You had to have calmer moves to reserve energy  for the break but every now and then you had to explode."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So what were some of the songs that you would dance to back then?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"James Brown, Baby Huey....It was a couple of James Brown songs though....."Give It Up Or Turn It A Loose"..."Sex Machine". I used to do the Hustle, too. So I didn't just breakdance I did the Hustle as well. "Trans- Europe Express"...that was later on..I used to do the Hustle to that. The thing about "Listen To Me" by Baby Huey was your footwork had to match what was going on in that song......like the beat and the horns and every detail of it. You got to remember when I was breakdancing there was no cutting (by the DJ) going on. They just put the record on and let it play."

James Brown - Sex Machine (contains the legendary B-Boy Song "Give It Up Or Turn It A Loose"  OG Copy Norin Rad's Stash)

SIR NORIN RAD:"DJing was totally different.There was no backspin at that time......."

DJ EZ MIKE:"Flash invented that, you know what I'm saying! You had to dance from the beginning of the song to the end. Flash came along and made it possible for you to lose your mind for 10 minutes 'cause he kept the breakbeat going."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So what made you pick up DJing after you had stopped B-Boying?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Flash made me pick it up. I would have never DJed if it wasn't for Flash. He taught me everything I know about DJing. Flash wanted to understand why is it that I have to wait for the breakbeat to lose my mind? So for two or three years he was missing in action. That's my best friend and we were together everyday. All of a sudden he stopped coming out. And all of the time he was in the house, perfecting the backspin and extending the breakbeat. Once he got it together.....I slept at his house that night and he woke me up at like 4 o'clock in the morning to show me what he had done and I'm the first one to witness what he invented.  Then he started teaching me how to do it. Now, even though he taught me how to do it...in the house I was incredible..in front of people I was too nervous, I couldn't do it. So people like Theodore came out before me but I was already doing it. So it took time until Flash finally said,"Okay, you're ready!" And I came out and I became like a full-fledged partner. Even before the group started (Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five) me and Flash were together. There was no group (of MCs) when we started DJing. It was me and Flash, my best friend." 

August 18th, 1979: Grandmaster Flash, Disco Bee, DJ EZ Mike & The Furious Five are rocking at the legendary Webster P.A.L. in the Bronx

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did you perceive Flash's invention as something that would forever change Hiphop when he first showed it to you that night?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"No. In all actuality I got mad that he woke me up to show me that stuff. I'm like, "Are you serious?!!?" Then I went back to bed.... No, he left me first! He was like,"I'm going to bed!" I'm standing there like,"Ok, I'm not trying to understand what you just did! I'm not impressed! I don't know what's going on here. Whatever, man...I'm going back to bed, too!" I didn't grasp that every DJ on the planet earth would start putting their hand on the record. I don't care what you do with a turntable if you put on your hand on the record it's because of Flash being the first one to do it."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So it was only through his invention of the backspin that MCs later on would have continuous beats to rhyme over?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Exactly, and sometimes people misinterpret when we say,"Flash created rapping." People misinterpret that! The song the people would rap over, you couldn't say it over the part where there was lyrics. You had to wait for the break and say your little nursery rhymes. What Flash did allowed you to write a ten-minute-rhyme cause he gave you an extended beat to rap over. So by him developing that people had the opportunity now to write rhymes."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Some of his MCs namely Melle Mel and Mr. Ness were B-Boys before they picked up the microphone, is that correct?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Exactly, me and Mel used to battle each other before he started rapping. I battled Mel quite a few times. His footwork was superb! When I battled him he gave me a run for my money because his footwork was better than mine. He had great, great footwork! We danced against each other in a rec room around 1973/74. Mr. Ness used to breakdance as well but he never danced against me. I personally think I was that much better than him. That wouldn't have been a battle. That would have been unfair. "

DJ EZ Mike and Melle Mel (The Furious Five)

   


SIR NORIN RAD:"How did the crowd react when Flash showed his backspin technique in public for the first time?"


DJ EZ MIKE:"They were enthusiastic and confused. People did not dance to the break at first. They wanted to know how did he get the break going as long. So everybody that came to the party, they came to stand and watch. So it took a while before they started dancing again. At first they were mesmerized and confused and wondering,"How is he doing it?"

SIR NORIN RAD:"What was the umbrella term for your whole crew?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"You mean for the Hiphop group?"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Yes, DJs and MCs..."
DJ EZ MIKE:"First it was just DJ Flash, not Grandmaster, it was just Flash. Cowboy used to rap on the mic at the block parties here and there. Then when he got Melle Mel and Kid Creole it became Grandmaster Flash & The 3 MCs. Then he got Mr. Ness and it became Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Four. Then he got Rahiem and it became Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five. Even though it was Grandmaster Flash, DJ Disco Bee and DJ EZ Mike, the name of the group was Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five."

June 6th, 1980: Grandmaster Flash,  Disco Bee, DJ EZ Mike & The Furious Five are rocking at the Ecstasy Garage in the BX

SIR NORIN RAD:"What was your function as a DJ when you played with Flash? What kind of music did you play?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Well, I would play any song that Flash did not have in his line-up. You can't play a song twice! So Flash's segment was of all the number one top b-boy songs. Any other song like Cheryl Lynn's  "Got To Be Real" I would tear that up and as I got better I could step in and cut with Flash on his major songs. We would go around the turntable catching the beat. "1,2,3,4 hit it!" By the time it goes "4, hit it!" Flash would move out the way and I would spin back the record and catch it, then spin back the other record and catch it. When I moved out the way Disco Bee would spin back the record and catch it and we would go around the turntables like that. "

SIR NORIN RAD:"Would you go record shopping with Flash?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Ok, I'm a DJ that mimicked Flash. I don't know shit about records! The only thing I know about songs is what Flash taught me. Flash would go by hisself. Every now and then I'd go with him but I just did that to be with him. As far as picking out records, listening to them one by one, being in a record store for seven hours looking for beats that was Flash's baby. I don't know how he could do it I never had the patience for it but he would just go through 1000 records.....one by one...it may have twelve songs on one album...he would pick up that needle and go through all twelve songs at the record store!!!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"So he was like real patient and had a deep passion for breakbeats?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Oh my god! It was unbelievable! He would buy some albums, we'd go home, he' play them and then break them because it wasn't what he was looking for. Threw them away."

SIR NORIN RAD:"How many crates of beats did your crew have at the height of its career?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"I would say thirty. You gotta remember you had to have your crates lined up in a way that they are like an orchestra. An orchestra starts off in one area but as they are playing it's building up. So your crates are lined up like they are starting off smooth and then you go up, then you bring it down again to a cool level. Now the next time you're going up....oh my god..you better go up all the way because the party is starting at 6 o'clock and it's not ending till 3 o'clock in the morning! How do you do that? So I need to play interesting records on the cool out tip, interesting records on the slow tip and then interesting records for the rest of the night."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So that means you had to plan in advance and arrange your crates accordingly so that you were able to cover each segment of the party? Like setting the atmosphere when the people came in, getting them into a certain groove and then speeding it up with the heavy breakbeats before you cooled it down?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Right. So now you have to remember...who are you DJing for? For yourself or the people?"

SIR NORIN RAD:"The people."

DJ EZ MIKE:"Right. So now I'm DJing for the people. My plan is to start off with crate number three. Half way in crate number three nobody is on the dancefloor, so I'm jumping to crate number nine. Crate number just got deaded! Now I'm going to crate number nine 'cause I gotta get this party started. So you may have your arrangement but based on the reaction you're getting you may have to change that."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What was Disco Bee's role when he was DJing with you and Flash?" 

DJ EZ MIKE:"Ok, Disco Bee knew records! So whatever Flash needed Bee knew exactly what crate it was in. He would find that shit in no time. But he can also DJ. He wasn't one of the best DJs but he could DJ."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did your crew also have a record boy?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"That was my role. I was a record boy. Record boy / DJ / labourer..... (laughs) One thing is for sure Flash wouldn't carry no records because his hands were too valuable. He didn't carry crates and if you're a DJ you shouldn't carry none either. You should never carry equipment! Not the speakers, not the amps, nothing.....Because if I hurt my hands it's not too much of a deal.....the crowd came to see Flash. So if I hurt my hands it's okay, if Flash hurts his hands it's really not okay."

SIR NORIN RAD:"That's a really interesting point."

DJ EZ MIKE:"Yeah, because if you got a splinter in your finger that's gonna affect your skills on the turntable. Protect your hands, man! Your hands is your livelihood! Your hands and your ears are your livelihood. "

SIR NORIN RAD:"I feel that the role of the record boy is generally underappreciated by  today's Hiphop community. From what I have come to understand it took a special kind of skill to pass the right kind of records at the right time to your DJ. That was very important because the DJ had to always keep the crowd dancing. Nowadays technology has basically made the record boy become obsolete because most DJs rock with laptops now. Thus, an integral part of the element of DJing and of Hiphop as a whole has been destroyed."

DJ EZ MIKE:"On that note I wanna add this: I'm not against technology but if you didn't have the right touch back then you couldn't DJ because different records had different grooves. So there are some songs that you can spin the record back and the grooves are so deep the needle will stay where it belongs, but then they got those records where the grooves aren't that deep. If you didn't touch it light enough and spin it back light enough the needles goes in the wrong place! The needle would jump out of pocket! They don't worry abot that no more! You had to have a skill set, you had to develop a skill set! You gotta be able to say,"Okay, no matter what record I put on I can spin it back properly!" Let's say Flash was DJing all night, the record might jump twice and that's incredible right there! Two times???? That's incredible!! You gotta remember you're also getting tired when you're DJing and you gotta be able to keep that same skill set! No matter what!" 

SIR NORIN RAD:"So that means you couldn't get yourself some Pink Champale or Colt 45 while you were DJing?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"No, you had to do your job. You better had nothing to drink on stage around the records. Period. Or around the amps, or around the speakers. You can't have no liquids up there."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Would you share your song titles with other DJs who came up to you and asked you about them? That's a common thing in Germany nowadays....."

DJ EZ MIKE:"Are you kidding me????? HELL NO!!!! Like what kind of question is that for a DJ to ask??? You don't give NOBODY your motherfucking song titles!!!! GO FIND IT!!!! You gotta remember your records is what makes your party better than the next guy's. That's why it is important to always shop, take your time, go through each album because someone else might find that beat before you. Don't be a biter! Try your best to make them wanna find out what you got!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Listening to these old tapes I noticed that Flash always cut up "Take Me To The Mardi Gras". Did he introduce thas beat to Hiphop?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"Yes, that was him. That was Flash's song! He found that one!  (hums the sound of the bells of that song) He would cut it with "Apache". He was killing it! I have to say there are a lot of DJs that are incredible at what they do but I never see nobody do what Flash did with two turntables. You know the slipmat? Flash invented that! He went to the store and bought felt, cut the felt around the record, spraystarched it with starch and then played it. The cue! Before Flash invented the cue there were knobs. It wasn't a switcher to click over. You had to turn the knob one way and the other knob the other way. That took too long for Flash to get back to the record before the break came in...the break went off! So he invented the cue inside of a cheap Gemini mixer. It allowed him to have that speed he needed."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What was the name of your soundsytem?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"The Gladiator! We had a mean soundsystem back then!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Would you like to give shout outs at the end of this interview?"

DJ EZ MIKE:"First of all I'd like to shout you out! I'd like to shout out my boy Norin Rad and the Intruders Crew! The most important shoutout that I wanna give is to my best friend, Grandmaster Flash!"


 

   

 

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