Interview with B-Boy Spy (Crazy Commanders)

                                          Interview with B-Boy Spy (Crazy Commanders)

                                                                  

Spy (Crazy Commanders)

                                                    

                                   conducted by Sir Norin Rad (The Intruders / Germany)

SIR NORIN RAD:“When and where were you born?"

SPY:"I was born in Santurce, Puerto Rico in 1963."

SIR NORIN RAD:"When did you come to the USA?"

SPY:"My moms brought me here when I was three years old. So that would be 1966."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did you move directly to New York City or did you live somewhere else before you went there?"

SPY:"No, we moved straight to the Bronx."

SIR NORIN RAD:"To what kind of music were you exposed as young child growing up?"

SPY:"I grew up to Salsa music. I got mad family members that are musicians. My uncle is a musician. They had congas, they had timbales. I grew up with all that right by me, you know what I'm saying?"

SIR NORIN RAD:"So I guess you started Salsa dancing at a very young age?"

SPY:"Yeah, yeah, yeah...I used to be dancing, wilding out! I was alway crazy hyperactive, like I was crazy energetic. I was like the most super energetic kid out of all of us. So whenever they started going in...like playing congas or whatever...I started going in."   

SIR NORIN RAD:"When did you become aware of the park jams in the Bronx where DJs would cut up breakbeats and had the B-Boys going off?"

SPY:"You could say by 1977 'cause it was like before the Blackout 'cause the Blackout was in 1977. Towards 1977 that's when we was rocking with all that, you know what I'm saying? That's when I had moved to the opposite side of the Bronx towards Burnside Avenue...with Aqueduct. That's when I became more aware of it. It was already out but it blossomed. I didn't even realize how it blossomed so much and so quick. I was like,"Wow!"That's when I got down with Shorty Rock (B-Boy of the Crazy Commanders) and them. My moms was constantly moving so she had moved to that part of the Bronx. She was poor, she was trying to get situated. Every six months she would move. She was moving all over the place. To be honest with you before the jams in the parks and the parties in the clubs they was playing music out the window and we was on the block dancing. We used to steal the barricades that the police used to stop the cars and we used to put them on the block and we used to block the street so the cars won’t come in and people from two or three  blocks would be outside jamming. We used to rock like that!!! That was before I went to the park jams and all that. That was before everything. A lot of people don’t even know that. But I went to a lot of park jams, too. Definitely.“

SIR NORIN RAD:“Who inspired you to start Breaking and to come up with your legendary moves?“

SPY:“Nobody inspired me. There wasn’t no other B-Boys that inspired me to come up with my moves. It was just me being crazy active and creative and when I used to hear music I started to dance..I responded to the music. I guess you could say that I started from looking at the Russians doing their traditional type of dance steps and gymnastics. You see the gymnastic things where the people go like this? I was trying to do that while I was on the floor doing swipes. I was trying to do that but I was doing it while I was listening to the beats. I did that at the same and it just blended, it just formed....From there it just created itself. I never meant to create no dance, no style it just came out. My family got videos of me when I was like 6, 7, 8 years old going down trying to do what the Russians used to do.  I used to be trying to do it, too. And then I started to insert gymnastic moves 'cause I was going to school for gymnastics, right? I used to love gymnastics when I was young. I don't know why. So it all blended together. I was going around on the floor like this...then I tried to put my hands on the floor and go like this. At first it wouldn't work so I guess slowly, slowly it took its form...with the music it all blended together. I guess that's how it all began. Slowly, slowly it created itelf. So when I used to go out to the jams and they would play the beats outside I jut started to go down. Before you know it everybody was like,"Uuuuh!!!! Aaaah!!!" And all of a sudden it was like two, three, four of us doing it!!! And before you know it, it was a whole bunch of people doing it. It just blossomed like a flower. I never thought it would be so big. I never took credit for these moves, I never said nothing. I never thought it would blow up. BUT I created breakdancing itself on the floor. I did create it and that's a fact. Others they created their own moves, their own steps on the floor. Yeah! But a lot of it came from me. I made up all my moves, I had a bunch of moves. During my time..in the 1970ies...I had my own moves, you know what I'm saying? A lot of the moves that other B-Boys would do are mine 'cause they took mines and they developed it and did stuff with it.....to each his own. A lot of them also created their own moves which is beautiful. I love it. I'm taking nothig from none of them. I really got no other explanation to it but I could tell you slowly but surely as time went on...one move after another ....one step after another that's how it went. From me doing this whatever, whatever Russian looking style to a horsey type thing. That's how it went."

SIR NORIN RAD:"How did your crew come into existence? What does CC Crew stand for?"

SPY:"The CC Crew is the Crazy Commanders. Two Cs. It was created in what? 1977. It was started by me and Shorty Rock when my moms moved to Burnside Avenue. I met Shorty Rock there and he tried to bring me back out 'cause I had had an accident. I was doing gymnastics and I ran into a tree. Boom!! I was going backwards, backwards and I ran into a tree. I almost died, you know what I'm saying? I still got the scars. I lost my memory, I was messed up for a long time. Anyways my moms moved to where Shorty Rock lived. That's where I started all over again. I didn't even know who I was or nothing. It was like a whole new beginning. So I had met Shorty Rock and them and they was already doing it. It was already growing on that side of the Bronx. That was like the end of 1976.  Imagine! And I was coming from the Southeast Bronx. Breaking had already taken off and I didn't even know. The CC Crew....it was me, Shorty Rock, Twinkle Toes, Mongo Rock......Mongo Rock was the truth!!!!!!!!!! Jojo and his brother.....a lot of people don't wanna give Jojo props but he was the truth!!! We had Manny, Trace 2. That was basically the heart 'cause that was our block. Everybody else came from elsewhere. There was a bunch of us. We were going around and taking out every crew there was. Just to make a name, all over the Bronx! I'm talking about they would call for us and we would go just break against everybody. Everybody that thought they was somebody we would go to their block and take 'em out. Just to make a name! CC stood for Crazy Commanders because we commanded everything in the Bronx!!!! There was also the C Crew....the Casablanca Crew. They was nice!!! There was the KC Crew. There was the Mexican Crew. There was the Nine Crew. They came out like 170th Street.  They became stick-up kids after breakdancing. A lot of them got locked up. There was a lot of B-Boy crews! I'm talking about a lot of crews. Not just four or five. You had the Zulu Kings. They had been part of the Black Spades before. You had the Ching-A-Lings..that gang...they had a B-Boy crew that became known as The Rockwell Association. There was TBB....The Bronx Boys..that is still around to this day. There was Starchild La Rock and TDK. And I'm only talking about these parts of the Bronx because I can't really tell you too much about Soundview where I really came from because my moms moved me to this side when I was still very young. I was too young but I was really from that side of the Bronx. That's why we called ourselves the Crazy Commanders because as I said we commanded everything in the Bronx. The Southeast Bronx...they wanted no parts of us even though I was really from their side but I made it my business to make a lot of noise with my CC Crew."  

 B-Boy Shorty Rock (The Crazy Commanders) with Fly Girl Mari

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"So originally you're from the Soundview section of the Bronx? So you're familiar with Bronxdale, Castle Hill, Monroe, Bronx River....?"

SPY:"Yeah, yeah, you're right. I know all these places but I'm from Bronx River!!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"I was told that you and Trace 2 were Writers that bombed trains together back then. You were called Space and Trace. You wrote SPACE, correct?"

SPY:"Not too many people know about this, Norin. Yeah, that was my partner. I used to write Graffiti. I was all over the 4s. I had the 4s locked at one time!! And I had a little bit of the 2s and 5s. I was running all over the train tracks. That whole Graffiti thing is a big part of our B-Boy history, too. Hitting up the insides with the uni wide markers...all that. Trace and me.. we were all inked up. I had my room full of ink. My mom used to hate that shit.  (laughs)."

Tag by Trace 2 (Spy's partner)

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"Let us talk now about another partner of yours namely Shorty Rock. Please describe how you met him and what kind of relationship you had!"

SPY:"Like I told you I met him on Burnside Ave. We used to live by Yankee Stadium so when I had like the accident I got hurt. You know, I crashed doing gymnastics. I lost my memory. All I remember is that my moms moved to Burnside Avenue. That's where I met Shorty Rock and we blossomed as friends and we became partners. We're still friends to this day, we're like brothers. We're still good. "

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did you live in the same building?"

SPY:"Yeah, we lived in the same building. He used to live on the first floor and I used to live on the third. To be honest with you, my son comes from his sister. Okay? So that will tell you how close we are."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did you attend the same high school?"

SPY:"Not the same high school, we went to the same junior high school. Not to the same high school 'cause I went to DeWitt Clinton High School. Shorty went somewhere else. When I went to high school, they had moved him to Texas or California. He left the Bronx. That's how we lost contact.  After junior high school when I went to high school his family took him and sent him to..I think to Houston. That's how we lost contact."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What was the name of that junior high school which you and Shorty Rock both attended?"

SPY:" I.S. 137. There were a lot of B-Boys in there, too. A lot of battles took place in there, too. Everybody tried to compete against us."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Where did these battles take place at?"

SPY:"Outside in the schoolyard or you could say in the cafeteria, too. In the caefeteria, too, but in the hallways though. Not in the cafeteria itself  but in the hallways of the cafeteria because you couldn't do it in the cafeteria. They wouldn't like that."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Please describe how these battles would go down!"

SPY:"We would lean against the wall and do a circle. You go down, we go down. Like that! You know, the hallways is big 'cause it was a big school. Everybody up against the wall. You go down, we go down. There weren't too many of us. It ain't like the whole Crazy Commanders Crew was there. Just a few of us and a few of them and you would probably have a couple of class members and a whole bunch of people on the staircase witnessing what was going on or whatever. Somebody would have a tape player...them old shits and we would get busy on the floor. It used to be cassettes!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"What lead to these battles? Was it like other B-Boys talked shit about you and you went to them and took them out? Or did they come to you and challenge you directly?"

SPY:"Exactly! I guess they would say, "Yo, so and so think they're better than you!" And we would tell them, "Tell them, we wanna dance against them!" The word would get out, you know what I'm saying? The word always got out. I don't know how but the word always got out. The word would always reach us. Let's say through school or through the blocks the word always got out regardless! If I wanted to dance against you and you would live let's say 20 blocks up, in school the word would get to you 'cause in school everybody knows like everybody. "

SIR NORIN RAD:"Is it correct that whole crews were looking for you back then?"

SPY:"Yeah, like that!  Or they would invite me to their block.  "Yo, Spy! Come down to 170th! We wanna dance against you!" You know? Or,"Spy, they're rocking down in Cedar Park! Come down! We wanna battle against y'all!" "Echo Park! We gonna battle against y'all!" And it would be like five or six of them against me and Shorty Rock."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So you're saying you two would take out whole crews?"

SPY:"Hell yeah! That's how it used to be! Depending on the DJ that's rocking we would rock. We would dance against them and beat them real quick and we would stay there rocking. And then we would make friends with them and before you know it they would be joining us. That's how it used to be. That's how my crew got so big! We would dance against them and before they knew it they would befriend us an they would become CC Crew with us. That's how I met Batch and them. That's how I met TBB. These two kids that I knew Manny and his brother Richie they brought Batch and two other B-Boys from the opposite side of the Bronx to battle me and Shorty Rock and we went at it with them. They were really good. We was going at it, going at it and I ended up beating them because I did some real crazy off the wall shit. I did some stuff that nobody had ever seen. We ended up beating them and that's how we became close with them."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Please elaborate on how you practiced and how built up your arsenal of moves! Did you practice alone or did you practice with Shorty Rock?"

SPY:"Both. We would do both. We would practice together and we would practice alone 'cause remember we wasn't always together. At first we practiced together. We made up routines. We had mad routines!!! That's why we was so good together. And I practiced alone that's why I had so many moves. I used to practice in the living room and in the kitchen.....anywhere I had a chance."

SIR NORIN RAD:"How often did you go to the jams back then?"

SPY:"Every weekend! Every weekend! You could even say damn near everyday. They would be jamming outside or they would do house parties and birthday parties. That's why I say everyday 'cause they would invite you to all sorts of parties like that. We used to dance damn near everyday. In the beginning there wasn't no flyers. The flyers came later. When Grandmaster Flash and DJ Charlie Chase started to play music in the parks there wasn't no flyers. That's before they became famous and started to play in the discos and all that. They was out in the parks.  They was out in the blocks. That was before flyers. The flyers came in secondary so that we knew where to go. That's why the flyers came in 'cause they saw that everybody was so hyped up and loved the music."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Let us talk about some of the crews that you faced in battles back in the 1970ies. What do recall about The Mexicans? Where were The Mexicans from? Is it true that they were from University Avenue?"

SPY:"They were lead by a girl called Wanda. She was a butch. She was good though. They was from Walton Avenue. They were like four blocks down from University Avenue, way down. Yeah, they was from Walton. I was more closer to University Avenue and I'm not from University Avenue. It used to be.. look...you had University Avenue, then Aqueduct, then you got Harrison Ave, right? Then you got Grand Avenue and then you got Walton Avenue. Wanda was good. I had a girlfriend named Evie that was super nice better than her. Evie was super nice and she never got no props. I didn't even know that she knew how to dance. Everybody was telling me, "Yo Spy, your girlfriend is nice!" I never paid it no mind and she was super nice. In reality when I finally paid her attention I saw that she was nice, nice, nice! I said," Oh, shit! You are nice!!" Word!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"How did you get that name SPY?"

SPY:"I got it from a gang member that gave it to me when I was like real little. A gang member gave it to me in a backyard they was trying to put me as a Baby Skull. I don't remember too much. I was about 7 or 8 years old. I don't know where they got it from but they gave it to me and it has been my name since then."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Who was the KC Crew and what was your relationship like?"

SPY:"KC Crew that was a Black crew. Those were black B-Boys. KC...I think that stood for Kool Crew. They was all about smoking weed and all that but they was also dancing. They was all Blacks. Like we was more Latinos, they was all Blacks. We used to go up against them a lot!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Please name the spots where you battled the KC Crew at!"

SPY:"They would come and we would come! It would be all over! Like in the jams..we would come to Cedar Park or we would go to Echo Park or we would go wherever they was calling us. The majority of times they would call us. Most of the time it would be like,"Oh, they're rocking in Echo Park! They're all gonna be there!" So then we went there and started dancing against them. We would draw a crowd as soon as the circle formed. Like that! It wasn't really like no call outs. We would just be going to the parties and they would be there. It got crazier and crazier because the scene got bigger and bigger. A month from now you would be dancing against other B-Boys. More people! Like that! The thing was that we didn't realize it. We thought it was just people  coming out of nowhere but they was already there. In reality it was growing!! We didn't even know because we were still young. Back then I was just having fun but now I understand what really went down. It grew all over the Bronx!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"So since you were uniquely gifted you were able to defeat all these other B-Boys which in turn inspired many of the younger onlookers to pick up Breaking? It was like planting seeds...."

SPY:"Exactly! That's exactly what I mean because the younger generation saw it and they fell in love with it. Now all of a sudden they wanted to do it, too. They loved it because it was cool and it drew attention. At that time everybody wanted to be a B-Boy."

SIR NORIN RAD:"I was told that many Puerto Rican B-Boy Crews  brought people from their block to the jams so that they would cheer them on. Was that also true for the Crazy Commanders?"

SPY:"Yeah, yeah! Exactly! The whole block would be there. Not the whole entire thing but the majority of the girls and the kids that loved the music and all that. The teenagers would be there and the ones that wanted to follow them...the wannabees, you know?"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Jojo told me that battling The Mexicans back then was always risky because whenever they felt that they were losing the battle they would start fights....."

SPY:"Right, right. They always wanted to fight. They always got mad. Yeah! It was like that with the majority of all the crews. Most crews got mad, not only The Mexicans. They didn't want to lose. But The Mexicans they was like on it because they were our neighbours. So they always got mad. That's what it was. Jojo said that because The Mexicans were our neighbours so they were more mad than anybody 'cause they couldn't beat us. You know how it is when you're next to the champion and you can't beat the champion. You're gonna be mad. Wanda...she was their leader and she gassed them all up to be against us. We was all real young so anyways. Her whole thing was to beat us and then if they can't beat us on the floor to beat us up physically. To kick us.. all that type of stuff. So I invented some moves that helped me to kick their ass, too. Do a spin and kick them in their face or whatever. I would be like,"Fuck it! Whatever! We fight!" 'Cause I was really fighting, too. We used to have alot of fights with them. I used to have Trace 2 on my side. Trace 2 was gigantic. He would back us up. Then we had Manny and them. They was big and fat. They didn't dance but they was big and fat. So they used to be like our big bodyguards. When I think about it, we used to have a lot of fun!!!"

B-Girl Wanda (President of The Mexicans)

SIR NORIN RAD:"Please shed some light on B-Boy Twinkle Toes from The Crazy Commanders!"

SPY:"Oh yeah, Twinkle Toes!! He was a black kid. He used live right around the corner from us. Yeah, he was nice!! He used to dance on his toes at that time. He was the only one that was able to dance on his toes and all that. Like he used to uprock on his toes. That's what I'm trying to tell you. He was Black and half Puerto Rican but his family was more Black. He used to uprock on his toes which a lot of people couldn't do at the time. Like really, really uprock on their toes. We couldn't do that, you know what I mean? The same way with the handglide.....Weeble (TBB) for me was the first guy who ever did the handglide. We couldn't do that either. We learnt it but we couldn't do it the way he did it at first. We were amazed! He was the one that taught us that shit, you know what I mean? Jojo said he invented the backspin. I give it to him, he was the first B-Boy who ever did a spin like that but I had already done other spins."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What was the stomping ground of the Crazy Commanders crew? Like where did you hang out at on the regular?"

SPY:"We used to hang out on 180th Street & Aqueduct. That was our little park right there. Well, you could also say that we used to hang out on 184th Street between Creston Avenue and Morris Avenue. There used to be a school there....115. Right across the street there was a little candy store where we used to hang out at. That was our real stomping ground. That's where we was all at. I could say that we was there more than anywhere else. That's where we used to meet at. We would listen to music and talk about this and that. Right around the corner is Fordham Road. So we liked to go to different stores and go shoplifting. We used to be little thieves, too. Don't get it twisted. That's where we got our Lees and all our shit from. Remember we really had no money so if you wasn't selling a little bit of weed here and there we were shoplifting or stealing. To us it was having fun. That's the way we looked at it. We didn't know the difference."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did the Crazy Commanders wear gear in a specific color combination?"

SPY:" No, our color was blue. Straight up blue. We wore straight up all Lee Suits with white T-Shirts under it. So you could say our colors was blue and white. We didn't really have a specific trademark, you know what I'm saying? But I gotta say I was really more of a loner. I used to go out by myself most of the time. So I hung out a lot with B-Boys from other crews. I used hang out with Trace 2 and we would meet other Writers. "

SIR NORIN RAD:"How did you come up with the Six Step and the CCs? I have seen many cats online crediting you with the creation of these footwork patterns."

SPY:"You know what's so crazy about it? They say I invented the Six Step and other types of steps but I don't even know what that is.  I don't know what that is!!! I really don't know what the hell a Six Step is!!! I just know I go down and I dance. I swear to God I'm not lying to you. They made up all these names later. They didn't come from me. Bro, I don't know what the hell they're talking about!! All I know is I created Breaking on the floor. Six Step, Ten Step, Twelve Step...I don't know nothing about that. These people put names on things that they don't even understand. If that's a Six Step. What do you call going the opposite way???? Come on! You're serious? I'm not here to shoot their shit down. Like I said to each his own. At least they gave it publicity which kept my moves alive. I'll give 'em that much and I'll give 'em props for that. "

SIR NORIN RAD:"What about that title "The man with a thousand moves"? Was that given to you in the 1970ies or was it attached to your name like later on?"

SPY:"No, that was already given to me in the seventies 'cause I was so nice. They didn't know how many moves I had so they thought I had a thousand moves. You know, they thought I had a thousand moves but they failed to realize that I had a million! They should have named me "The man with  a million moves", you know?!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Who gave you that name?"

SPY: "I don't even know how that came about. Somebody came up with it and it just stuck."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What do you remember about the day when Jojo and his brother Easy Mike came to your building in order to battle you and Shorty Rock?"

SPY:"Not too much, honestly. He wasn't all that good that day. He needed practice. His footwork was twisted. I don't mean to shoot him down. Don't get me wrong. That's my boy, you know what I'm saying? But his footwork was sloppy. That's the way I looked at it. And I helped him a lot later on. But to battle him....it wasn't really no competition. The only B-Boy that used to give me competition was Mongo Rock.When he was part of The Crazy Commanders he wanted to dance against me like everyday. But Jojo when I first met him he was alright. I don't take nothing from him."

Mongo Rock and Spy (The Crazy Commanders)

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"How did you meet Mongo Rock?"

SPY:"He wanted to dance against me, too. His brother Jesus I met through Mongo Rock. Jesus was part of the Casablanca Crew. He was a little older than us."

SIR NORIN RAD:"And you're saying that Mongo Rock was your toughest competitor back then?"

SPY:"Yeah! 'Cause he used to take my moves and tried to change them. He was very smart. He went against me everyday, so he was learning from me. He was like the baddest one out there.....quiet as kept. He was super nice!!!! Nobody ever gave him that props."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What exactly do you mean when you say you battled everyday?"

SPY:"It means we hang out today, tomorrow we hang out, the next day we hang out...like that. We would be out in the streets, talking to girls, copping sneakers or whatever and somewhere along  the day we would be  dancing against each other 'cause we would hear breakbeats somewhere. He would challenge me and I would be like, "Nah, come on! Get out of here, man!" So then he would be like, "You're scared?" So then we ended up dancing against each other again. You know, like that!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"So he would battle you even if there was no one else around?"

SPY:"Even if there's no one around! That's the whole shit. Even if there's no one around, that don't mean no difference. We used to have our own boombox or whatever. He used to carry a boombox or I had my own. We always had music! There was never a day that we didn't have music back then. To this day...I don't live without music. I don't ! You can ask my girl! I need it! That's my energizer! Without that I don't have no energy. Energy! Without that I think I would die! I love music. As a B-Boy I came up on music. It moves me. I guess that's what started it all...the love for the music!!!!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"It seems as if Mongo Rock was fanatical about Breaking..."

SPY:"Yo, I swear to everything I love....Mongo Rock was a B-Boy fanatic!!!!! (excited)  But that's my brother! That's how he was! He was like dying to beat me so bad but at the same time he was my brother and it was like nothing! I can't even explain it. He was so cool about it! I guess he wasn't even trying to beat me. I guess he was just trying to learn. That's what it really was. He was good! To me he was the baddest!!!!!!!!!!!!!" 

SIR NORIN RAD:"Since you've mentioned going shopping for B-Boy gear I would like to ask you what kind of gear did you rock back in 1977, 1978, 1979?"

SPY:"You want me to tell you something? Mongo Rock was the first Kangol Kid!!! Was it Mongo? Yeah, I think Mongo was the first B-Boy to wear a Kangol. He loved them shits!!! He had a red one, and a black one and a white one. Not a huge collection but he's the one who created the Kangol for the B-Boy. That was in 1978 or 1979. I quit Breaking in 1982. I'm the one who created the fucking baseball cap joint. Remember the baseball cap to the side? I used to not like hats but being that I had so much hair at the time I used to wear baseball caps just to hold my shit down."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What about the sneakers?"

SPY:"Back then we had Pro-Keds....the Super Pro-Keds and the Pro-Keds 69ers. Those were nice!! We would get them from Jew Man's. It was right there on Tremont Avenue. They had one on Tremont and they had one on Southern Boulevard, too. The one on Southern Boulevard was the one that was hot! I think that was the first one. I used to love BVD's, too. I used to love mocknecks. But we was more into sweatsuits. When I was B-Boying what we was really into was Lee Suits. Lees with the acrylic letters.....we had our name on the side of our leg. Because we used to be graffiti Writers so we put mad designs on our Lees. Like our B-Boy or crew names. You ever heard of P-Body 170 (The Crazy Artists / Starchild La Rock)?  He was super nice in graffiti so I used to let him do my shit 'cause I wanted it to be perfect! He was like the baddest out of all of us in drawing and shit. I also used to love the Playboys and the British Walkers."

Whole Car by P-Body 170 (TCA/ Starchild La Rock)

SIR NORIN RAD:"So what are your top three breakbeats of all time?"

SPY:""Apache" by The Incredible Bongo Band, "It's Just Begun" by The Jimmy Castor Bunch and  "Trans Europe Express" by Kraftwerk. There were more.... The DJs used  to cut up the break part of the record. They didn't play the whole record. That's why I don't remember a lot of the songs from back then. I only remember the beats. I loved that shit."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Thank you so much for the interview!"

SPY:"You're welcome, my brother."

 

 

Interview with MC Terry Tee (Touch Of Class / The Nice & Nasty MCees )

                         Interview with MC Terry Tee (Touch Of Class Disco / The Nice & Nasty MCees )

MC Terry Tee (Touch Of Class Disco / The Nice & Nasty MCees)

                                                conducted by Sir Norin Rad (The Intruders/Germany)

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

TERRY TEE:"I was born in the Bronx. Originally down...near Arthur Avenue in the Little Italy section of the Bronx. As strange as it may seem I was born on Washington Avenue in the Bronx. I then at a early age....ten years old...moved up to the Northeast Bronx...the Baychester section of the Bronx where I  spent most of my adult life. That's where I was educated and that's where I would say I really found myself....up in the Northeast Bronx."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Okay, and may I ask when you were born?"

TERRY TEE:"I was born in the lovely year of 1963." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"To what kind of music were you exposed as a kid?

TERRY TEE:"My parents both are from the Caribean island of St. Martin where I reside right now. My father is from French St. Martin and my mother is from Dutch St. Martin. St. Martin is a unique island in the Caribean. It is a welcoming island to a diaspora of cultures and inividuals from all over the world. So my parents also were exposed to a lot of different music. St. Martin wasn't the booming tourist destination it is now, so my parents migrated to the US...to the Bronx where they met, married and where I was born.  My father would listen to Country,James Brown, Roberta Flack. He was also a lover of his Caribean music...Reggae, Skat, Calypso....The Mighty Sparrow. So my parents listened to a lot of Caribean music and me growing up in the Bronx I was exposed to the American side. So I was growing up in a Caribean household but I was influenced by the American scene as well....by what was happening in the 1970ies I would say. I was exposed to a lot of different types of music....to what was going on at the time...you know, the Jackson Five and even the Osmond Brothers (laughs). Music has always been a part of my life."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So when you were in your teens you were exposed to a lot of classic Soul and Funk music?"

TERRY TEE:"Yes, I was."

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

TERRY TEE:"Okay, I was exposed to Hiphop from its foundation. It was all about the DJs and their different beats and breaks. It was the DJ that was the superstar. The MC played a minor role because the MC...that's where MC comes from...Master Of Ceremonies.....he kinda guided and narrated what was going on and tried to tell the crowd when to clap.....he would say things like, "Let me hear you say Hooo!!!" That was the MC. That's all they did. The star of the show was the DJ and then second to that was the B-Boys, not the MCees. The B-Boys...they would battle on the floor dancing. I became exposed to Hiphop from going to some of these events down in the South Bronx. DJ Breakout started his crew The Brothers Disco before Touch Of Class was formed. Breakout is also from our neighbourhood. We were all neighbours, we lived a block away from each other. Kool DJ Herc eventually migrated up to the Northeast Bronx as well. Herc lived a block away from me on Seymour Avenue. As Breakout emerged Kool Herc came into the neighbourhood. Touch Of Class ....we were friends, we played basketball together.....we started to harness our raps as MCees started to do more than just saying, "Throw Your Hands In The Air!" or, "Everybody Say Hooo!"  .....that's when our group started to form. The DJs were still paramount. The MCees were starting to emerge."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So where did you witness breakbeats being cut up by a DJ for the first time? Was it at a Brothers Disco party?"

TERRY TEE:"No, it was actually....the very first time was in 123 Park.....which is a school....JHS 123...in the Soundview area of the Bronx. I went with my cousin. We listened to Afrika Bambaataa and somebody else and I was just totally taken in. Like the B-Boys, the breakbeats!!! (excited) The mixing of music, you know breakbeat after breakbeat......it was just totally amazing! From there I was just mesmerized by the potential of what all this is about!  I got caught up in this movement from that first party in 123 Park in the Southeast Bronx."

SIR NORIN RAD:"You were really captivated by what you saw and heard there....."

TERRY TEE:"Oh yeah!!! Like I told you my household was always full of music. My parents were admirers of all genres of music.  So me and my brothers and sisters we grew up in a household of a lot of music. As a Caribean parents on a Saturday...you're out of school...it was cleaning day in the house. The music was jamming, my mother was cleaning. I was always a admirer of music but when I went to JHS 123 I saw this movement emerging and that thing just grasped my soul and it's never left!!! It has never left!!!!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"It's interesting that you should say that because after having talked to many of the original B-Boys I have noticed that they all described these Hiphop parties as life changing events.  

TERRY TEE:"I'm not a very religious man but I'm a very spiritual man and I do believe that those of us who were instrumental in the foundation of this movemnt called Hiphop...I believe it was a divine calling. When you heard those beats it touched you not in your ears, not just in your brain it touched you in your soul, okay? And when you heard that calling you had to answer, you had to be a part of it, you had to make your contribution to this movement."

SIR NORIN RAD:"As you said the DJs dominated Hiphop in the beginning but after Grandmaster Flash had invented the backspinning technique which enabled the DJ to cut up the breaks seamlessly and thus to provide the MCees with Beats they could rhyme over without being interrupted by a singer the dynamics of HIpHop changed. What made you pick up MCing? Were you inspired by the Funky Four?"

TERRY TEE:"You are correct. The second stage of the early foundation of Hiphop is when....you're right......Grandmaster Flash evolved into not just dropping beats but also mixing it. He took two copies of the same record and elongated the beat, he made the break longer to go on forever as long as he was mixing it. That gave the MCees a foundation to do something. Now MCing evolved to where MCees started telling stories. They started really rapping. That's where rhymes came about and that's where the Nice & Nasty MCees of Touch Of Class started to do their thing. We were inspired by the Brothers Disco when Rahiem was in The Funky Four. Rahiem, Sha Rock and them I'd say they were like two or three years ahead of us. Rahiem was just a master of rhymes! He's not getting enough credit. I know Melle Mel is a genius and he deserves all the accolades but my hero, my inspiration from rhyming came from Rahiem. Rahiem to me was a lyrical genius and he inspired myself and the other Nice & Nasty MCees. I would say I can speak for my colleagues. We had to up our game! Now Brothers Disco....that's when groups started to become corporations because Brothers Disco was the umbrella group, The Funky Four was the MCees and Breakout and Baron were the DJs. Touch Of Class was the umbrella group, The Nice & Nasty MCees were the MCees. We even had a B-Boy, we called him Psycho because we were part of that early element of Hiphop. What carried us and gave us a bit of notoriety was the Nice & Nasty MCees but our group Touch Of Class had every element of the early days of Hiphop. We had our DJs, we had our B-Boy and we had our MCees. The MCees took center stage when rapping now became the group's forte. The DJs now were supportive of the MCees so the MCees could kick some wicked rhymes."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So what was it like to witness The Funky Four live on stage when Rahiem was still with them?"

TERRY TEE:"The Funky Four gave us motivation because we were all from the same neighbourhood.....Breakout was from the same neighbourhood. We performed in the same venues...Edenwald, Valley Park, 78 Park. We looked at them as inspirations because they were older than and they were there before us but they also were our competition. So they were our motivation in the sense that we admired them and we were neighbours but  they also were our competition for notoriety and predominance in the Northeast Bronx. So their routines inspired us to create and develop even better routines....in my opinion!!! (laughs)! I think that our rhymes and routines were just as deep or even deeper than theirs because we evolved and we started to build our own reputation in the Northeast Bronx. But they were still our brothers. When the day is done and the sun sets we all were from the same neighbourhood but the word "inspiration" wouldn't probably fit. I'd say they were more of a motivating factor."  

SIR NORIN RAD:"When did Touch Of Class form? 1978?"

TERRY TEE:"1977. We formed in 1977. We really started to make inroads in 1978/1979 but we were together from 1977."

November 9th, 1979: Touch Of Class performs at the Edenwald Center in the Bronx along with The Mercedes Ladies

 

 

 

November 23th, 1979: Touch Of Class performs at the NAACP along with the Cheeba Crew

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"Okay, so that means that you as Nice & Nasty MCees must have also undergone that change from being MCees that were basically just aiding their DJ to keep the party rocking to that kind of MCees that did routines and had intricate rhymes."  

TERRY TEE:"That is correct. As MCing was evolving we evolved as well. We started out as just Masters Of The Ceremonies helping our DJs. We had three DJs: Mellow Beat, Willie Wil and Disco Gee. We would just narrate what they were doing and try to hype up the crowd, try to motivate crowd but then when MCing started to dominate and when DJing evolved to carrying a beat then we started working on routines and how to pass the mic. We'd sit down and write rhymes...things of that nature. We went along with the trend that was going on in Hiphop at the time."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Which DJ would cut up the beats for the Nice & Nasty MCees?"

TERRY TEE:"All three of them they had their different genres. DJ Mellow Beat was more into .....he was like the party starter. He would start with..you know, the warm up. But when the MCees had to do rhymes ...Willie Wil and Disco Gee they were the ones who carried the weight for the Nice & Nasty MCees during the routines and  the hype session of the party."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Didn't you also have a Puerto Rican DJ by the name of Grandmaster Ike among your ranks?"

TERRY TEE:"Yes, Norin! You really know your Hiphop History! Grandmaster Ike was with us for a year or so before he left us. He was a good DJ."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Who came up with that name Nice & Nasty MCees?"

TERRY TEE:"Ah, that I have to give credit to Mexi Ray. Him and Apollo One are brothers."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Who was the captain of the Nice & Nasty MCees?"

TERRY TEE:"Okay, in our group we had...Apollo One was with us but he left the group as were really making our name known because he went into the service. So then it was Mexi Ray, Charlie Dee and me. There was a girl that we had at the time..for a short period..her name was Hi-C. But during the heyday of Touch Of Class it was the Nice & Nasty 3 MCees. From the three of us I have to give props to Mexi Ray. He came up with the most routines. We would practice. We would practice just like any athletic team. We would practice about two times a week in the basement of DJ Mellow Beat's house. Mexi Ray would come up with the foundation of the routines and me and Charlie Dee would then say, "Okay! See at this bridge here we could do this or we could do that!" It is a collaborative effort that puts it all together and that's what we would go on stage with. Mexi Ray had a very imaginative mind. I would give him that rating. He came up with the creation of many of the routines and me and Charlie Dee would then probably say, "Yeah Curtis (Mexi Ray's government name) that's a good concept but we gotta make it nasty!!! You know, me and Charlie now we would throw in this and we would throw in that and change this more into a slang. So all our routines were all collaborative efforts. The creator of the foundation? Yes, that was Mexi Raybut the final product everybody had their hands on the steering wheel."

SIR NORIN RAD:" Who was the best lyricist out of the Nice & Nasty MCees and who was your hype man?"

TERRY TEE:"That one? Okay, I'm gonna be biased...that was me. Who had the more intricate rhymes and the more far out there lyrics?  That was Mexi Ray but when it came to getting the crowd hyped and....you know, the DJ throws on a heavy beat and the crowd goes wild and you just wanna match that heavy beat with some really devastating rhymes and people are saying, "Wow!!" That was I!!!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Who was the flyest MC among you? The one that had the girls go crazy like Easy AD of the Cold Crush Four or Mr. Ness of The Furious Five?"

TERRY TEE:"The pretty boy of the crew and the more stylist of the crew that's Mexi Ray!! Me I concentrated on getting the crowd hyped and I would be like, "We're taking this to the next level!" Mexi Ray was more about getting those ladies all wet and wild. That was Mexi Ray's job. And Charlie Dee? He was in between. He could get the crowd hyped with me. We were a good duo when it was to time to get the crowd animated and he could also fall back into the role of the ladies' man."

The Nice & Nasty MCees

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"How would you describe Apollo One's role?"

TERRY TEE:"Apollo One was unique! He was a little older than all of us. He maybe got us by two years and he came up with more mature rhymes and with a more mature style. And his style was just very different. Because he was a little older than us he kind of was the bridge between Disco and Hiphop. He still had some Disco roots in him but he managed to do a version of both Hiphop and Disco. "

SIR NORIN RAD:"Like Lovebug Starski?"

TERRY TEE:"Exactly! Lovebug Starski...right! I would not say that Busy Bee Starski was a hybrid, I would say Lovebug Starski was a hybrid.  That was Apollo One. He was like a hybrid. He came from the Disco scene but he realized the importance, the relevance of the Hiphop scene and he was the embodiment of that in the Touch Of Class Crew."

DJ Mellow Beat and Apollo One (Touch Of Class) in 1979

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"I was told by other people from the Northeast Bronx that the Touch Of Class crew really distinguished itself from other crews through its approach to writing rhymes and through the way you used to dress up. Would you say that that's an accurate statement?"

TERRY TEE:"Yes, it is. Hiphop came from a really raggamuffin kind of place but then people saw,"We could take it to another level! We got our own little thing going on here." Touch Of Class...we wanted to move not in a raggamuffin way. We wanted to compete with the most raggamuffin crews out there but we also wanted to be like that bridge 'cause you gotta understand we were just coming out of the Disco era. People were coming in with that fresh new sound called Hiphop. Touch Of Class kinda wanted to be like that bridge in the middle.  Now we could rock with the best of them! We could play with the L-Brothers, we could play with Grandmaster Caz and all of them but we also were able to do functions in Mount Vernon Park. We were able to do functions in New Rochelle Park. We wanted to take it to a more upscale era because Hiphop had a little dark side to it. Now it's mostly positive but it also had a little dark side to it because of where it came from. It came from gangs  wanting to make peace. It came from B-Boys battling each other on the dance floor. Not every B-Boy session ended peacefully!  Most of them did, some of them didn't.  You know, there were shots fired. There was this and there was that. We wanted to make sure that we were on the cutting edge of taking Hiphop into a direction that would be embraced by more people because there was some people out there that would say, "This Hiphop thing will never make it anywhere. All y'all are doing is listen to beats! How can you take a beautiful tune from James Brown and just play the beat? Those were the old schoolers at the time. Those were the forty and fifty year olds in the 1970ies. Those old schoolers would say that we were destroying R&B and that movement from the 1960ies. They would say that we were destroying that artform that they had. But thank goodness for Flash, thank goodness for Theodore who took the criticism and turned it into an artform. Thank goodness for the MCees that took the artform and turned it into routines and rhymes. We got into storytelling and things of that nature. It's not Rap, it's Hiphop. Hiphop has music, Hiphop has clothes, Hiphop has art......Hiphop has a swag, dances.....all of that is Hiphop. Hiphop is a lifestyle. That's what it is. I'm right now 60 years old and I could tell you..I'm a facility manager of a major establishment here in St. Martin and I still have my Hiphop swag, okay? Why? Because I was part of that movement. "

October 24th, 1980: Touch Of Class performs at the Ecstasy Garage in the Bronx along with DJ Afrika Islam & The Funk Machine

SIR NORIN RAD:"What did it mean to dress fly back in the 1970ies and early 1980ies?"

TERRY TEE:"Oh well, unlike the movement that they're trying to do now today, making it a gender neutral society...back then the men were men and women were women and women were attracted to men. The better you dressed, the more girls you had. Okay, that's the way it went. A man dressing in an Alpaca V-Neck Sweater was saying something!! A man in the freshest British Walkers was saying something!! Before Run-D.M.C. took it to Adidas, it was Puma that was dominating. When you came out with some Pumas, some Lee Jeans and Alpaca, a Cortefiel coat you were saying something!!! Throw a Kangol on with that? You were the freshest cat in the jam, okay? You turned heads, you were a traffic stopper, okay? That's the way it went and when I saw your gear, Norin...... I was like, "Man, Norin Rad would have killed them out there!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did you also wear sweaters that had your crew's name in old english letters?"

TERRY TEE:"Yeah, that became a trend for a little while. I wouldn't say that we started it but we did emulate it and wore it to most of our jams. You'd get a Graffiti Writer.....I forgot about Graffiti...I said B-Boys but forgot about Graffiti..our whole crew had their name written in Graffiti on their Lee Jeans. And then we also had t-shirts and sweatshirts with our name Touch Of Class in the front and our MC names on the back. When we went to perform we were in uniform and we believed in putting on a show. That's where MCing really evolved to. It was all about entertainment and I might say we were only 17, 18 years old at the time."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What were your main stomping grounds as far as indoor and outdoor jams are concerned before you started to perform in places like the T-Connection or the Ecstasy Garage?"

TERRY TEE:"Okay, in the early days of Hiphop it was out in the park. Everything was free. They took power from the light post to perform in the parks. As it started to evolve into, "Hey, we can make a few dollars of it." Then they started to go to certain venues. The T-Connection..that was a club. It was a Disco club. You know, disco was starting to fade out. Richie T the owner of the place decided, "Well, this Hiphop movement is going on now. Bring it to my club!" That's the ground zero for one of the most iconic indoor venues of Hiphop. The Ecstasy Garage was just that. It was a garage! At night the owner would allow crews to rent it out and do parties there. It was a garage. Literally a garage on Jerome Avenue. You also had those skating places...They wanted to bring in more money that's why they invited Hiphop groups to perform there. The outdoor never lost its appeal. It was a way to get back to your community, your base. So we  would do something in 78 Park, we would do something in Edenwald Park, we would do something in the Valley. That was your base, you gave them a little free something on a Saturday or a Sunday night if you weren't booked somewhere but you excited your base, performed for free. But now when you're at the Stardust Ballroom or the T-Connection you billed together like two or three groups from different areas of the Bronx or Manhattan. Now people would come to support their group. If Touch Of Class played with let's say The L-Brothers at the T-Connection all the L-Brothers supporters would come uptown to the T-Connection and all of Baychester, White Plains Road, Gun Hill Road are coming to the T-Connection to support Touch Of Class. So it wasn't one way or the other. The outdoor venues were still there for you to keep your name and your rep up and to keep your base motivated. The indoor venues became a place were you could go up against other crews and that's where the enterpreneurial money making aspect came about because now we could do jams, we could charge two or three dollars and make a little something. And trust me it was a little something. People did this for the love, not really for the money. Richie T from the T-Connection...yeah, he at the end of the night could say, "I did pretty good." Because he got his bar, he got his door. The groups...the money you made... it was enough to take a OJ and go home. That's about it. Then you pulled your money together to buy new Sure mics. You needed new speakers.  So the leader of our group which was DJ Mellow Beat he would say,"Guys, today we got paid 300 $ but I gotta split up 150 $ because the other 150 $ we need for new bass bottoms." So it is what it is."

June 28th, 1980: Touch Of Class performs at the Ecstasy Garage along with Grandwizard Theodore & The Fantastic Five, The Cold Crush Brothers and Afrika Bambaataa & The Soul Sonic Force

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"I see but I guess it felt good to enjoy the admiration of the people in your neighbourhood and in your school."

TERRY TEE:"That is true. I mean like I said we were teenagers and it was flattering. I went to Aviation High School and that's all the way up in Long Island City. I had to take the 7 train to Grand Central and the 5 train to Gun Hill Road. For the 5 train to Gun Hill Road......during the late 1970ies and early 1980ies all the cool people, all the fly girls were in the back of the train. So everybody would be in the last two cars. Everybody mixing and mingling. You know, checking out girls...this and that. Now when the 5 train is reaching up now to Gun Hill Road everybody is getting off at Gun Hill. Your moving from the back to the front of the train and it felt good when you heard people playing your music from the jam last week as you were walking through the train. You heard yourself rapping on a tape as you were walking through the train....I ain't gonna lie it did feel good." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"My man Sureshot La Rock provided me with a flyer from August 1979 which advertises a DJ & MC Convention at the legendary Webster P.A.L. in the BX. Your crew Touch Of Class did participate in that event....."

TERRY TEE:"Yeah, we won that."

August 24th, 1979: Touch Of Class Disco participates in a DJ / MC Convention at the legendary Webster P.A.L. in the Bronx.

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"How did these competitions go down back then and did your prepare yourself for these kind of events as a crew?"

TERRY TEE:"Well, for these events..you're talking about the P.A.L. on Webster Avenue...we had to practice. Just like I told you we would practice several times a week. Your passing of the mic had to be flawless. Like the Furious Five would say, "Make five MCees sound like one!" The DJs....as an MC you had to be able to ride the beat....that's why the DJ would practice with the MCees. So the DJs had to be flawless in what they did. All of that took a lot of practice. Those who put the work in rose to the top. Ourselves and a few other crews put in the work and it paid off when we went to these conventions. That's where the uniforms came in. We were all in our uniforms...we had mic stands....Sure mics...our DJ was on point. You know, our DJ would walk in with his own needles. You wouldn't take a chance somebody sabotaging you. You'd walk in with a little cheering section, too. Every crew came with their own cheering section but the goal was to get everybody else on board to cheer for you. Yeah, we won two of these events at the P.A.L."

SIR NORIN RAD:"By whom was the winner of such a convention determined?"

TERRY TEE:"Okay, at this time now you had godfathers like Kool DJ Herc. He had started in the early 1970ies and by the late 1970ies he was now Hiphop royalty. So people like Herc they were given the status of judges. As a crew participating in these conventions you had one shot. You'd go up there and you'd have maybe 15 minutes. Now if you wanna do two tunes, you do two tunes, two routines. You wanna do three tunes....It's up to you but you got 15 minutes. You got 15 minutes to move that crowd and make them fans of yours. After 15 minutes is up the next crew comes on stage. At the end of the night the judges determined the winner. They'd take the crowd  participation also, "Who thinks T.N.T. Disco won?" or, "Who thinks Grandmaster Productions won?" They would listen to the crowd but the judges' scoring was the ultimate deciding factor.  Most of the times the judges and the crowd they matched."

February 9th, 1980: Touch Of Class performs at the legendary T-Connection in the Bronx

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"What did take back then to be considered as an outstanding MC?"

TERRY TEE:"You had to have the x-factor. There were a lot of people that tried to be MCees but they didn't make it. Those that made it, they had that x-factor. Number one you had to have an aura about you so that the crowd would gravitate towards you. You had to be an entertainer, okay? Then also your rhymes had to be captivating. It couldn't be boring and mundane. It had to be about something. You had to have something that would make the crowd say,"Wow, let me listen to this!!" I'm not bragging and I don't want to hurt nobody's feelings but not everybody could be an MC. You gotta be born with it just like a dancer. You could go to the best dance school but if you don't have that x-factor as far as having that rhythm in you will not become a dancer. MCing is the same way. You gotta be able to feel your lyrics, it's the best if you live your lyrics 'cause that makes you say them with passion. You have to have good rhymes, you have to have a stage presence and you have to have that aura about you that makes people gravitate towards you. You gotta be born with it. It's not something you could learn. Like I told you I loved Rahiem but my style and his style were different. He's a smooth operator.  I like the nature of his rhymes but he's a smooth operator. My style was little bit more rough but I was motivated by him and I looked up to Rahiem. Melle Mel...he was just naturally gifted. Keith Cowboy...naturally gifted. Keith Keith from the Funky Four....naturally gifted. Sha Rock!!!!! It just flowed from Sha Rock!!!! Sha Rock didn't go to an MC school and she was ground breaking!!! She is the first female MC! It just flowed out of her. She didn't learn that from nobody!!!! She didn't emulate nobody. It just flowed and when she added the echo chamber to it.....(laughs)..she took it to a whole 'nother level!!!!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"I would like you to describe what it was like to perform in the Valley back then. Talking to DJ Breakout I was told that it was a special kind of location because you had to be built a certain way in order to survive out there. Before he DJed there he had been Breaking in the Valley with his friend Doc La Rock."

TERRY TEE:"Okay, you know of the Rucker Park in Harlem....for basketball. The Valley was to the Northeast Bronx......I'd say that was our Rucker Park. When you played in the Valley park you had to come with your A game...no B game!!! Like I told you the outdoor venues were give backs to the community. They were free jams. But when you played in the Valley park you had to come with your A game. I'm glad you're mentioning Doc La Rock.  He and DJ One Time....these were old DJs from our community where me and DJ Breakout are from. They are no longer with us but big ups to them. Those were the DJs that we looked up to. But the Valley was our Mecca!! Only royalty touched those stages. If you didn't have it...... it could get rough! The Valley park was a rough place. If you came with anything less than your A game people would throw bottles at you. You had to come good in the Valley."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did you have a people behind you that carried and protected your equipment and had your back when things got out of hand on a foreign turf?"

TERRY TEE:"When you went to those other people's territories you had to be prepared for anything. Now we came with a different element and we weren't about that gangsterism and all that but you had to come prepared. Yes, we had some brethren that were with us who would watch our back at the door, who would watch our back on stage. Some of the people that DJ Breakout used did security for us as well. We had our security crew. You had to move crates of records back in the days so you had to have people help you move things in and out. If you came with your sound sytem moving those bass bottoms was no joke. So like I told you Touch Of Class wasn't just a crew of DJs and MCees, it was an organization."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What are your recollections of Edenwald Center?"

TERRY TEE:"Okay, Edenwald Center was not on the level of the Valley but Edenwald Center had a lot of budding crews like T.N.T. Disco and others. When Touch Of Class played in Edenwald...you know, people liked to challenge us because they felt like, "Ok, these guys got the reputation but we're better than them!!" So we got challenged a lot in Edenwald. But you had to go in there and dominate them. That's what they expected. They felt if Brothers Disco played in there, they should dominate all the small crews. Whenever Touch Of Class played in there we had to dominate. We couldn't go in there and play nice with these groups. When I say "nice" I'm talking on a musical level. You had to go in there and spank them and spank them good. And we did that. Edenwald is rough!! If you go in there it could lead to physical confrontation, it could lead to a lot of things 'cause now you're on the home court of these smaller crews. So if you agreed to perform in Edenwald there again you had to come good! For you to keep your rep you couldn't avoid these places. Places like Edenwald Center, Boston Secor Center.. you had to go. When they called you and said,"Touch Of Class we want you to come down here and we want you to  play with Grandmasters Productions or T.N.T. Disco in Edenwald." We could not say, "No!" because you had to show them why you're dominant. That's how DJing and MCing was back in those days. If you were one of the leading groups there were people gunning for your spot but you could not walk away from a gunfight.....I don't mean literally a gunfight..... but you couldn't walk away from a challenge. You had to go and show your dominance. You had to show them why you deserved the top honours that you got. And we did that."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So it was like the young wolves were coming for the leader of the pack to get his position and he had to fight them off?"

TERRY TEE:"At all times, yes! That was the competitive, sometimes ugly side of Hiphop back then because there were always young wolves...you put it right....trying to take you down and you couldn't let that simmer. You had to take that challenge! They would challenge you and you had to take them on and show them why you're number one. Show them why you dominate this area. You had to do it."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What do you remember about jamming at Boston Secor?"

TERRY TEE:"Boston Secor was small. It was a more upscale community. They weren't really too favourable for the Hiphop movement but they had a lot of people who loved Hiphop in their area and they would rent out the spot. DJ Pete La Rock from P.T. Disco he would call us down to there to play and we would go. It was a good spot. It wasn't on a level with Edenwald and definitely not on a level with the Valley but it does get his reputation. It was one of the big Hiphop spots in the Northeast Bronx."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Please highlight the importance of the breakbeats for Hiphop! You got a lot of people nowadays who don't appreciate the breakbeats."

TERRY TEE:"Well, if you don't understand the foundation of anything it will be very hard to build on it. The BREAKBEATS are the FOUNDATION OF THIS WHOLE HIPHOP MUSIC!! Breakbeats...that's where it started, that's where it came from. It was all about the beats!!! People would go through their parents' archives of records looking for breakbeats and the breakbeats were the hits. Who could outdo who? Who did more research on beats and who found something out of all the Jackie Wilson records etc. It was all about finding something that another DJ didn't find. It was all about the beats!!!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"And that's why people who weren't down with the DJ and his crew were not allowed to go near the beat crates."

TERRY TEE:"Now listen....to protect beats....let's say DJ Breakout found a beat or one of our DJs found a beat.....like DJ Mellow Beat found a beat on an old tune or maybe even from a different country..they scrape off or black out the label so no one would know and then when you rocked it at a party people were trying to look over the ropes. They would ask themselves, "Yo, what record is that???" By you blacking it out you're keeping it secret until someone eventually a month or two months in would figure it out and they would have it, too. But while you had it exclusively, you had to protect it. That's why DJs were very particular who could come behind the ropes because other crews would try to spy on you. It was all about beats!!!! I remember when DJs would cut up that beat by Barry Manilow....Copacabana.....I think it was Grandwizard Theodore who dropped it first. He drove the whole Hiphop scene insane 'cause nobody knew where it came from. He would just start it at the break and then mix it, mix it, mix it! And it was such a dope beat and he had that exclusively for about let's say a month or two until somebody figured it out and other DJs started playing it. But that was a competition..beats."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So what were your favourite breakbeats to rhyme over back then?"

TERRY TEE:"For me personally one of my favourites was "Take Me To The Mardi Gras" by Bob James. That was my favourite 'cause it was heavy, you could rhyme on it, you could dance to it you could go fast or you could go slow. I just loved it! And then it also had a nice intro. The our DJ used to cut that up!! Oh man, I loved it. I also loved "Seven Minutes OF Funk" by the Whole Darn Family when that came out I used to love that and surprisingly "To Be Real" by Cherryl Lynn. I loved the break on Cherryl Lynn!!!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"How would you rate the sound system of the Touch Of Class Disco Crew? If I'm not mistaken the Northeast Bronx had a couple of crews that came through with heavyweight sound systems such as the Kaos Crew and of course The Brothers Disco."

TERRY TEE:"We had a good sound system. We brought it out to 78 Park and we brought it to The Valley but these crews you mentioned they had devastating sound systems!!! So we never got into sound system battles because we were not on that level. DJ Breakout was in our neighbourhood and he had the Mighty Sasquatch. And the Sasquatch...we couldn't compete with the Sasquatch, nor did we try because the Sasquatch when that rolled out....I mean, DJ Breakout could be playing in The Valley and you would hear him in Edenwald!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Where exactly is 78 Park located?"

TERRY TEE:"On Needham Avenue in the Northeast Bronx."

78 Park

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"What was your relationship with the Grandmaster Productions Crew? There are a couple of flyers from 1979 that have both your crews names on them."

TERRY TEE:"They were good friends of mine and neighbours as well. We all lived in the same neighbourhood. DJ Scorpio...he lived around the block from me. We called his van the Big Green Machine. He had a Chevy G20 van. His van was what carried our soundsystem and our equipment. I know Grandmasters Productions very well. They made some noise in the neighbourhood as well.  They did not get the same recognition as Touch Of Class but in the neighbourhood, yeah......they were pretty much known. They played a lot of times in Edenwald."

April 18th, 1980: Touch Of Class performs at Edenwald Center in the Bronx along with Grandmasters Productions

 

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

TERRY TEE:"Ah yes....to all my colleagues in Touch Of Class...DJ Disco Gee, DJ Mellow Beat, DJ Willie Will, Charlie Dee, Apollo One and of course Mexi Ray!!! To the Brothers Disco! To Grandmasters Productions and to the Bronx as a whole!"

SIR NORIN RAD:" Thank you!! I wanna shout out my crew The Intruders and my mellow Sureshot La Rock! Princess Teela (RIP)!"

 

 

 

Interview with MC Hi-Cee (Touch Of Class / Inner City Disco)

                      Interview with MC Hi-Cee (Touch Of Class / Inner City Disco)

 

MC Hi-Cee (Touch Of Class / Inner City Disco)

                                      conducted by Sir Norin Rad (The Intruders / Germany)

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

HI-CEE:"I was born and raised in the Bronx, New York City.....in Jacobi Hospital which is in the northeast section of the Bronx."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Okay and where exactly did you live in the Bronx when you encountered Hiphop for the very first time? Was it Edenwald ?"

HI-CEE:"Yes, it sure was. That's where I was born and raised in Edenwald Housing Projects. Yup, that's exactly where it started."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What kind of music were you exposed to as a young girl growing up?"

HI-CEE:"I come from a very diverse background. My mother is Caribean..Trinidadian and my dad was Southern. Music was a very big part of our family. I was raised on traditional Soul music at the time, right in the midst of the Civil Rights Movement. R&B of course...and then my oldest brother had a very huge influence on me with Jazz. So I was introduced to a lot of classical Jazz artists at a very young age. So melting Hiphop and some of the Jazz was pretty familiar to me. So yeah it was a myriad of different  music of different sounds. So my evolution with music has been a long standing part of my life."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Could you please name those artists that stood out to you before you became a part of Hiphop?"

HI-CEE:"Sure. James Brown.....of course.....all the Motown artists. The Temptations, Diana Ross & The Supremes. Aretha Franklin was another very huge sound in my household. Sam Cooke....and then in the 1970ies....of course the Jackson Five, The Stylistics, Blue Magic, The Manhattans...that whole genre of music...and then you know it just transitioned into Disco in the mid to late seventies....like Donna Summers and all of these new artists."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Please describe how you got into Hiphop! Where did your first encounter with it take place? Was it at a park jam?"

HI-CEE:"Uhm.... sorta kind of but it actually stems back to the B-Boys..to that whole B-Boy culture and Graffiti. Breaking was my initial exposure to Hiphop."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Please elaborate on that! Were you a B-Girl back then?"

HI-CEE:"I would say I was. I was a self-proclaimed B-Girl. That whole culture was just about being young and relaxed. You know, having jeans and sweatshirts and sneakers....you know just hanging out. We would wear the Super Pro-Keds and the wide bottom Lee Jeans. So yeah it was something for the young people to do, just to hang out and express their creativity through music and dance."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Your name appears on Hiphop flyers as early as 1979. So you were undoubtedly among the first female MCees. What made you pick up the microphone and start rhyming?"

HI-CEE:"I had a friend who was at the time a DJ. He was spinning on the 1s and 2s and we would just hang out. I just picked up the mic and I had a knack. I had always been a little bit of a poet. So you know I would write rhymes and I just got encouraged one day to pick up the mic when he was jamming in house. And that was the beginning of it. So wherever he would go he would bring me wih him and I would just get on the mic and rhyme."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What was his name?"

HI-CEE:"His name was Carl. I forgot what his DJ name was. He wasn't from Edenwald but he was from right outside of the neighbourhood."

SIR NORIN RAD:"How did you meet him?"

HI-CEE:"Actually I knew him before he started DJing. We were all like teenage friends and I was dating his best friend at the time. We actually had a crush on each other but I wind up dating his best friend. Me and his friend got close but we maintained our relationship as friends. So when he started DJing and started doing his thing it happened organically and I just started rocking the mic. He was actually my connection to Touch Of Class."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Which year was that?"

HI-CEE:"1977/78."

SIR NORIN RAD:"How long did you perform with him?"

HI-CEE:"It wasn't long. Maybe a few months. I do remember that it was warm when I started rocking with him because we were doing our thing outside. So I would say it was probably about four months. He was connected to DJ Mellow Beat of Touch Of Class. He was really good friends with him. He knew him, we went to his set and the rest is kind of history."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So what was it like for you to stand in front of a crowd and to kick your rhymes for the first time?" 

HI-CEE:"I kinda sort of..I remember being in a house and it was all guys. Hiphop was dominated by males back then. DJ Breakout lived on the same block. It was a little stressful but because I was with my really good friend and he felt that I had the confidence to do it I kinda didn't wanna let him down.So I had to bolster up whatever courage I could find at the time to pick up the mic because of course they wanted to hear me and they were all looking at me like, "Is she the next Sha Rock?" (laughs) I was right behind her. So yeah it was a little intense when I think about it."

SIR NORIN RAD:" Please describe how you joined the Touch Of Class Crew which was one of the most prestigious DJ/MC crews in the northeast Bronx. How did your first DJ react to your decision to leave him for Touch Of Class?"

HI-CEE:"There wasn't no bad feelings. He just wanted to see me get to the next level. Which was good..."

SIR NORIN RAD:" So did you have to go through something like a tryout in order to join Touch Of Class? Did you have to rock the mic in front of the crew while their DJs were cutting up beats?"

HI-CEE:"Oh yeah! Exactly! I had to kinda audition. They had some beats going on. I kicked some of my rhymes they liked what they heard and let me join their group."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did you already go by the name of Hi-C at that time?"

HI-CEE:"Yes, sir!!! (laughs) It was Hi-C from the beginning." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"How did you come up with that name? Did your choice have anything to do with that drink Hi-C?"

HI-CEE:"So it goes a little something like this: I didn't get my name from the Hi-C drink. That's what a lot of people like to think. It's just that if  you put "Hi" to the initial letter of my first name you would get Hi-C."

SIR NORIN RAD:"How did the other MCees of Touch Of Class treat you when you joined their crew?"

HI-CEE:"They were very, very happy to have me on board because those gentlemen were like different. Touch Of Class was a different type of crew. It was exactly what that title was. During that time you had a lot of....I don't wanna say non-classy but unclassy MCees. We were classy!  You know, we had a lot of pride in our appearance and in our delivery of lyrics, in our technique of rapping. We were all very, very lyrical. They all were very lyrical and they all could move a crowd. So for me to be able to pretty much impress them it was an honour for me to be part of that team. Now they were all very welcoming. We really, really performed well together. There was a little tension between me and Mexi Ray....who is Apollo One's brother. He was a little bit spoiled and I was, too. He liked the limelight......so to be a female with them made it a little bit competetive...for the most part between he and I...but the formula still worked well."

August 4th 1979: Touch Of Class is rocking at the 28 Lincoln Ave Disco

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"So please explain how much work went into coming up with exceptional rhymes and routines, into making the whole crew appear as a well functioning unit."

HI-CEE:"Well, the process pretty much was.....each invididual MC of course had their own rap lyrics that they would develop and you know we would come together and rehearse just to get a flow and to be comfortable with each other but then with specific beats we would have specific routines. There was one time where Touch Of Class....we were in a competition....it was an outdoor competition and our routine just totally took over. Nobody after that competed against us. We would come up with routines. Usually it started with a specific song, a specific beat. The DJ may have something that he wanted us to work on an so we would just listen to it and then we would just come up with you know different rhymes, the rotation of the rhymes. If there were gonna be any movement we would build that in. We would rehearse multiple times during the week whenever it was feasible for everybody to get together. I know weekly we....Touch Of Class..would have a standing day that we would rehearse. When we knew there was gonna be a competition we would be rehearsing multiple times during the week."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So I guess you would think a lot about new rhymes and concepts for new routines during your days back then."

HI-CEE:"Yes, I did but it never felt like work. So I at the time was in transition. I was going to school downtown in Manhattan. That took up much of my time along with my boyfriend. So I basically dropped out of high school. Unfortunately I did but that gave me a little bit more time to work on my craft. I managed to go to work and in my private time I would write rhymes. A lot of our rehearsals would be done later on in the evening once everybody was through with their working. You know, some of the team they were old enough to work and we would just plan to get together in the evening and work and do what we neeeded to do. We pretty much knew that while we were not actually together and rehearsing we still needed to work on our craft. That kinda build in."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Please describe your approach to writing rhymes back then. Would you write your rhymes while your fellow MCees were around or did you prefer to be alone when it came to that? Would you write your rhymes to a certain beat that was playing on a boom box in your room at home or did you write rhymes to a beat in your head?"

HI-CEE:"I'm just a creative person. So a lot of my rhymes were tied back to old school songs or lyrics. Things that people would sing at the time. So I would just play with that. For the most part it was music that woul inspire me to write a rhyme. So I remembered old school lyrics and I may twist it and you know come up with something. We styled it you know to Hiphop and we would just write."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did you keep a rhyme book with you?"

HI-CEE:"Of course! Every MC has to have a rhyme book!! I would keep pads or a notebook. Probably a spiral at the time."

SIR NORIN RAD:"You have stated that the whole Touch Of Class crew also stood out because of the way its members dressed. Please elaborate on that!"

HI-CEE:"We were all definetely fly! As I said I was very creative so I would design a lot of my outfits. So I would make sure for me that I was always fly cause I knew that the brothers would always gonna come nicely dressed. We presented ourselves with a high level of class to the young Hiphop scene at the time. Nobody was doing it like we were."

SIR NORIN RAD:"What was considered as female fly gear in Hiphop during the late 1970ies and early 1980ies?"

HI-CEE:"You had the bamboo earrings with the big gold chains. A lot of the designer jeans definetely was the thing. High heeled shoes, some would have on platforms. You had the sheepskin coats. At that time there was a heavy influence of the cowboy style.  So we would wear cowboy hats, cowboy boots with heels. Again the designer jeans was the thing back then. That's when that whole genre began with Gloria Vanderbilt, the Sassons, the Jordaches, the Calvin Kleins. The Le Tigre shirts at that time were very stylish. You would pop your collar.....yeah."

SIR NORIN RAD:"I have seen a lot of 1970ies pictures of Black and Puerto Rican ladies from the Bronx which show them wearing a scarve around their head as well as colorful blouses with huge collars. Was that style still around when you got into Hiphop?"

HI-CEE:"Yeah, so that was right towards the end of the Disco era. So they would have these really puffed sleeves. We would call them puff sleeves and they would have the really long collars. So that's indicative of getting towards the end of the Disco era and going into Hiphop. Some girls you would see them with scarves. Either they would tie them around their neck because it was just part of the dance gear at the time or they would tie them around their neck. It was some sort of a gypsy kind of style. Yeah, that was that mid seventies look."

SIR NORIN RAD:“Did you have a pair of Marshmallow shoes back then?"

HI-CEE:"I had a pair of maroon Marshmallow shoes with the white bottoms. I sure did. I also had a leather coat. Delancey Street is where you would go to get your leathers. If you were fashionable you had to have a leather jacket or a leather coat. That was another big part of your attire, of you being fly." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"What type of hats did the women in Hiphop wear back then?"

HI-CEE:"You would see some of them with Kangols...you know, the one that LL Cool J rocked... you would see some of them rocking those but for the most part...the females...they would have their hair out. They wouldn't have their head covered unless, you know, you had a cowboy hat during that time."

SIR NORIN RAD:"At which venues did you rock at when you were part of the Nice & Nasty MCees of the Touch of Class Crew?"

HI-CEE:"The T-Connection was one....Edenwald Center. We did the Ecstasy Garage one time. That was towards the time when I was gonna separate with them. We did a lot of outdoor jams in the parks. There was one spot on Webster Avenue that was really popular for us....the P.A.L. We rocked down in the Valley, too, at some point. Edenwald Park.......places like that."

August 24th, 1979: Touch Of Class Disco participates in a DJ convention at the legendary Webster P.A.L. in the Bronx.

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"What's the difference between rocking at a community center like the Edenwald Center and rocking at a club like the T-Connection?"

HI-CEE:"Well, the first difference was at a club you had the potential to get paid. So when you rocked at a club that was basically like the birth place of the battle scene. You know, the battling of the different crews. The jams at the community centers were more of a recreational thing. You gotta chance to go and do your thing. You know, showcase your talent. But when you moved into the club, when you're performing in a club....now you have the element of making money. Now you're being paid. And that, you know, really was the difference. Getting into the T-Connection... which at the time was the number one club in the Bronx....that meant you had arrived!!! They had a big stage. The venue was just set for performances. You really felt like an artist."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So that means in places like the Edenwald Center you were on the floor standing face to face with the crowd?"

HI-CEE:"Yeah, exactly you were on the floor. You know, the same floor as the party and everybody was up close. You didn't have the barrier of a stage...it was all together with the party. And that was the difference! The jams at the centers were partys. Even though you partied at the T-Connection but you also had the payment. You know, it was just the way it was marketed."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Please elaborate on the parties in the community centers during the late 1970ies. What kind of dances were done there? What was the atmosphere like?"

HI-CEE:"The Freak!!! That was the main dance!!! (laughs) At the community centers it would  actually be such a big party scene....it would be so heavy that the floors would be muddy because of the sweat and the dirt of the shoes. And so when you asked me about the gear back then I recalled the guys when they were coming out of a community center party......the dirt was up to their calves on their Lee Jeans because of all the moisture! It was hot in there. These places were called sweat boxes. But it was the most phenomenal time because you had a large group of people that was coming of age and there was just a new freedom and liberty that you were experiencing and you know we didn't know that we were giving birth to a whole new cultural artform. We were just having a really, really good time...."

October 12th, 1979: Touch Of Class Disco is rocking at the Edenwald Center in the Bronx

      

SIR NORIN RAD:"Would you say that it was harder for you as a young woman to make it as an  MC back then?"

HI-CEE:"It's interesting because I rocked with two different crews it's two different perspectives for me. So yeah, with the Touch Of Class.. because it was a male dominated group it was a little bit more difficult because they were very dominating, they made all the decisions about the direction of the crew. I was not consulted on anything and they actually dismissed me from the crew for really no reason. In my opinion I became a lot more popular than the other MCees because I was a female and I had a small following. They would come to all of our jams and they would help me hype it up. So whenever I got on the mic it would just be hyped! The others weren't getting exactly that level of response. So it kinda created a little bit of friction there. There was some resentment. So they decided that I wasn't gonna be a part of the team. From the outside looking in I just disappeared. Kenny Ken....(DJ of the Cheeba Crew) he introduced me to Inner City Disco. With them it wasn't hard because I was with my contemporaries. We were all females, we fed off each other. We knew that there were other female crews out there but we felt that we were number one. So it was a whole different experience. I believe that this particular crew..because we were all females and we performed just so well.....that made it easier for us to get into doors than it was for other groups." 

January 5th, 1980: Touch Of Class rocks at the legendary Ecstasy Garage. This was the last time Hi-Cee performed with them.

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"From where did you know DJ Kenny Ken?"

HI-CEE:"I met him through Touch Of Class. We were jamming together somewhere and Kenny Ken is such a personable person.... he just started talking to me and we just clicked and then we became reallly cool friends. He married my best friend. I introduced him to his wife and it's history ever since (laughs). They just celebrated 40 years, so you know?! He saw in what kind of situation I was with Touch Of Class and he didn't like it. He intervened and I guess he knew Inner City Disco through La Spank (MC of Inner City Disco).....but yeah, he made the connection for me." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did they welcome you with open arms?"

HI-CEE:"Definetely. It was amazing. We really felt like family."

SIR NORIN RAD:"How did you manage to regularly get to your new crew's rehearsals in Queens?"

HI-CEE:"Yeah, well Kenny Ken was kinda helpful because he would drive out to Lefrak from time to time and when he wouldn't drive it would take me all day. I would hop on the train. It was a journey and it took a lot of time but that's what I love about New York..that ability to transfer to different neighbourhoods because of the train system. I spend a lot of time riding trains and that's how I became familiar with the city......all boroughs....with the exception of Staten Island. It was just something that had to be done. I didn't think much about it. My mother was very supportive with anything I wanted to do positive. She would just tell me to be careful and that we did. La Spank actually came from Gun Hill Projects which is not far from me. She's a couple of stops ahead of me. It just all kinda worked together. Lil Tee...I forgot...I think she was from the South Bronx. So, you know, we would all come back together to the Bronx. It was just us together. We would do what we had to do. We were very comitted!! It's just amazing to think back."

January 12th 1980: Inner City Disco rocks at the Ecstasy Garage in the Bronx along with the Heavenly 7. As you can see by that time Hi-C had already joined Inner City Disco.

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"Were you already present for that battle between Inner City Disco and the Mercedes Ladies?" 

HI-CEE:"Oh, are you kidding me? Some people say that they beat us but they never showed up because we were so ready!! We had all of our arsenal we had created. We had routines and we had rehearsed them to the tee. It was fly and we were ready and somebody probably told them that we were that ready as far as the MC battle of it.....'cause see their DJs couldn't touch our DJs!!! They just couldn't! And there were some guys that couldn't touch DJ Quenny Quen. One thing that Quenny Quen showed us that she should have did is that she mixed "Apache" blindfolded. Blindfolded!!!! Blindfolded!!! Do you hear me!!! That's something I will never forget! I wish that was recorded! That's something I will never forget! Never!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Well, when I interviewed Quenny Quen she stated that a battle did indeed take place between Inner City Disco and the Mercedes Ladies. She said that your crew had a routine in which each MC would call out his counterpart. She also said that she messed that part up because she called out her own name instead of that of DJ Baby D. Could it be that you weren't present for that battle?"

HI-CEE:"I know the first initial announcement......'cause we had practiced so hard. They didn't show up. So that battle must have happened at another time. The routine that she was talking about was one that I created off of that movie where this one gang calls out another gang. We would say, "Mercedes Ladies!!! Won't you come out to play??"

SIR NORIN RAD:"That's from that movie called "The Warriors"."

HI-CEE:"Yeah, exactly!!! But I'mma be honest with you I don't recall a battle with them. I don't remember that. It may have happened though when I wasn't around....I know it was a little drama about it and I think they called us out and we responded and they knew that we was ready so they didn't show up."

March 28th, 1980: Inner City Disco performs at the legendary T-Connection in the Bronx.

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"I was told that your manager Pop believed so strongly in your crew because he bought equipment  and even clothes."

HI-CEE:"Oh yeah, he took us shopping! It was the most magical experience. One day..I believe we were in Macy's..probably been there the first time in my life....it was the first time that someone spend that kind of money on me and the other girls. Yeah, he took us shopping and we were ready! We were just ready!  From head to toe! He bought us shoes, he bought us jeans, he bought us swatshirts. All of our mics..we had top notch equipment!!! He invested a lot in us."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Please describe the role of each MC of Inner City Disco!"

HI-CEE:"I would say that Lady Sweet was like the beauty queen. La Spank was just a force, you know? She was just powerful. She would take over!! Lil Tee... she was just standard but she was a pretty girl. We were all scorpios I believe. And then me I would just rock the mic! I was just the lyrical one. And everybody was lyrical but you know I was the lyrical pro. Whenever they needed something clever or catchy.......or someone that would move the crowd that would be me. My skills were a little bit more advanced and I will say that I didn't think that there were any other female MCees out there that really were as lyrical as I was."

MC/DJ La Spank (Inner City Disco)

 

                                                            

MC Lady Sweet (Inner City Disco)

SIR NORIN RAD:"Did you rock with them in that big park in Lefrak which they referred to as Rock Creek Park?"

HI-CEE:"No. I went straight to the clubs with them."

SIR NORIN RAD:"I would like to ask you a couple of questions now which deal with the nature of true MCing. How did MC battles go down during your era, during the era of original pure MCing? Would MCees diss each other personally? Would they threaten each other?"

HI-CEE:"No, no way. MCing was a platform that was used to have a party, to have a good time and then later it got into that storytelling thing. Rap changed all of that. I believe al lot of it stems from that 2 Pac Biggie Smalls scenario. Rap now became adversarial to a degree where lives began to become threatened. They began to use Rap as a platform to threaten other people's lives and to tell tales of hurting and terrorizing other people's loved ones in that process. You just started to see things that were not the original intent of Hiphop. It took a different turn. The other huge I would say transition from my era...the true Hiphop era...to where we are now is that in the beginning the DJ was the center piece of Hiphop. It was all about the DJ, the DJ skills and the beats that he played, what they would do to keep the party going. The MCees were just pretty much the hype men for the DJs. So when it went to recording you no longer had the DJ. You didn't need the DJ and now it's all just focussed on the rapper. I think that was another huge transition that took Hiphop into a whole 'nother direction. That really changed the dynamics of Hiphop. Now the party element disappeared."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Reading about what happened to some of those legendary original  DJ/MC Crews after they got signed to record labels like Sugarhill Records about twentyfive years ago really shocked me. All of a sudden the DJs who started Hiphop and were the backbone of MCing became obsolete as they were replaced by a studio band and the record labels had no real use for them and didn't want to pay them." 

HI-CEE:"We lost a very huge part of Hiphop when that happened...you know, a part of the culture. It's not surprising that this was motivated by money but at the the end of it those early MCees would not have been where they were without their DJ. That's just the bottom line. The Furious Five would have been nothing without Grandmaster Flash,okay? Because in the beginning people came to see Flash. And yes, they were very good MCees but the people came to see Flash. The Funky Four Plus One they came with DJ Breakout and DJ Baron.They had the best beats that you could ever imagine!!!! I take off my hat to them....till today!!! These dudes??? Their crates???? Uuuuuuuuuuuuuuh.....Yeah, it was really incredible! I'm a music enthusiast. So I can appreciate the DJ side of it. But yeah, we lost a huge part of Hiphop when the recording of rap started to happen. DJing....it's a craft. It's something that you had to work for in order to master it and all these parties in the early days of Hiphop took place because of the DJs, because of their performances and the beats that they mixed." 

SIR NORIN RAD:"Would you agree with the assertion that Hiphop music for the most part is a child of the Funk, Jazz & Soul music of the 1970ies?"

HI-CEE:"Absolutely!!! We would NOT HAVE HIPHOP if we didn't have these genres. No, no!!! The beat.....the breakbeat.....that is the driving factor of Hiphop. That is the core of Hiphop....the DJ in the mix!!!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"It is fascinating to ponder upon the efforts which the DJs invested back then in order to build up their soundsystem and what it took to find beats back then. Travelling through New York City, taking the train from the Bronx all the way down to Brooklyn, going to different thrift stores and looking through dusty stacks of records just to get a second copy of a specific breakbeat. At times the beat part was very short so the DJ had to be fast to be able to catch it and from those beats and DJ techniques grew a whole beautiful culture!!! I have interviewed many of the most influential B-Boys in Hiphop and most them stated that  hearing those breakbeats blasting through the speakers of a powerful soundsystem filled them with bliss. They called it a spiritual experience."

HI-CEE:"Yes!!!! And see that is the connection to our original culture...to Africa and just the power of that!!! It's a unique phenomenon."

SIR NORIN RAD:"No doubt. What did take to be a fresh MC in the original era of Hiphop? Like when it was all about rocking the mic live in front of a crowd with a DJ in the back cutting up breakbeats?"

HI-CEE:"Well, you had to stay on beat. You had to be able to rock as a unit. That really had to become your instinct. That's why the rehearsal piece is so important because DJs would have their own routines and what they were gonna play. So you had to be able to rock over their mixes and so you had to rehearse. Then you had cassette tapes so we would record the mix and we would rock over it so that we would become one with the beats. Were few people could rhyme off the top and I take my hat off to them but you had to go over your raps. And you had to go over your rhymes with the beats. And you would only rock certain rhymes over certain beats. So when you heard a specific beat at a party you knew,"Oh yes, I'm gonna pull out specific rhymes! These are the rhymes that I'm gonna rock to this beat!" The beats and the rhymes, they went together, you know? So sometimes when I was still with those outstanding MCees of Touch Of Class they would pass the mic to me when they heard  a certain break that they knew I was popular with."

SIR NORIN RAD:"Would you say that it was important to possess a certain charisma as an MC?"

HI-CEE:"Oh, definitely!!! You had to have a certain swag! You really had to be confident and part of that confidence came from how you looked. So when you knew that you had a show coming up you had to prepare for that show! And you know with Inner City Disco we had uniforms. Pop invested in us, in our uniforms and our look an we really looked like a group. So when you came to our show and you saw five ladies dressed alike you would do a double take and be like,"Oh wait a minute! Who are they?""

February 29th, 1980: Inner City Disco performs at the Ecstasy Garage in the Bronx

 

SIR NORIN RAD:"What were your top three breakbeats to rhyme over?"

HI-CEE:""Scratching" by the Magic Disco Machine. That beat is crazy! Number two is "Frisco Disco" by Eastside Connection. I loved that. And then there was a song called "Planetary Citizen" by John Mac Laughlin. Loved that! That was my theme song!! That kinda goes back to the DJ Breakout days."

SIR NORIN RAD:"So you must have attended the early DJ Breakout parties then. When it was still mainly about the B-Boys?"

HI-CEE:"What??? Of course!!!!! All the time!!! Come on, yo!!! I was there! I remember him playing "Indiscreet" by D.C. La Rue which was one of DJ Kenny Ken's favourites. We called that beat the Cricket Song!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"The Cricket Song?"

HI-CEE:"Yeah, 'cause the break sounds like a bunch of crickets. Breakout just used to go crazy with it. Baron was a good DJ, too. Don't get me wrong....He was more of a party DJ. Kinda little on the Disco side....just a little. But Breakout was the hardcore B-Boy Beatmaster. If you wanted to hear raw beats you would go to his jams. I remember when he played "Give The Drummer Some More" by The Little Hooks with Ray Nato & The Kings. People would go crazy over that beat!!!!!"

SIR NORIN RAD:"Last question........what was it like to perform in front of a BX crowd back then. I mean I guess the people in the crowd pretty much decided who would make it as an MC and who would not, didn't they?"

HI-CEE:"Oh yeah, they weren't kind. So....here's the thing if you didn't step up and you weren't good you knew it because they would let you know and that ended whatever MC career you had. So when you see those MCees that were able to perform for any length of time back then you know that they were tried because if you weren't good you were not gonna see them anymore. That's what also happened to a lot of DJs early on. Many of them didn't have the equipment or the beats to make it. You really had to have some money behind you to some degree to be able to be out there! The equipment piece alone was a huge investment to make sure you had the right speakers and the right amplification. That's how you were tested during that time. The abililty to bring some power with your equipment and your beats and then your skills, you know? So if you made it to any degree you had a formula that was working. "

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

HI-CEE:"Oh sure, I'm gonna shout out my son who has a career of himself in R&B & Hiphop. H continues with the legacy of the family and I definetely wanna shout out my two crews the Inner City Disco and Touch Of Class. And DJ Breakout, too, because he was very influential in Hiphop in my area and in my era. But yeah, that's who I'm shouting out."

SIR NORIN RAD:"I wanna shout out my Intruders Crew and my mellow Sureshot La Rock (thanks for all the flyers)."