One of my favourite ever hip hop flicks (I'm talking DVD/ VHS, poster on the wall and everything) is 25 years old this week. If you haven't seen it, I urge you to forthwith, either to the ICA or down HMV when the DVD drops. Now, dated it maybe, but for a snapshot of how things basically were back in the day, then this is the film you need to see; b-boying, graf, battling, b-ball, bad acting, the Bronx...it's all there.
In celebration of the birthday, I talked about the film with Hip Hop's No.1 UK Big Dawg, The Westwood. Here's what Timmy had to say (he was slightly subdued on the day - wonder if he'd just head about being 'moved over' to 1Xtra? Just a thought. I also wonder why the BBC insists on segregating Black British Music? Wait, this is for a separate post, coming soon...
In the meantime: Here's a story that must be told ... Tim Westwood relives life in the Bronx as he assesses the impact of the film Wild Style on hip-hop
Interview with Hattie Collins
Saturday August 4, 2007
The Guardian
"On the real, man, when Wild Style came out it was like a rite of passage going to see it. It came over here initially at some local cinemas like the Brixton Ritzy and then it was around on bootleg VHS in those days.
It definitely had a tremendous impact on me. Why? Because everyone loved the music, and had a passion for the music, and with it came the lifestyle and the culture. Wild Style really broke down in essence what hip-hop was - the graffiti, the DJing, the mcing and the B-boying. It had real, genuine people in it, and it caught the essence of that creative energy that was coming out of the south Bronx.
I was there when it was happening, so I've got my own stories to tell and my own experiences. I used to run around the Bronx and I'd run around Bronx River. They used to do parties at the community centre, that was me as a tourist being shown around by some early-time artist. I forget who.
I remember being shown the Bronx River Projects where Bambaataa was based, and the window where he used to put his speaker out onto, to play into the project's courtyard. But that was as a hip-hop tourist. That was just, like, paying homage. Where I really experienced early hip-hop was in the Latin Quarter and those Manhattan clubs where hip-hop was really happening back in the day. Then, over here in the UK at Spatz and Soul City, when breakdancing and graffiti was at the forefront.
When Wild Style came out, it definitely caught my imagination and helped form my passion for hip-hop and shape my early days in the game. I was DJing at a London club called Gossips and the Cat's Whiskers in Streatham back in the day and we used to do this hip-hop party on a Saturday afternoon. Wild Style had a real influence on the way people dressed and the way artists rhymed and the way you'd cut breaks as a DJ.
My favourite scene from the movie, on the real, is when the rapper wins the competition and comes back with the money. The dude's name is Busy Bee Starski! So he wins, and then he gets some girls and some liquor and his men and he goes to the hotel and lays the money out to spell his name. I just thought that so caught it for me; someone from the ghetto winning money and celebrating. I just thought that was great. A lot of people in those early days had this interpretation of hip-hop that people were doing it to stop gang violence or for the love of it - but Busy won the money and he went and spent that money, so good for him. It didn't have all the big names in there - like Melle Mel - but it had artists that were operating locally, and it really described that early scene, so more power to it. Those guys had presence and profile for a minute, but I don't know where they all are now. Fab 5 Freddy is still out there - he went on to do MTV Raps - but the rest of them ... How old are those guys going to be now? There's not many people that can have a career that long as an artist.
It was an incredible movie, man, it really changed a lot of people's lives, including mine, because it broke down the definition of what hip-hop was, and engaged the whole culture, the whole lifestyle element. It helped shape hip-hop because it took it in the purest form you could get for a motion picture, and transplanted it all around the world. It defined hip-hop of that period. It showed the real essence of deejaying and the essence of emcee battling. At the time it was really raw.
There were later movies like Beat Street and other cash-in movies that had no credibility at all, like Flashdance, but this was the real deal. I think the power of it was that it wasn't a commercial interpretation or a cash-in of what went down. The equivalent now would be someone filming it on their video camera and putting it up on YouTube.
Artists back then weren't experienced like they are now; on MTV and in Hollywood. It's all about the rappers now and nothing else. We're in the era of rap, not hip-hop. It's not about the four aspects of hip-hop culture any more. It's a big business and it's about the artists and rightfully so; it's a commodity you can buy.
You've still got Crazy Legs, but breakdancing is a young man's game and graffiti artists don't seem to be part of hip-hop anymore. But the film historically is really important, because it did reflect what was going on. The end scene where they had the big jam wasn't something that happened every week in New York, because it became such a club-based scene, but it definitely caught the raw energy of the Amphitheatre. That's how it went down.
And the soundtrack - with tracks like Military Scratch and the Wild Style theme - is big to this day. Well, it doesn't hold as a timeless piece of music, but it's held dear to people's hearts and we love the music and whole vibe of it. Wild Style is a classic piece of hip-hop history.
· Westwood is on Radio 1, Sat, 9pm; Wild Style is now showing at the ICA, SW1; the DVD is out Sep 10
No comments:
Post a Comment