According to Charlie Ahearn, 43rd Street and 8th Avenue of the 80′s had been strangled by the government for at least 20 years. Times Square was shut down because of the potential of a real estate boom in the area. Ahearn says 8th Avenue was ‘The grime crime capitol of NYC’.  The night life was rife with ‘action’. The general public were intimidated by dealers openly selling drugs, young women were being harrased by men looking for prostitutes and the general lawlessness of the area gave rise to organisations such as the Guardian Angels. Street kids from Brooklyn and the Bronx came to 8th Avenue to buy drugs, watch kungfu films and play the amusement arcades in the area, it is said it was common for kids to be robbed while playing games in the arcades. Prostitution, transvestites, drug dealers, pornography. All this, literally under Ahearn’s window. 

He was already fascinated with street culture, making the film The Deadly Art of Survival and Wildstyle. Times Square was in the midst of the Street scene, and so was Ahearn’s apartment building. He moved there in 1980 with his artist wife, Jane Dickson, while in the process of setting up his Wildstyle production office.  Ahearn usually shot on 8mm film, but the birth of his son in 1986 prompted him to buy a video camera.

 8th Avenue night life would become active between midnight to 6 am, and Ahearn wasn’t getting much sleep, he woke up night after night to film whatever was going on in the street outside;  transvetite madness, drug deals gone wrong, fist fights… LOTS OF FIST FIGHTS! As Ahearn put it - TTragedy after tragedy”‘ unfolding.

Times Square Sleaze

Ahearn’s voyeurism became a replacement for the newspaper, if he needed to know what was happening he just looked out the window. Most of the footage in Doin’ Time In Times Square was captured when a commotion out in the street below woke him up. One night, woken by loud Biz Markie music playing, he went to the window with video camera to find a group of people doing crazy dance moves in the street below. When people visited his apartment, Ahearn would show them his video recordings, the video tapes were a mixture personal family activity and drug addict fights and prostitutes on the street. This was what gave Ahearn the idea of presenting Doin’ Time In Times Square as an extended home movie.

If you’re fascinated by the madness that is the underbelly of society then Ahearn made this film for you. This twisted dark comedy of night terrors is prime time viewing for the voyeur in most of us. Hollywood has made billions feeding our hunger for street dreams by repeatedly selling us a dramatised version of what occurs outside our own windows, so wasn’t it inevitable that sooner or later we would want THE REAL THING?

"Get down before the police come!"

Nowadays the viewing of reality tv in the form of street madness is common place, internet sites such as You Tube present us with all the makeshift reality madness TV we require. The cyber voyeur that is everyday Joe Public will unleash the iPhone camera at the slightest altercation, which then can and will be uploaded to our personal channels in an instant. Welcome to the world of bum fights, Nigerian vs Ghanaian bus arguments, MC battle gone wrong, the crackhead street madness, black vs white street fight… There seems to be no art to capturing human tragedy on an iPhone, and equally nothing mentally beneficial to gain from watching the madness on your computer. But in Ahearn’s own words what he captured was “a slice of life of a time gone by“, when society paraded its damaged goods openly hand in hand, up and down Times Square for the world to see. Charlie Ahearn’s film is a documentation of  Times Square’s ongoing nightly reality tv twisted drama… tragic, funny, freaky, fascinating. He played mini big brother with his aerial view of the madness below.

Bum Fights

Woman attacks man with broom stick!

While his family slept, Ahearn filmed junkies and lowlives from the safety of his apartment above, at least it was relatively safe once he had the iron front door fitted. Filming lowlives is one thing but allowing them into your apartment is another! Fitting the iron door came after his front door was kicked off the hinges by thieves. Jane, his wife, home during the breakin screamed out “C’MON MOTHER F%^*£RS I’M READY FOR YOU!!!, which prompted the thieves to flee empty handed.

The Times Square filmed by Charlie Ahearn no longer exsists, his apartment building was torn down and replaced by a “Miami style art deco 37 storey building”. 

“Times Square has been Disneyfied”, but he does not miss it, says Ahearn “why would anyone want to reminisce on the grime and crime of Times Square?”

"Don't be Side kickin my side kick"!!

The punch knocked the guy out cold! He was robbed by at least 3 other characters where he lay

Crack head goes through the unconscious guy's pockets.

1. The Deadly Art Of Survival

“Nathan who is unaware of a contract out on his head is jumped and beaten bloody by a local street gang.Using his martial arts skills he set out to get revenge and is pitted against a group of drug dealers from a rival karate school called the Disco Dojo “ 

Charlie Ahearn has been a man in the right place at the right time and has recieved numerous accolades for just that. As if you didn’t know already, Ahearn is the celebrated director of the seminal hiphop masterpiece, Wildstyle.

Wildstyle with its semi dramatised/documentary approach perfectly captured the ghetto hiphopera unfolding in front of America’s eyes. Ahearn was smart enough to let the story unfold without a thought of dilution nor any other less than divine intervention, which as we all now know was the inevitable. Of course, Wildstyle went on to be a ground breaking worldwide success. But Wildstyle may never have been made if it wasn’t for one of Ahearn’s earlier films… The Deadly Art of Survival. 

It was the making and showing of this low budget doc/fiction No Wave classic which thrust Charlie Ahearn into the world of hiphop. On seeing The Deadly Art Of Survival Fab Five Freddy approached Ahearn… And the rest, as they say, is history. 

The Deadly Art of Survival  was originally the idea of one Nathan Ingram, ghetto soulbrother martial artist. After seeing one of the short films that Ahearn showed in Ingram’s neigbourhood, he approached Ahearn with an idea for a ghetto martial arts film starring himself and his young students. Ingram was inspired by the idea of a martial arts ghetto epic to capture young blacks imaginations (they were already hooked on martial arts movies), in order to eventually steer them clear of the drug and crime wave rife in New York city throughout the 70′s.

On a side note: 21st century Nathan Ingram still works in the community in a similar way to how he did in the 70′s, but now running a prestigous martial arts school in China town, teaching martial arts to kids of all cultures.

As with many films of this genre, The Deadly Art of Survival contained all the typical traits of low budget film making… sketchy acting, adlibbed dialog, shooting in front of a street audience, boom microphone hanging too low. Super 8 film limitations meant that a whole scene was planned out and shot in a single take. But all those quirks make films of this nature so unique… they literally cannot be reproduced or re-enacted ! 

The Deadly Art Of Survival was shot between ’77 and ’78, and was filmed mainly on weekends because some of the actors were school kids from Ingram’s neigbourhood. Other cast members included  Charlie Ahearn’s artist friends such as downtown ‘No Wave’ 8 mm film producer Beth B, the choreographer and dancer Yashiko Chuma, and the artist Kiki Smith. Nathan Ingram’ s family and their real life church scenes also featured in the film. The church in question, situated on 14th St, was run byIngram’s father and mother, scenes feature Ingram’s father playing the church organ, and his mother praying in an intense fashion, while cousins and other family members appear in the congregation.

A prehiphop NYC street scenery can be seen through the lens of Ahearn’s Super 8 camera, at this point in time Bruce Lee and Martial arts were the attraction for young black men in the projects. Martial arts was practiced by many who were inspired by kung fu films. Early breakdance movements of the 70′s were also inspired by martial arts movies, it was literally a no brainer to make a martial arts inspired movie.

Ahearn estimated that the film, shot entirely on super 8 film, cost $2000, which covered the cost of buying pizzas over the two year period to feed the kids involved and give them incentive to take part.

Lee Quinones' freshly painted Howard the Duck mural 1977

 Graffitti artist Lee Quinones’ artwork was featured in film, and a few years later Quinones’ became Ahearn’s star in Wildstyle. His freshly painted Howard the Duck mural was featured in the  The Deadly Art Of Survival’s opening scene. He also painted a graffiti mural of a train on the wall of Handsome Harrys Disco Dojo. The Disco Dojo was a fictitious karate school run by the ruthless Handsome Harry, played by George Gonzalez, a fellow martial artist friend of Ingram. But the dojo was just a cover for Harry’s drug dealing operation. In one ridiculous scene, the unscrupulous Handsome Harry is seen blowing weed smoke in his young karate students faces in an attempt to hook them on Marijiuana and rob them of their pocket change. The character of Handsome Harry is a spoof comic view of ghetto karate dojo’s of the time, conning young kids into paying for a service they were meant to get for free. Nathan Ingram’s whole philosohy was to present these kind of services for no charge.

The Deadly Art Of Survival is named after the school that Ingram established in 74′, he never charged his students a fee because he saw martial arts as a way to build his ghetto students sense of self and promote a better way of life other than drugs and crime. All the martial artists in the film were students of Ingram, including the ‘ninja’ who were an integral part on the plot. The fight scenes were also choreographed by Ingram.

With hindsight, Ahearn feels he would have thought twice about some of the dangerous stunts he allowed to happen during the making of The Deadly Art Of Survival. During the last fight scene, when Handsome Harry meets his end at the hands of Ingram, George Gonzales fell backward into the river, nowadays this could never be done today without a stunt double. Charlie also talked his twin brother, John Ahearn, into a dangerous climb up to the top of a bridge to get an aerial shot “thats how things were done in those days” he explained. 

The following dialog is from a scene in The Deadly Art Of Survival. It is a conversation between Sly Abrahams and Steve Rikenbaker (some friends that Ingram had drafted into the movie). One of them had recently been to a  Parliament Funkadelic show, so they adlibbed a conversation about the show. They discuss their preference to Bootsy Collins performance over Funkadelic, they also spoke about the girls who were at the show…This piece of dialog is an insight into the current music trends of circa 77′, 78′  that young blacks were getting into. It also shows that hiphop attitude was a natural instinct of ghetto kids of  NYC.

This next piece of audio is from a scene where the ninja’s were playing with Nathan’s mind, it is an early example of hiphop NYC.

Howard Ingram in the opening scene

The Disco Dojo sign

holyroller tributes Malcolm Mclaren from HolyRollertv on Vimeo.

“We were mini Malcolm Maclarens.”

A  Hip Hop Secret

In an interview with Jarrell Mason of WUAG-FM, Michael Holman boasted that he happened to be the holder of many hip hop secrets.One of these secrets went like this… “If it wasn’t for the downtown New York punk rock and new wave scene, Hip Hop as we know it wouldn’t have happened.”

The implications of that statement are more far reaching than one can imagine. Does he know something that the forefathers of hip hop don’t, or are refusing to acknowledge?

Surely hip hop’s success worldwide is the result of a much more complex process of events, surely it was hiphop’s fresh new urban energy and growing demand  that catapulted  the music into the downtown clubs and beyond..wasn’t it due to this growing demand for rap music and hip hop culture that had more and more labels reaching for their cheque books, and what about the power, vision, experience, tastemaking and musical ability of DJ’s like Afrika Bambaataa, didn’t hip hop leave the Bronx when Bambaataa decided?

Isn’t hip hop’s dominance and survival in the music world due to the continual evolution of black music culture. Or is it’s success due to the same world that has continually stated even from the early 80’s that hip hop was a fad?

The implications of Michael Holman’s statement are so far reaching, that it would be a mistake not to question it. Michael Holman in an early 80’s interview said that: “the people (from hip hop culture) who are involved in shaping and creating and presenting hip hop, they are people I think the media and popular opinion in general would like to colour as social undesirables, uncultured losers, but what they are, are real winners, because they have come from nothing and made the most popular the most interesting sub culture happening now in the world ,i think”. (note at that stage of Micheal Holman’s involvement in hip hop, he did not give himself credit for forming the 5 elements of hip hop to ‘package it better to sell’ as he said n London this year.)

Has Michael Holman’s view point changed since the 80’s? Maybe he does have the handbook of hidden hip hop history, lets assume he does, and exchange notes with fellow legends. “ask Jazzy Jay, says Holman …”they (Jazzy Jay, Bam, and other dj’s etc)  were looking at it like, well we had a nice little run entertaining the ghetto kids”. But it is not as simple as that. Bambaataa and Jay (Zulu Nation) already had ideas of their own to expand their audience

Negril & The Roxy

Afrika Bambaataa saw hip hop as Planet Rock. His idea’s didn’t just expand, They exploded! In photographer Martha Cooper’s book The Hiphop Files Ruza Blue aka Kool lady Blue said  ”Negril started in October 1981 And finished in March 1982 . It ended because there were too many people coming to the club and the fire department closed it down”.

Bambaataa on the wheels of steel

In an interview from Jeff Chang’s Cant Stop Won’t Stop, Jazzy Jay recalls ”We were schooling them (the downtown scene) on our artform. Bam would put these breaks on and drive them wild, then I’d get on the turntables and start cutting shit up and they’d be losing their minds”.

Michael Holman: ”In June 1982, Ruza Blue took the Hip Hop nights to the Roxy Disco Roller Rink, and with her went the Rock Steady Crew. She eventually became their manager, I was really about TV, I did not want to be a club promoter, so I went on to realise my idea of a HipHop TV show”.

The Celluloid Connection

Zekri and Bambaataa rocking twin shades

It was at The Roxy where Bronx hiphop was exposed to all kinds of people including Bernard Zekri and Jean Karakos from the french label Celluloid.

Journalist Bernard Zekri befriended Afrika Bambaata and his Zulu crew from hanging out at the Roxy. From those meetings formed the New York City Rap Tour, the first tour of France and the UK featuring Afrika Bambaataa, DST, Fab Five Freddy, The Rock Steady Crew, Dondi White, Futura, and Phase 2. Some of the most seminal early hiphop recordings featuring  many of the participants of the NYC rap tour  were released on Celluloid.

Uptown Jack of all trades

Michael Holman is one of many who were in and around NYC’s downtown scene ”outsiders” who found their way into hip hop’s ranks. Everything man Michael Holman, the creative jack of all trades; film director, artist, journalist, manager of NYC breakers, scenster entrepreneur (Cant Stop Wont Stop pg.410) host of a 1980’s pilot for a hiphop tv show called Graffiti Rock, and member of the Jean Michel Basquiat band Gray.

This was a period in NYC’s history where Holman recalls “one could literally be who they wanted to be”.

The band Gray was formed in 1979 by Basquiat and Holman, it experimented with electronica and and played at downtown clubs like the Mudd. some of this experimental music was featured on the film Downtown 81 which also stars Basquiat. It was at the Mudd and similar downtown clubs that hiphop reached out to in the early 80’s.

Gray ‘So far so real’.

The ex-Wall Street Junior investment banker turned hiphop impresario credits himself for making the first film Catch a Beat, on super 8, of what we have come to recognise as the hiphop movement. Holman went on to capture many visual images of the growing hiphop movement and even launched them on cable TV in the early 80’s. It is also said that it was actually Holman who introduced Bambaataa to the late Malcolm McLaren. Of course there is the other  versions of  McLaren meeting Bam in Manhattan, which we will look at later.

Bankers and B-boys

Holman of part Jewish, part African American descent, seems to be natrually selected for the role of  scenster entrepreneur, his education, eloquence and charisma gave him the perfect tools to charm bankers and b-boys alike. Holman came to New York in the late 70’s. He was working on Wall Street as a junior investment banker circa 1978, where he says he  first discovered hip hop. After seeing a full blown burner on a train and wondering how the kids were getting away with making these paintings. From that moment, Michael Holman found his way into hiphop. He now boasts early doors status standing alongside Fab Five Freddy as one of the original bridge of the streets, the downtown scene, and the media.

Ghetto Gold Rush

It is said that as well as making the first film, Michael Holman was the first to put the word ‘hiphop’ in print in a magazine. Holman has placed much emphasis on being the ‘first’ to do many things in hip hop, but in 1980 the hip hop trend was spreading, moving quickly towards the inevitable commerciality. Holman could see it coming and wanted his piece of the cake. There was an increasing interest in all aspects of hiphop culture from the media and the mainstream, and many were cashing in. Holman was no exception, another looking to be ahead of the gold rush.

“I suffer from a condition known as ‘trend hiemers’ disease”

Graffiti Rock

His pilot showing of Graffiti Rock in the 80’s predated Yo MTV Raps!, and had a kind of  hiphop Soul Train energy, but for various reasons explained by Holman doesn’t get past the first episode. One reason given was that the companies he approached couldn’t see the difference between Graffiti Rock and Don Cornelius’s long running Soul Train. Graffiti Rock’s failure to explode into commercial sucess left Holman jaded, resulting in his return to film school.

Graffiti Rock was geared towards a young white audience, the diluted breakdown of NYC hiphop style, speak and scene, is simplistic in approach. the dance crowd is predominantly of the high yellow hue, were’re guessing mainly hispanic, with sprinklings of whites, and a small number of dark skinned black’s thrown in. Holman justifies this in an interview with Jarell Mason on WUAG/FM where he  states “I was told that the station managers at the time were against showing black kids in general, even polite nice black kids… to the degree that I had the set looking street, I’m happy with what I had. They were not gonna have some street looking kids coming on their TV”. But in an earlier TV interview Holman stated “Hiphop is such a strong, pure and powerful subculture that only IT will dictate the commerciality of it, only IT will dictate how it is exploited”. Maybe Michael Holman regrets his compliance to what he thought those TV bosses wanted, or maybe not. But the limited success Holman achieved in securing a TV deal was probably due to the fact that he was attempting to sell a dumbed down version of hiphop as the real thing.

Graffiti Rock’s opening scene starts with a close up of Jimmy Jazz ’s hand scratching the recording on the Enjoy label, a very significant label that released  Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five’s Super Rappin‘(one of the very first hiphop records) in 1979.  Kool Moe Dee and Special K introduces Holman, who spits an off beat novelty rap recital inviting the public into the world of Graffiti Rock. A world that is pretty close to what hiphop is all about…No, Scratch the last statement, we meant – not as diluted as it could have been. The staged MC  battle between Run DMC and The Trecherous 3 slightly trivialised the concept of MC battling, with freestyles that struggle to pass as real battle rhymes. While Graffiti Rock represented a toned down image of hiphop in the eyes of many, it’s possible that Michael Holman was doing what he thought was neccesary to get his foot in the corporate door. When Holy Roller asked Holman his thoughts on the show not being picked up, he replied “How do you think I feel? if Grattiti Rock had been picked up I would have become a millionaire!”

“By the end of the 80’s hiphop was dead“

Graffiti Rock was an unthreatening, choreographed portrayal of hiphop culture. This one-off 80’s pilot show conjures a reluctant image of  the hiphop eco system, all the so called ‘5 elements of NYC hiphop’ were represented; the graff, the mcing, the fly girls and b-boys chanting “graffiti rock, graffiti rock!!” and breakers on the floor. The NYC Breakers throwing down to Planet Patrol ‘Play at Your Own Risk’, can be seen as the high point of the show, and if there was a low point it would have been DJ Jimmy Jaz’ scratching…but he was faded out before he did too much scratch damage with his very basic ability. When Holman said “Don’t try this at home with your dad’s stereo, only under hiphop supervision!” the statement was not to be taken lightly!

The show remains a valid piece of history simply because it is the first attempt at presenting hiphop culture on TV. Holman’s entertaining but corny use of hiphop speak can leave viewers cringing, but overall the sugar coated Graffiti Rock is quite addictive. A brief look the sanitized graffiti rock hiphop image  will always pose the following question…

Was real hiphop in the building?

“Initially I only wanted real hiphop kids,but the investors forced me to make the audience more inclusive, apparently they were concerned about selling a show with an all black and puerto rican crowd, later on I learned that they were right to be concerned.“ (Quote from his website)

Holman assures that he got into the movement well before it was called hiphop. Some semi-known scensters lurked in the studio audience of Graffiti Rock, the actress Debbie Mazar, Loose Bruce, electric boogie boy Normski (seen in the late Malcolm McLaren’s Buffalo Gals video and Flash Dance), and Gray band member come actor ‘Prince Vince‘ Vincent Gallo. Gallo helped in casting the Graffiti Rock studio dancers.

Downtown Calling

On Sunday the 25th of April 2010 Holy Roller was present at Pop up Cinema at Village Underground for the only UK showing of Downtown Calling, a film by Shan Nicolson and co-produced by none other than Michael Holman. Downtown Calling is a film documenting the impact New York’s downtown scene has on the U.S. and the rest of the world. The irony is that it really seems to be about the impact the Bronx had on the rest of New York the  U.S.A and the rest of the world.

This film, whilst placing so much emphasis on hiphop, missed opportunities to give much credit to the true pioneers of hiphop. Footage used in Downtown Calling came from various sources including Beat this! A Hiphop History, a film by U.K. filmmaker Dick Fontaine. In one specific scene Holman says that he introduced Malcolm McLaren to Afrika Bambaataa, . In the following recording McLaren explains his  first meeting with Bambaataa.

Malcolm Mclaren

Shottsman asked Michael Holman to elaborate on the statement he made that hiphop was dying until the downtown scene was exposed to it. Here is Holman’s answer:

Micheal Holman 1

He says that rap was not an important element of hiphop. But lovers of old school hiphop tapes from those days strongly question that.
In this segment Holman says that the 5 elements of hiphop is something himself and Fab 5 Freddy put together as a package to make it easier to sell.

Micheal Holman 2

In this next segment Holman talks about Graffiti Rock. He jokes that he suffered from “Trend-heimers disease“ meaning he’s always 5 years ahead of his time.

Micheal Holman 3

Glorifying the tastemaker

In the promotion of Downtown Calling, one writer used these words to describe Michael Holman’s influence on Hip Hop:

“Holman’s nights at Club Negril became the launching point for the globalization of hip-hop culture (mostly due to his personal crusade to cross pollinate New York City’s uptown and downtown music scenes). Having graduated New York University’s Graduate School of Film, Holman directed Catch a Beat (the first B-boy/breakdance film (1981), associate produced Beat Street (the first hip-hop feature film) for Orion Pictures (1984)”

The writer incorrectly stated Beat Street was the first feature film, of course we know that the first feature film is Wildstyle released in 1983. Does the writer suggest that Michael Holman is solely responsible for hiphop’s worldwide success? Is there a danger in over romanticising certain individuals roles?

The Questions Remain

Much bigger forces than just Michael Holman were at work in bringing hiphop to the rest of the world, this much is clear, all the right answers are there but to get to them we must be in search of the right questions. Holy Roller  always has a bunch of questions feel free to add yours beneath and we’ll discuss the answers.

Shouldn’t the Bronx Block parties be credited as the launch pad of hiphop to the rest of the world as opposed the downtown NYC?
Why does ‘The Downtown’ take credit simply because journalists were not comfortable in going into the Bronx to witness real hiphop?
Does the credibility of inner city phenomena depend on who’s looking at it in the wider world?
Who has the right to dictate the sell by date of inner city phenomena?

Unsung Godfather?

Hip hop did not die in the late 80’s as the media and Michael Holman have suggested. The timeline between his entrance and exit of the culture strangely coincides with his rendition of the culture’s so called birth and ‘death’.

Hip hop has been subjected to these types of slurs ironically by the same people who feed off her. The image and reputation of hiphop culture has been tarnished, smeared, sabotaged, emulated and exploited time and time again… Yet it still it lives to fight another day.

Here’s a Micheal Holman related recording we found at the Record And Tape Exchange, Camden Town.

YOU CAN DO IT! BREAKDANCE was K-TEL recording advertised on television in 1984 .It taught kids to “Moonwalk,body pop and electric boogie”. This record featured unheard of artists such as B.T and the City Slickers, Joy and the Sticks Alex and the City Crew and non other than Michael Holman with the song New york City Breakers, a crew he managed at the time.This record was doomed for the bargain basement bins, but is definately worth the asking price of £ 2.50

michael holman… the new york city breakers

With the very odd timing of Rollin D’s Ready Your Ropes and the sudden passing of Malcolm McLaren at the age of 64, it is fitting to repost Planet Rock to Duck Rock. R.I.P Malcolm McLaren

“if you don’t know the history of the author then you don’t know what you’re reading”KRS1…

Lets try to talk about 80′s impresario Malcolm McLaren and his Duck Rock video album released in 1984 without personal attacks on the mans character, after all, none of us know him personally… so… here goes… We’re using points system. For every negative comment that’s 1 point added to the overall score. The person with the least amount of points accumulated wins. Let’s try at least!

1. Don’t get it twisted

A huge blackman walking down a New York City street in a Sex Pistols tshirt in the early part of the 80′s is unusual. But then again Afrika Bambaataa is not your usual guy. The man is larger than life with even larger ideas. One of these  ideas is the Zulu Nation. Zulu is alive and well in NYC in the 80′s, it has been alive since its conception in 1973. Bambaataa had won a trip to Africa as a prize in a writing contest.

He had also seen the film Zulu starring Micheal Caine and was inspired by the Zulu’s resilience against the British Colonialists
Bambaataa was a name adopted from Zulu chief Bambatha who led a rebellion in South Africa in the early 20th century.

Originally the Zulu Nation was a break dance crew consisting of the Zulu Kings and Zulu Queens. Bambaataa is founder of the Zulu Nation and true pioneer of the hiphop movement.

Hiphop stayed in the Bronx until the likes of Bambaataa took it out of the Bronx.

Fab Five Freddy made it possible for Bambaataa and others to play at Manhattan clubs like the Mudd before predominantly white audiences.

Skipping School

2. When is a Zulu chief not a Zulu chief?

Malcolm Mclaren, Ex Sex Pistols manager and then manager of Bow wow wow first learns of HipHop through Bambaataa. He talks of being in fear for his life at one of Bambaataa’s Bronx parties, clearly misled by what he had heard and read. The story in white circles at the time was that white people who went to parties in the Bronx were sure to be robbed or even worse, this according to Bambaataa was total nonsense. McLaren speaks of blagging his way through the black and Hispanic crowd posing as “CBS record label rep”, crawling under the dj table and pleading with Bambaataa to stand next to him for ‘protection’.

Bambaataa showcased more of his dj skills and growing Zulu Nation entourage at the Ritz alongside Bow Wow Wow, a band McLaren had put together to showcase the Vivian Westwood fashion line he was involved with promoting at that time.

3. Stealing things is a glorious occupation, particularly in the art world. (McLaren quote)

Within a year of McLaren puts together Buffalo Gals with the help of super producer Trevor Horn of the Art of Noise. Hiphop NYC style was about to hit the UK, the result of McLaren’s first attempt at a record is Duck Rock.

The Duck Rock video captures many styles and images, the exciting intro shows pre bling NYC 81 as the back drop to the World Famous Supreme Team’s classic chant “Do you like scccrrratchin? What izzit“? McLaren poses with horned beat box pushing his new image of leader of the duck school. The video’s music styles range from wild wild west square dance duck mockery, to world music flavours and early 80′s Bboy fusion. Here is a huge slab of NYC 81. Rock Steady and Mr Freeze breaking and popping to the chant of “duck duck duck“. Lil Normski also features in the video, then a 13 year old kid, smurfed his way onto UK TV screens. Many VHS tapes were worn out from the obsessive rewinding of those epic moments. Black UK kids (the early UK bboy scene was predominently black, white kids joined in later) immediately adopted the new phenomenon. Rock Steady gave young British kids their first lesson in b boying. School playgrounds filled with kids rolling on the ground trying to emulate what they’d seen in those brief moments. Afrika Bambaataa’s Zulu (‘Natives’ was the term McLaren used on one song. Of course the Zulus are ‘natives’ of south africa but far too often the word ‘native’ is ‘primitive’ in disguise’) is ever present throughout this video “Zulu on a time bomb”. Leagues away from Bow Wow Wow.

In Julian Temple’s excellent documentary “The Filth and the Fury” the Sex Pistol’s lead singer John Lydon labeled McLaren as a ‘thief, who stole his ideas’. Another band member said McLaren was a blagger who knew many people in the music industry.

Throughout Duck Rock, McLaren takes on the role as head master and is not afraid to hand out the orders. We see McLaren getting impatient with a World Famous Supreme team member for getting his words wrong. In fact most of McLaren’s input in this film is handing out orders to dancers, double dutch girls, zulus… anyone. The cast of characters (mainly Africans, Hispanics and African Americans) are taking orders from McLaren in his head honcho role.” “FALL HEAD OVER HEELS, CLAP CLAP, ROLL BACKWARDS, GET DOWN ON YOUR HAND AND KNEES, MOVE FROM SIDE TO SIDE, LIKE AN ANIMAL”

Not so much lyrical, but more nursery rhyme. Not many lines to read between…hmmm maybe.

Hip Hop’s would be 6th element “Double Dutch” was also showcased on Duck Rock, but just didn’t catch on overseas even though Bambaataa included the double dutch girls alongside rappers bboys and graffiti writers on not so distant future tours to Europe.

4. Too cool for school… so skip it!

McLaren described Hiphop as ‘black people’s punk music’ claiming that they’ constructed their music from record industry rubbish that no one wanted’.

In actual fact Bambaataa was very well versed in many styles of music and adopted the moniker ‘Master of Records‘ because of this. Tracks that Bambaataa played often where bootlegged and sold for big money after Bambaataa started the initial buzz on a record.

5. What goes around…

Bambaataa joined forces with ex-Sex Pistol and PIL frontman, John Lydon (McLaren stopped him from using the name Johnny Rotten at one point) for the Celluloid record label flame thrower World Destruction.

Malcolm McLaren must be viewed as one who joined the gold rush when HipHop was there for the taking.

Q: Was Malcolm McLaren an innovator?
A: Questionably!

Q: Was Afrika Bambaataa’s Zulu Nation ideas at the core of Duck Rocks ‘Hip Hop philosophy?’
A: Definitely!!

6. Faking the funk

Malcolm McLaren’s Duck Rock goes down in Hip Hop history by default, boldly walking straight through the Hip Hop front door, briefly showing a guest pass on the way in. In the early part of the 80′s, Hip Hop was young and hungry and was willing to leave that door open for anyone willing to feed her.

Buffalo Gals is a bonified hip hop song, simply because it featured Zulu Nation before most of us even knew what Zulu meant. In the very same way jazz musician Herbie Hancock adopted Hip Hop in the song Rockit and employed Grandmaster DST as his ticket, or Blondie’s song Rapture mentioning Grandmaster Flash, her ticket Fab 5 Freddy in the background with a spray can. Well damn that must be Hip Hop right? Grandmaster Flash accept’s Blondie into the Hip Hop realms on his Sugar Hill classic Adventures of Grand Master Flash on the Wheels of Steel when he cut up Blondie’s ‘rap’ “Flash is Fast, Flash is cool”.

Gwendolyn Chisolm, member of The Sequence (the Sugarhill label’s first and only all female rap group), adopted the name Blondie as her M.C. moniker. Another member of the group, Angie B later goes on to have commercial success as chart topping RnB star Angie Stone.

To McLaren’s credit, if there was no Buffalo Gals then there would have not been the classic ‘Hey DJ‘ by collaborators The World’s Famous Supreme Team.

7. “Hip hop music would have reached all those people anyway with or without us” (Beastie Boys quote)

Who can truly separate who has paid for a legitimate ticket to ride the hip hop train from who’s having a free ride?

It’s very possible that McLaren was stealing a free ride in the Zulu cabin. If this was the case, then McLaren’s entry blag would have DEFINITELY been ‘Oh I’m with Bambaataa!’, just like at those early 80′s Bronx parties.

by Shottsman

Holy Roller’s Information Juggernaut, The Spectacular Rollin’ D, has defined a new meaning for the phrase ‘knowing the ropes’.

Rollin’ D took on a very special, but gargantuan mission, to uncover the history of what’s known as Double Dutch. That’s the street game of skipping 2 ropes at once while dancing and chanting rhythmic rhymes and routines. We at Holy Roller call Double Dutch ‘The Missing Element of Hip Hop’. Rollin’ D was beamed up to the jump rope mothership, she entered a Rosen Bridge of soul and wormholed her way to the Double Dutch event horizon of past and present, then skipped to the future.

Ready your ropes: Pick up your feet is the first of a three part series followed by Part 2: The mid 80′s and beyond, and then Part 3 Rhythm and Rhyme, it’s a Movement. By the end of your read, you will be well acquainted with crews such as The Fantastic Four, Black Magic and many other great pioneers of the sport.

In the Holy Roller Hip Hop Hall of Fame, the Double Dutch girls of the 1980′s are about to earn their honourary crown.

Shottsmann

Down down baby, down down the rollercoaster,
Sweet Sweet baby, I’ll never let you go
Shimmy shimmy co co pop
Shimmy shimmy pow!

The Double Dutch Cops - Brief history of a competitive sport.

In 1974, the first Double Dutch tournament took place outside the Lincoln Center in New York City. Detective David A. Walker and his partner Ulysses Williams had been working that year on developing the popular street game into a competition sport for girls. In 1975 the American Double Dutch League was established.

This was in the midst of New York City’s financial crisis. Landlords couldn’t afford to maintain or sell their buildings so they were burning them down. Gangland warfare was rife, nobody felt safe riding the subway. There was not much organised entertainment for young people, and across town Afrika Bambaataa was forming the beginnings of the Zulu Nation.

As community detectives working with the Police Athletic League, Walker and Ulysses had noticed that girls were not attending their programs. Walker noticed how black girls in the city like to ‘show off their routines’ while playing double dutch, and how they taught each other rhymes. Double dutch was a neighbourhood challenge on the streets, Like breakdancing” (The Games Black Girls play, Kyra Gaunt, pg.141).

Double Dutch had been a popular street game amongst black girls for many years, the rhymes and rhythms going way back to early African American culture. Introducing an annual national competition monopolised on this popularity, raised the profile of the game and encouraged young girls to take the game more serious. From 1974 through to the late 80’s Double Dutch rose in prominence and gained international exposure with a proud place in the rising hip hop scene.

In the 90’s the game lost momentum, this was not helped by the withdrawal of sponsorship by McDonalds, who had been a major sponsor since the early years. The ADDL had come to rely on this funding, so it was a big blow to their work. McDonald’s withdrawal “single-handedly collapsed the network of rope-jumping leagues. The ADDL continued but struggled as it carried on without McDonalds’ financial resources.” (European Rope Skipping Org). But the sport carried on quietly, and over the years continued to spread across the world with Japan, The Netherlands, and the UK running ‘national leagues’ and competing in international competitions.

Over 30 years on, Walker’s legacy, the National Double Dutch League (not to be confused with the American Double Dutch League which he resigned from in 1992) still holds the annual ‘Holiday Classic’ at the legendary Apollo Theatre every December. This international competition attracts the top teams from around the world. The specialty at the event is the Best in Show Award – where teams bring out their own ‘Fusion Freestyle’ choreographed dance routines to a soundtrack.

Preserving history and promoting the future of Double Dutch, the NDDL, run by David A Walker’s daughter Lauren,  is one of the few places you can access a little known documentary that deserves a prime place in the Holy Roller archives.

Pick up Your Feet – The Double Dutch Show

A double dutch documentary made in 1981 by Skip Blumberg.

Set on and around a blazing hot summers day outside the Lincoln Centre in New York City, Pick Up Your Feet is a rare and exciting insight into the world of Double Dutch at the height of its popularity.

Mayor Koch takes the mic to declare June 13th 1981, Double Dutch Championship Day. This is the 8th Annual World’s Double Dutch Championship. It is called the World Championships, but most of the teams hail from NYC – and the majority from the predominantly black communities of Brooklyn, the Bronx and Harlem.

The Jazz Dolls from Brooklyn, The Super Supremes from Manhattan, The New York City Girls from Queens, Dark and Lovely from Brooklyn, McDonald Dynamos from Harlem, Double Dutch Tigers form the Lower East Side, Jumping Joy Double Dutch Club, Jumpers Incorporated, The Sparklers, Black Magic…and featuring…

The Fantastic Four

Image from http://www.nationaldoubledutchleague.com © Mike Williams

Robin Oakes, Nicki Adams, De’Shone Adams and Dolores Brown made up the The Fantastic Four, in 1981 they were the current international Double Dutch champions but had been inexplicably disqualified from competing because during the year they’d featured in a Mc Donald’s ad. This somehow broke the rules of the competition – perhaps it was an ‘amateur vs professional’ problem.

Skip follows the girls to their regular practice session, this is where we witness how much hard physical work it takes to be a true Double Dutch champ. We learn Double Dutch is not just about the girl in the middle and her skills; it’s equally about the girls spinning the ropes keeping the rhythm.

Their arm strength, stamina and endurance are second to none.

High jumps, splits and flips over one another all the while keeping the rhythm. The rest of the film features numerous teams busting out their best routines for the competition, incorporating various forms of African American dance styles, gymnastics and routine finishes choreographed for maximum effect.

Pick Up Your Feet is a true gem, as well as being an expose on the thriving Double Dutch scene, Blumberg’s film gives us a glimpse of the atmosphere and vibe of 1980’s New York in the summertime,  boomboxes, roller skating in central park, adidas three stripe tees with felt iron-on lettering.

My Name is Dolores, I’m rough and tough
If you mess with me, I’ll kick your butt

Ooo, she thinks she’s bad
Baby, I know I’m bad.
Ooo, she thinks she’s cool
Cool enough to steal your dude.

My name is Robin, I’m sassy and strong.
You turn your rope, I’ll jump all day long.

Ooo, she thinks she’s fierce
Baby, I know I’m fierce.
Ooo, she thinks she’s good
Good enough to rule this hood.

Double Dutch as the Long Lost Element of hip hop

BGirls, 1982, © Janette Beckman http://www.janettebeckman.com/jb.rocks/

This photo from 1982 by Legendary Hip Hop Photographer Janette Beckman, is titled simply ‘BGirls’ but it is in fact a portrait of the legendary Fantastic Four double dutch crew. These girls have been left out of most references to the rise of Hip Hop, as a result they remain nameless, but they were there. They toured nationally and internationally over a number of years in the early 80′s.

The Roxy nightclub, famous for being the home of the early 80’s hip hop scene (as well as being the home of NYC roller disco) with weekly Wheels of Steel parties run by ex-Londoner Ruza ‘Kool Lady Blue’ and headed up by Afrika Bamabaatta. The club routinely sponsored MC battles, Zulu Nation gatherings, breakdance competitions with the Rock Steady Crew, graffiti murals, AND… Double Dutch competitions.

The Fantastic Four must have performed at The Roxy. They were the Double Dutch crew who traveled with Fab 5 Freddy, Rammellzee, Afrika Bambaataa, Rock Steady Crew, Phase 2, Futura and Dondi to Europe for 1982 The Roxy Tour (also known as The New York City Rap tour) in the first ever international hip hop tour.

Janette Beckman, who later moved to New York and took some of Hip Hop’s most iconic photographs, was sent by Melody Maker Magazine to the concert when they hit London. She managed to capture a couple of moments, but as with the lack of mention about Double Dutch in hip hop history, so is the lack of visual evidence.

Fantastic Four at the New York City Rap Tour, London 1982 ©Janette Beckman http://www.janettebeckman.com/jb.rocks/

At times it was a difficult tour, playing in school gyms in small remote towns across Europe where the people were puzzled trying to figure out this new culture. In an anecdote in the Jeff Chang’s acclaimed book, “Can’t Stop Won’t Stop” (pg.182-183), Crazy Legs recalls a moment when some drunk people in the crowd threw bottles on stage during the Double Dutch Girls performance. The music was stopped while Dondi, D.S.T. and Phase 2 led a group of the New Yorkers to beat up the drunks. After that, the audience cheered and the show went on!

The story of the The Fantastic Four is hard to track, partly because they were advertised and promoted under a number of different names. But with a bit of examining pieces of the puzzle, we discover that the girls also toured with the 1985 Fresh Fest II 52-city tour of America, which featured an all star line-up – Run DMC, The Fat Boys, Whodini, Kurtis Blow, Grandmaster Flash, Shabadoo, Turbo and the Dynamic Breakers.

Again, any video footage connected to this tour, shows Run DMC freestyling at press conferences and the Dynamic Breakers bboying, in fact look it up, there is some great footage of Whodini performing on stage, but no Double Dutch Girls. The sport’s contribution in early 80′s Hip hop culture has hardly been recognised. Kyra Gaunt, in an interview with DXT (formerly known as Grandmaster D.S.T.) asked why Double Dutch was included – his answer was simply that he thinks it was because it represented authentic street culture from NYC.

The Fantastic Four  in the late 80′s, went on to join the original line-up of a women’s double dutch crew called Jump Sister, Jump - who later became The Double Dutch Divas, we will get to them later as we move along the jump rope timeline.

The Duck Rock connection…

In the same year as the New York City Rap Tour, Malcolm McLaren released his song ‘Double Dutch‘, the video of which introduced most of us in the rest of the world to the girls and the game. His debut solo album Duck Rock, part of McLaren’s infiltration of the hip hop world (see our previous article  Planet Rock to Duck Rock) featured Double Dutch was a major player. Many of the girls and teams that feature in Blumberg’s documentary, also star in McLaren’s video, many of them wearing official Double Dutch league t-shirts. The cover of the 12” features the step-by-step instructions of how to do The Compulsory and Speed test – League standard moves. Also, the label on the record features the American Double Dutch league logo on one side, and Keith Haring artwork on the other.

Step by Step Compulsory routine, Double Dutch 12" cover art

In true Malcolm McLaren cultural appropriation style, the song claimed to star and talk about ‘The Ebonettes’, but the Ebonettes were not a real group or team, nor were they the real female vocal group The Ebonettes. The song does name check a few of New York City’ teams at the time. An amazing video to watch – it is a shame the actual girls crews featured in the video were not properly name checked.

Malcolm McLaren's Double Dutch 12" label featuring the American Double Dutch League Logo and Keith Haring artwork

Sponsored By Nuggets

McDonalds was a major sponsor for Double Dutch sponsoring teams, leagues, competitions and running an number of ad campaigns.

McDonalds Ad 1980 – Starring the Fantastic Four

Watch a better quality version here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uo5DbV0ZKAI

McDonalds Ad 1985

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JnPrhHZaP80

Detail on a vintage Washington DC Double Dutch League t-shirt:

Girls only?

Primarily and traditionally Double Dutch is a game girls play, but since the mid-80′s it has increasingly involved numerous male stars. Some of this can be attributed to the globalisation and regulation of the sport – which has funneled it into a purely sports world as opposed to a community street game.

Initially, the ADDL restricted the competition sport to girls, it was one of the few community development programs to engage girls while there were many other sports programs for boys. But in 1980, the ADDL opened up competition sport to limited male inclusion.

In Pick up Your Feet, one section focuses on a young boy, who in 1974 seems to be the only boy in the whole competition. The focus of a lot of attention in his short Double Dutch career, young Peter was well prepared when asked what’s it’s like to be the only boy ”I say – It’s doesn’t feel like anything, I just like to jump, so I jump, and that’s the answer I give them… and if they say anything else, I just mind my business and go where I’m goin’”

The 90’s saw the arrival of a male Double Dutch performer who quickly became a star and has remained a major player in the sport through to today: Stephone Webb. In the early 90s, he appeared in a Sesame Street segment on Double Dutch coaching young girls team. In the 2004 documentary “Rhythm in the Ropes” Stephone features as the leader of the a team in the US who manage to finally bring the Best Of Show trophy back to it’s spiritual home of New York after many years of Japanese domination…

For more, go check Ready Your Ropes Part 2 : the late 80′s and beyond!