When the story of hip-hop is told most times it is always the Holy Trinity of Herc, Bambaataa and Grandmaster Flash. They are indeed pioneers but for some reason DJ Hollywood’s story always gets lost in the other stories. But it is Hollywood who opened the floodgate for the emcee to become the focal point of hip-hop. Before Hollywood the focus was the DJ who played for the b-boys and b-girls in the park. It is he who started the phrase “Throw ya hands in the air and wave ’em like you just don’t care.” Every rapper has been influenced by Hollywood directly or indirectly through hip-hop’s musical lineage that frequently recalls James Brown, Muhammad Ali, West African griots, Gil Scott-Heron, The Last Poets, the struggles of the Black underclass and the posh discovery of it by whites in downtown New York and the corporate boardroom but not the man who had the first most significant club dates. Kurtis Blow has produced this documentary “The History Of Rap” and made sure to explain the importance of Hollywood’s role in hip-hop.
