Lord Jamar and KRS-One are at odds with one another regarding the cultivation and rise of Hip Hop in the early ’70s.
In mid-June, Bronx duo Dos Flakos shared a video of the Teacha giving a talk on the different ethnic groups that participated in developing the culture around rap during its formative years.
“Today, people want to downplay the Latino role in Hip Hop,” he began. “They are so stupid. Hip hop cannot— would not have existed without specifically Puerto Ricans … specifically. Cubans were here, Haitians were here, Dominican Republic was here, everybody was here. All of South America been in the Bronx, okay?
“But Puerto Ricans in particular sided with the Black folk here, and the Jamaicans were coming in as well, and this group of Puerto Ricans, Jamaicans and American Blacks made Hip Hop — not American Blacks, not Puerto Ricans, not Jamaicans; all of them made the culture.”
https://twitter.com/_DosFlakos/status/1802550548077441460
A few days after the above clip began making the rounds online, the Brand Nubian veteran took to Instagram and shared his thoughts on multiple races being credited with the inception of Hip Hop.
“You know how we determine parentage?” he asked. “Through DNA, motherfuckers. Through DNA. Now, when I look at the DNA of Hip Hop [and] the double helix of Hip Hop, what I see is soul music, funk music. I see parents that might’ve come up in the South, who moved to the North — specifically the New York City area — and whose children came up in that post-civil-rights era with that northern attitude that was like, ‘Motherfucker, I wish I was around during slavery times, I won’t have let motherfucker’s [mess] with me.’
“Like when Roots came out when we was young, n-ggas was like, ‘I wish a n-gga would’ — that’s the energy that birthed Hip Hop; those kids that watched Roots and all that type of shit. That’s the energy that birthed Hip Hop, bro, and that’s the DNA you see all in Hip Hop.”
He continued: “We hear it musically with the type of samples that we choose or chose to play at the time with the breakbeats, but we also hear it in the language, okay? We see the DNA of the Five-Percent Nation very much inside of Hip Hop, with terms like ‘peace’ and ‘cypher’ and ‘god’ and ‘son,’ y’know what I mean?
“But nowhere do you seen the DNA of Puerto Rican culture. Not talking about Puerto Rican individuals; I’m talking about Puerto Rican culture, Jamaican culture. Those things did not influence Hip Hop regardless of how official motherfucker’s sound saying it. I’m sorry. I hate to hurt your heart, that the things that you adore and love is something that Black American youth created.
“This is a fucking fact. No one said ya’ll wasn’t there — sure you were there — but if I’m building a house, and you watch me build a house, does that mean you built it too? No! When the doctor births a baby, is the doctor the father or the mother of the child because he was present at the time of birth? No!”
Hip Hop celebrated its 50th anniversary last year.
Since its birth in 1973, the craft and its culture has reached every corner of the world as it continues to dominate the charts and expand past music into film, fashion, entertainment and more.
Jamar seems to only be referring to rapping, and not the other elements of hip hop (breaking, DJing, graffiti), which Puerto Ricans were certainly involved in. Hell, they ended up making a movie in the early 80’s about the start of hip hop culture and used NY graffitti legend Lee Quinones, who is Puerto Rican, as the main character. To use Jamar’s building a house analogy, Black people had the blueprints, but Puerto Ricans were definitely on the job to help build the house.
Even rapping, Big Pun shits on Jamar irrelevant exsistance so he should do the world a favor and STFU
How about we start off by just stating Puerto Ricans are black. And Lord, knowing the mathematics of Islam, he understands that the original man is the black man so him talking like this is reckless to me he’s not teaching or unifying, but more of separating
That “building a house” reference is a terrible argument… That’s like saying, if a group of Puerto Ricans help physically build a house, they still shouldn’t get credit for building it because they didn’t produce or make the materials used to build that house… He’s reaching…
Roots came out in 1977. Hip Hop started in 1973. So that had nothing to do with the creation of Hip Hop. Lord Jamar has huge resentment issues and believes in every conspiracy theory out there. 5 percenters latched on to Hip Hop after it had already been created so those terms weren’t adopted until later. Lord Jamar didn’t grow up in NYC.
You don’t know wtf you’re talking about. None of the idiots commenting here know wtf they’re talking about. Regardless what year Roots came out in, he’s correct that those that created rap music (the foundation of Hip Hop) did bring that energy that Roots helped yo inspire. Black people built it. Period. Take young Black men out of Hip Hop and it never would have been invented. Take Puerto Ricans out? We still have Hip Hop. This thing was completely influenced and fed by the Black experience. Puerto Ricans were attracted to it and got involved early. But if no Black man had started spitting the poverty, the dance, the word play and the knowledge, y’all wouldn’t be listening to rap today. I was outside when it got started. So I know.
The 5 percenters used to do the security for Kool Hercs parties! Dont speak on what you do not know!
Jamar is an idiot…
Lord Jamar is a racialist. That’s all.
Lord Jamar has to be wrong about everything. And he latched on to this ADOS nonsense. DJ Kool Herc was born in Jamiaca. Grandmaster Flash was born in Barbados. DJ Disco Wiz is Puerto Rican. Lord Jamar really thinks he can correct someone like KRS-One on Hip Hop’s history
Jamar is on some bullshit. Goddammit man, he needs to shut the fuck UP already with that nonsense. Constantly running around with some ethnic chauvanism chip on his shoulder. You got people in their 50s and 60s trying to recall early childhood memories with “perfect detail” , knowing damn well they could barely leave the block when they were that young, but claiming they have the ultimate knowledge on what other families were “absolutely not doing” back then. FOH.
Jamar is on some bullshit. Goddammit man, shut the fuck UP already with that nonsense. Constantly running around with some ethnic chauvanism chip on his shoulder. You got people in their 50s and 60s trying to recall early childhood memories with “perfect detail” , knowing damn well they could barely leave the block when they were that young, but claiming they have the ultimate knowledge on what other families were “absolutely not doing” back then. FOH.
Who cares what these washed up has beens have to say? Jamar is a geriatric 5% nation racist nutcase and KRS-One is a senile pedo-defender. Who cares who started hip hop? Without the white boys from Kraftwerk hip hop would also sound different today. Or imagine if some white college boys didn’t give acid to George Clinton….No P-Funk, No Dr Dre…the Chronic and all those great early Death Row albums would not even exist. Imagine what hip hop would sound like if the white man didn’t invent the microphone, electricity, speakers, etc.. You can take this nonsense back to as far as you want to go. Just enjoy the music and let the washed up losers like Jamar where they are….stuck forever in the last century.
Who cares what these washed up has beens have to say? Jamar is a geriatric 5% nation racist nutcase and KRS-One is a senile pedo-defender. Who cares who started hip hop? Without the white boys from Kraftwerk hip hop would also sound different today. Or imagine if some white college boys didn’t give acid to George Clinton….No P-Funk, No Dr Dre…the Chronic and all those great early Death Row albums would not even exist. Imagine what hip hop would sound like if the white man didn’t invent the microphone, electricity, speakers, etc.. You can take this nonsense back to as far as you want to go. Just enjoy the music and let the washed up losers like Jamar where they are….stuck forever in the last century.
You talking reckless about KRS-One. Don’t do that…
Lord Jamar is a small time race ist. You better skip his giberish shit like this site skips releases.
Damn I forgot Jamar even existed since he moved out of Vlad’s house. KRS has forgot more about hip hop than this clown could ever hope to know.
Lord Jamar’s father is black from Guyana…which makes Jamar Caribbean-American too but he simply identifies as a black American. Guy’s an idiot smh. Self-hating ass motherfuckah
Lord Jamar’s father is black from Guyana…which makes Jamar Caribbean-American too but he simply identifies as a black American. Guy’s an idiot smh. Self-hating ass motherfuckah
Lord Jamar’s father is black from Guyana…which makes Jamar Caribbean-American too but he simply identifies as a black American. Guy’s an idiot smh. Self-hating ass…
Jamar seems to only be referring to rapping, and not the other elements of hip hop (breaking, DJing, graffiti), which Puerto Ricans were certainly involved in. Hell, they ended up making a movie in the early 80’s about the start of hip hop culture and used NY graffitti legend Lee Quinones, who is Puerto Rican, as the main character. To use Jamar’s building a house analogy, Black people had the blueprints, but Puerto Ricans were definitely on the job to help build the house.
Hip-Hop is such an insecure culture. It doesn’t know who its father is. It doesn’t know where it came from. It doesn’t know where it’s going. It doesn’t know what its message is. It’s broken. Let’s be honest.