Bobby Robinson (1917-2011): An Unreleased History
Bobby Robinson, the founder of one of the first rap labels, Enjoy Records, and the first record man to sign a bonafide hip-hop act from the streets of the Bronx — Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five — died Saturday at the age of 93. I was lucky enough to be able to meet and […]
VIDEO: 5 Hip-Hop Business Tragedies
In the latest installment of The Big Payback video series, I explore five tragedies of the hip-hop business, including: The Eclipse of Sugar Hill Records The Demise of Macola Records Public Enemy’s Raw Deals The Black-Owned Distributor Fails The Death of KDAY Get more of the story below! Play it, embed it, circulate it! Peep […]
In Memoriam: JMJ taught Lyor Cohen the business
I knew Jam Master Jay only in passing. I met him when I was a young mail clerk at Profile Records, running packages between Profile and the recording studio where Run-DMC was completing their Back from Hell album. But Jay was always the most approachable of the crew. One of the stories I tell in […]
Did you know that New York’s Hot 97 was not the first pop station where hip-hop lived?
Little-known hip-hop fact #2: In 1994, Hot 97-FM became the first pop station in New York to feature a hip-hop format. But Hot 97 wasn’t the first pop station in the country to do so. In fact, they didn’t even invent the slogan that they made famous… Think you know the answer? Comment below! [Hint: […]
VIDEO: Dan Charnas at York College
On Monday, October 25, 2010, I was honored to be the guest of Business Unusual magazine at their Urban ThINC Series event at CUNY—York College in Queens. Quite humbling to be on the same panel as the brilliant Cedric Muhammad and Glenn Williams, Jr.! You can see me in the video below, reading from The […]