Revolutions
"urntablism is: mixing, blending, timing,
beat juggling, scratching, drumming,
The Art Of Turntablism
Interviews by True 54
think to do with a turntable. The East Coast originated it, the
Bay Area improved it, and now the world is trying to catch
on to the fastest-growing subculture of hip-hop.
DJ NOTABLES
Kool Herc. The undisputed pioneer behind the entire hip-hop movement. He threw some of the sickest parties in the
South Bronx during the mid to late '70s. These historic jams turned out to be the birthplaces of DJing, B-boying
(breakdancing), and MCing.
Afrika Bambatta. Took influences from George Clinton's Parliament Funkadelic and mixed them with the Kraftwerk
synthesized dance sound of the late '70s to form the early stages of hip-hop music. Known more for his insane
record collection then his turntable prowess, but don't sleep 'cause "Planet Rock" and "Searching For The Perfect
Beat" still get bumped today.
Grand Master Flash. DJ for the Furious Five, first developed the art of back-spinning records to highlight their dopest
parts and called them breaks. This was in '75, and eventually led to breakdancing, sampling, and beat juggling.
Grand Wizard Theodore. Inventor of the scratch and needle drop back in the late '70s/early '80s, partners with Flash,
pioneer, legend, etc. All you scratchers out there give praise to the father of a musical instrument.
Cash Money. DMC USA and World DJ Champion '88. He took scratching and trick DJing to whole new levels.
Jazzy Jeff. Made Will Smith's bunk ass look good while he invented the transform scratch and shocked crowds from
coast to coast. Cash Money claims they both came up with it, but Jazzy Jeff got it on wax first.
Steve D. Founder of the X-Men (now known as the X-ecutioners for legal reasons), invented beat juggling in 1989.
Q-Bert. Member of the Invisibl Skratch Piklz, road DJ for Kool Keith (Dr Octagon), won the DMC world battles
three years in a row; they had to make him retire from competitions to give the other kids a chance. In my opinion,
he's the illest scratcher on the planet. Check out his new solo album, Wave Twisters.
Roc Raider. Member of the X-Men, won the world DMC battle in '94 and '95. King of all body tricks and showman-
ship. Now he does scratching and beat juggling too, but in the early '90s you could find him lifting up turntables, tak-
ing off his shirt, spinning around, and all that shit.
Rob Swift. Member of the X-Men, dope as hell and never won a battle. Took beat juggling to incredible levels in the
early '90s; he broke down records to kicks, snares, basslines, words, and everything else. Learned how to make
records skip on beat so he could use one turntable as a sampler and the other one as a drum machine. He actually
produced beats live during battles on the wheels; his shit was so advanced the judges wouldn't, give up props 'cause
they couldn't fuck with him. Now he's so nice you can't front: beats, production, scratches, he does it all.
Babu. Member of the World Famous Beat Junkies, the best all-around DJ out there, period. Responsible for the
nicest juggles and smoothest flares ever seen in competitions since '94. Current ITF Champion for scratching, beat
juggling, and the team competition (along with Melo D, J Rocc, and Rhettmatic).
Melo D. Member of the World Famous Beat Junkies, he basically gets the same description as Babu. He kills it on
the beats, cuts, radio (92.3), and TV (the now-cancelled Vibe).
Develop. A new kid on the scene from NY, he's taking beats to whole new levels, does drums with both hands, makes
intricate beats from tiny snippets and the shit comes out funky like it should. He's phenomenal and definitely the
one to keep an eye on.
-DJ IM Press
MIX MASTER MIKE
Crew Affiliation: Invisibl Skratch Piklz
Titles Held: 1992-93 DMC World Champion,
NMS Champion 1992
In His Crate: How To Beat The Arcade Games,
Anti-Theft Device, Jack LaLanne's Workout
Base Of Operations: Bay Area, CA
How come the Bay Area is home to so many sick
turntablists? I don't know. It just happened to be
that SF turned into the mecca of the cut. Ever
since I met up with Q-we used to battle each
other back in the day, in '85. And what we started
was this whole formula of specific types of
scratches, and all these little kids started getting
into it, and now it's just blown up. If I'm interested
in turntablism but don't know shit, what's going to
make me get your album instead of, say, the X-ecu-
tioners' album as my introduction into turntablism?
Actually, it's the first full-on scratch percussive
turntable album ever made. Instead of just music,
it's more scratch-oriented manipulation. Like
I
scratch the drums, the high hat, the congas. It's a
whole different thing from all this other music
that's out. It's turntable music. What's some e of f the
stuff that would be credited to you in terms of
turntable innovations? The thumb wave, the laser
scribble, the hydroplane, the tweak scratch, there's
like 50 of 'em. But those are some. What is your
favorite record to listen to? Oh, well, my favorite to
listen to is Muddy Waters Folk Singer. And I like
Slayer. I like listening to BB King, the Meters, and
of course Jimi Hendrix. You've been getting a lot of
press about the Beastie Boys thing and most people
probably know how you hooked up, but why don't you
just tell me quickly how that happened? I met Adam
Yauch at the Rock Steady anniversary in 1995 and
we exchanged phone numbers. I used to send him
tapes, and he'd send me stuff. I'd leave these
scratch messages on his answering machine. I'd be
like, "Yo, Adam, what's up? This is Mike...here's the
rocket launcher scratch." And I'd do it. It would
just drive him nuts, and then finally he gave me a
call in February and asked if I wanted to work on
the album with him and the boys. So they flew me
down there and I did all the cuts for the Hello Nasty
album. I saw the MTU news thing you did, and I
noticed that the Skratch Piklz didn't get mentioned in
that interview. Are you trying to separate yourself
from them? No, not at all. Actually, I did mention
them. And they cut
ut it out. The first thing I said
when the camera turned on to me, was like
"What's up to my crew" and they just fuckin' sliced
and sliced. I would never put myself before my
crew. That's my crew; I built that crew.
UIN ROC
Crew Affiliation: Fifth Platoon
Titles Held: 1997 ITF World Champion
In His Crate: "My Philosophy" by KRS-ONE,
"Humpty Dance" by Digital Underground,
"Welcome To The Terrordome" by Public Enemy
Base Of Operations: Bay Area, CA
and
Where did you grow up? New York City area.
Queens and Jersey. Brooklyn. When did you move.
out here? January '97. Why? I was going to the
Academy of Art for computer graphic consultant.
But then I got into a little too much DJing. Why do
you think there's so much DJing in the Bay Area?
Number one, the Invisibl Skratch Piklz. Bottom
line. New York has their own vibe, like the X-Men,
that helped it come up there. But here in the Bay,
pretty much the Piklz. What do you see as the differ-
ence between East Coast and West Coast DJ styles? A
lot of East Coast styles are more beat juggling ori-
ented. Out here it's a little bit of both but the aver-
Bert is and
age kid knows who Q-Bert is and is more into
scratching. They might not know who Roc Raider
is or the X-ecutioners. Styles are different and what
comes out is different. Do you think the difference is
distinct? Definitely. They're both melding into each
other, but the style out here is more experimental
sounding, where back home it's still got that funk,
that hip-hop vibe. Just the sound. Body tricks.
I come with the show; that's just the way they
express their energy. Whereas out here people
would just scratch like crazy to a fast-ass beat,
crazy
that's how they express their energy. I never dis
body tricks. I grew up doing 'em too. I don't think
people have the right to say they're not credible,
because there's always something in something.
Tell me about your crew. Fifth Platoon, we've been
around since '94. It was Roli Rho, his girlfriend.
Kuttin Kandy, who's in the US finals this year, she's
one of the baddest female DJs in the world right
now in my opinion, DJ Do Boy from Boston, and
Daddy Dog and Neil Armstrong. Roli has the bad-
dest DJ in the world for the Vibe battle, Kandace is
the DMC US finalist this year, Do Boy has been a
DMC finalist since '96 I think, Daddy Dog has a
couple of local East Coast titles. Neil is our brain-
child. He runs the Web site and takes care of the
money. He DJs too, but when everyone else isn't
thinking, he is. What do you see as the future of
turntablism? It's gonna keep going. We all think like
musicians, and people don't realize that. If you've
heard Q-Bert's album, that's just one version. It's a
step. It's tight as fuck, some spaced-out stuff.
People are going to look at it different. We all have
our own taste, our own personalities.
RHETTMATIC
Crew Affiliation: World Famous Beat Junkies
Titles Held: 1997 DMC West Coast
In His Crate: "Funky Drummer" by James Brown,
"Ain't Sayin' Nothin"" by Divine Styler,
"So What'cha Sayin"" by EPMD
Base Of Operations: Los Angeles, CA
Tell me a little bit about the new mix tape. It's a dou-
ble CD. Double cassette, triple vinyl. You know
how Funkmaster Flex did a little mixing and her
had some guests? It's something like that. But
more underground and I cut it up and stuff. What's
cool about it is that there are a lot of independent
hip-hop artists, especially from the West Coast, are
featured on it. So what sets the Beat Junkies apart
from other DJ crews? Hmmm. We all have our own
our own
styles terms of how we attack things. The Piklz.
are more extreme to handling turntable music on
one side, whereas the X-ecutioners do the other
side. We're like in between. Doing production and
turntable manipulation? Exactly. We both scratch
and beat juggle. The X-Men also do body tricks
and whatnot. We just happen to be a hybrid of
both. Ironically, Shortkut and D-Styles, who are
members of the Piklz, are also members of our
crew. Our crew pretty much encompasses the
whole spectrum of what a DJ is. Besides just being
a battle/turntablist DJ, we're on the radio, and of
course we do production and promotions. We do
clubs, we do mix tapes. We cover anything that a
DJ does within the industry. Our forté and reputa-
tion is being a "turntablist" battling crew. What
other artists' projects have you personally worked
on? I scratched on Ras Kass' first and second
albums. I just recently did production work for
Divine Styler's new album. Production work for the
Visionaries, Black Forest, and Ellemenno. I have so
many projects I'm doing. I work at Fat Beats, I spin
on 92.3 The Beat on Friday nights on this show
called Soul Assassins Radio, which is
in is actually B-
Real of Cypress Hill's own radio show. Who do
find inspirational in terms of DJing or music in general?
Music in general, I'd say I like anything that's very
soulful, whether it's jazz or rock. I like Steely Dan,
and I love Miles Davis. You're Filipino, and it seems
like many of the top turntablists are Filipino. The
Filipinos have their own little DJ culture. Asians
are not very vocal, and back in the day within the
hip-hop culture we were only known as being as
either dope B-boys, graffiti artists, or DJs, 'cause
we can't rap worth shit. We weren't really vocal, so
we did things that came naturally for us. A friend of
mine said Filipinos have a tribal culture too; we
have rhythm in our blood.
..
you
88 THRASHER
89