From the Oct 21 – Oct 27, 1999 issue

Music

Can You Hear Street Sounds?

Hiphop Radio is a Basic Urban Right

by Charles Mudede

WHENEVER I ARRIVE in a new city, I search the radio for its hiphop station. If there is one, I'm pleased; this means I'm in a real city. If there isn't one, well it's just like being back home in Seattle, where hiphop is either diluted on KUBE or concentrated into one Sunday night slot on KCMU. Now, back in the days when I was a teenager, hiphop in Harare, Zimbabwe was played every Tuesday for one hour by some character called CT, who had the horrible habit of rapping over most of what he played. Despite the grave limitations of his show (I think he had no more than 20 records in his collection, adding a new one every three months or so), it was still pardonable, considering that it was in Africa (we were damn lucky to have an operating radio station, let alone a hiphop show). And during the early and mid-'80s, hiphop was relatively new -- not only to Africa but to America as well.

Now, though, I live in a big American city and feel it is my right as an urbanite to be able to listen to hiphop whenever I want to, instead of waiting like some farm boy with a big Acme radio, trying to catch the mix "late in the night," as Chuck D once put it.

KCMU's hiphop show, Street Sounds (formerly known as Rap Attack), is currently hosted by local superstars Kut Father and Mr. Supreme, with frequent assistance from turntablists like DJ Topspin. It is a great show which has vastly improved since back in '96, when the controversial Vancouver DJ Maximus Clean replaced Nasty Ness, who I hear moved to L.A. to pursue an acting career. Both Supreme and Kut Father are talented, and both have great voices and sharp comments about the music they spin. A quick glance at their five favorite CDs (Kool Keith's Black Elvis/Lost in Space, The Funky Precedent, Styles of Beyond's 2000 Fold, The Arsonists' As the World Burns, and Jurassic-5's Improvise) clearly shows that they possess excellent musical tastes. My gripe has nothing to do with the content of the show. My gripe is that there is only one such show to gripe about.

Feeling that I might be overreacting or overlooking something, I called my friend Wordsayer, a member of Source of Labor, and asked how he felt about the situation. "The idea of a community radio [show] is good, and vital," he said, "but it would be cool if it could be more than two hours. When one considers the impact the music has had on the dominant culture, it seems a blatant neglect to have only two hours. It shows the lack of attention paid to hiphop; it is an insult. But then again, that is the treatment hiphop has always been given. It's always on the cusp of whether it is legitimate or not, and yet it's the most dominant music art in this generation. It has spilled into everything. The other night I even saw Garth Brooks rapping on NBC, and I thought, 'What the fuck!' So, when you have two hours out of the week, not out of a day, you take it as an insult. Sunday from 6:00 to 8:00? Why not have it on Friday from 5:00 to 10:00, at a time when I can remember to listen to it?"

While I was still on the line, Wordsayer decided to call his friend, Joe Schloss, an ethnomusicologist at the University of Washington, so as to conduct a three-way conversation. "There is something like 16 different radio shows for different types of hiphop in the Bay Area," Schloss contributed. "It doesn't make sense, economically or socially, that we have only one hiphop show. It doesn't seem to benefit anyone. As popular as hiphop is, it seems the normal thing is to have a lot of hiphop on the radio."

"This is like the stone ages," Wordsayer said with total contempt. "In fact I think they should have a show just to local hiphop alone, hiphop from Tacoma, Bellingham, Vancouver."

Though one can pick up numerous hiphop radio stations on the Net, the radio is still a much easier way to access new and old hiphop, at least for me (I only have a phone line modem which transmits and receives data very slowly). Seattle will continue to suck as long as it fails to offer us two competing hiphop shows on FM stereo, Friday and Saturday nights, from 5:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m. Indeed, it is a basic urban right to have more than one hiphop show -- and presently Seattle is depriving me of my rights.

Hiphop Radio is a Basic Urban Right

Hiphop Radio is a Basic Urban Right

Buy Tickets for Other Events