Posts from the “Music” Category

“Hip-Hop Evolution” Is One for the History Books

Posted on December 29, 2016

Photo: Still from “Hip-Hop Evolution”

On August 11, 1973, Hip Hop was born when DJ Kool Herc spun a back-to-school jam in the rec room at 1520 Sedgwick Avenue in the Bronx. Entrance was 25 cents for the ladies, 50 cents for the fellas, and the spot could only hold 40 or 50 people—but from the footage shot, you could tell they put the Boogie Down in the Bronx.

So what made this Hip Hop and not a regular jam? Well, Herc was the first person to spin just the breaks, the drum (or drum and bass) solo on classic soul and funk records. He brought two copies of each record so he could set them up on the turntables and extend the break just as long as he wanted to. Herc not only created a style and a sound: he turned the turntable into an instrument all its own.

The thing about Hip Hop was, it was the sound of the streets. It was created, innovated, and updated by cats who had music in their blood and a need to dominate. Hip Hop’s formative years were an underground phenomenon; back in the days most stations wouldn’t play it on the radio let alone on MTV. But its isolation gave it strength and integrity—there was no selling out inside the community.

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Categories: 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Bronx, Crave, Manhattan, Music

Eddie Palmieri: Harlem River Drive

Posted on December 15, 2016

Eddie Palmieri poses for a portrait during the filming of RBMA Presents The Note: Eddie Palmieri, at Red Bull Studios in New York, NY, USA on 22 March, 2016.

“Genius has a way of validating itself with time” observes Felipe Luciano as he reflects on Harlem River Drive, the seminal 1971 Latin-jazz-funk album by Eddie Palmieri in an episode of The Note, a new docuseries now available at Red Bull TV. You can watch the full episode at the end of the article, as well.

Palmieri, who celebrates his 80th birthday today, is one of the greatest American musicians of our time. Hailing from the South Bronx by way of Spanish Harlem, Palmieri is a first-generation Nuyorican who made his way, along with his brother Charlie, through the New York City public schools where he was exposed to jazz music. He first played Carnegie Hall at the age of 11, which portended well for the boy who would go on to become a pianist, bandleader, musicians, and composer who helped to shape the sound and style of Latin and jazz music over the course of seven decades.

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Categories: 1970s, Bronx, Crave, Latin America, Manhattan, Music

Legendary DJ and Club Innovator David Mancuso Dies at 72

Posted on November 15, 2016

Photo: American nightclub owner David Mancuso, owner of the Loft disco on Prince Street in SoHo, meets with the SoHo Artists’ Association to discuss their complaints, New York, New York, October 14, 1974. (Photo by Allan Tannenbaum/Getty Images)

With every passing, 2016 solidifies its place as one of the greatest times of transition in recent memory. Most recently, legendary New York City DJ and club innovator David Mancuso (October 20, 1944-November 14, 2016) died. His death marks the end of an era in many respects, reminding us that downtown New York has long ceased to be the hub of innovation and creativity.

Mancuso pioneered the “private party” at his home at 647 Broadway at Bleecker Street. Back then, the neighborhood was filled with raw, desolate space that was once the site of a bustling industrial companies. Into the void, artists came, willing to live and work in spaces that were not zoned for residential use nor up to code. The Do-It-Yourself of ethos of the time was taking shape, as visionaries worked with what they had, and in doing so, created an entirely new world.

Mancuso took up residence in 1965, throwing about half a dozen rent parties over the next five years. On February 14, 1970, he hosted an invitation-only party called “Love Saves the Day,” which he marks as the official beginning of The Loft, by which the space would later be known.

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Categories: 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Crave, Manhattan, Music

The Peter Tosh Museum Opens on the Legend’s 72nd Birthday

Posted on October 25, 2016

Photo: Peter Tosh © GAB Archive/Redferns.

Nearly thirty years after his tragic death, reggae legend Peter Tosh is being honored with a museum in his native Jamaica. The Peter Tosh Museum opened in Kingston on October 19, on what would have been his 72nd birthday, to commemorate the fortieth anniversary of his solo album Legalize It.

The museum features a collection of artifacts and memorabilia from Tosh, including his legendary custom-built guitar, which was shaped like an M16 assault rifle, and his beloved unicycle, which was his preferred means for transportation.

Born Winston Hubert McIntosh in the rural parish of Westmoreland, Jamaica, in 1944, Peter Tosh moved to the notorious slum Trench Town at the age of 16. He first picked up a guitar after watching a man play, memorizing everything his fingers were doing and playing it back to the man.

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Categories: 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, Art, Crave, Music

Azucar! The Life of Celia Cruz Comes to Netflix in an Epic Series

Posted on October 20, 2016

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The Queen of Salsa, the incomparable Celia Cruz (1925-2003) is now the subject of Celia, an epic television series now airing on Netflix showcasing the Cuban singer’s incredible life. Featuring 80 episodes, each 45 minutes in length, the series, which originally aired in 2015 in Colombia on RCN Television and in the United States on Telemundo, tells the story of Cruz’s rise to fame in Spanish, with English subtitles.

Celia stars Puerto Rican actress and Miami Beach resident Jeimy Osorio as the legendary entertainer with fellow Boricua actor Modesto Lacén cast as her husband, Pedro Knight. Directed by Victor Mallarino and Liliana Bocanegra, and scripted by Andrés Salgado, Celia tells the story of the singer’s rise to fame, beginning in pre-revolution Havana, when Salsa music was a white man’s game.

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Categories: 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Crave, Latin America, Music

Lucian Perkins: Hard Art, DC 1979

Posted on October 4, 2016

Photo: HR, Hard Art Gallery, 9/15/79, from Hard Art, DC 1979, copyright 2013 by Lucian Perkins, used with permission of Akashic Books.

No less than Plato first wrote the words, “A true creator is necessity, which is the mother of our invention,” acknowledging the fundamental human drive to solve problems. As recent history attests, conditions of lack have provided the most fertile grounds for originality, ingenuity, and innovation.

Consider Washington, D.C. circa 1979. The nation’s capital had not yet recovered from the riots of 1968, which broke out following the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. For six days, the riots raged in response to the horrific living conditions for the predominantly African American population, with Dr. King’s murder acting as the tipping point.

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Categories: 1970s, 1980s, Art, Books, Music, Photography

Godlis: History is Made at Night

Posted on September 14, 2016

Photo: The Ramones, CBBG, 1977. ©Godlis, courtesy of agnès b. galerie, New York.

“There are no secrets that time does not reveal,” Jean Racine wrote. With the benefit of hindsight, it has become evident that punks are true embodiment of the counterculture movement. They never sold out and they never said die. They just keep on keeping on, D.I.Y.

Photographer David Godlis arrived on the New York scene in 1976, camera in hand, carrying as much film as he could reasonably hold in the pockets of his black jeans without looking indiscreet. He usually shot without a flash, using the techniques of masters like Brassai, who had famously photographed Paris at night forty years prior and inspired Godlis’s masterful eye.

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Photo: Richard Hell, Bowery, 1977. ©Godlis, courtesy of agnès b. galerie, New York.

Categories: 1970s, Art, Books, Crave, Manhattan, Music, Photography

Toty Ruggeri: Diamond Dogs

Posted on September 6, 2016

Photo: ©Toty Ruggeri, courtesy of Yard Press.d Dogs,

Picture it: Naples, Italy, 1984: the city had been unhinged by a massive earthquake that struck four years earlier, creating a massive divide between the rich and the poor. The government had allocated $20 of the $40 billion earmarked for reconstruction to create a new class of millionaires, while another $10 billion went into the pockets of the Camorra and the politicians on the take, giving the Mafia entrance into the construction industry. Only one quarter of the funds were used to reconstruction.

The results were to be expected. Naples, already plagued by the wars between Mafia gangs, a high rate of youth unemployment, ineffective local government, a decaying urban infrastructure, and a trashed public image, was caught in between chaos and despair, but from the darkness new hope emerged.

That hope took the form of Diamond Dogs, a subterranean getaway from all that was going wrong. From the years 1984 through 1989, Diamond Dogs where artists, musicians, writers, poets, actors, and directors could converge, fomenting a cultural rebirth of Naples in its time of greatest need. Photographer Toty Ruggeri was among the crowd with his camera in hand, capturing the scene as it unfolded.

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Categories: 1980s, Art, Books, Crave, Music, Photography

Joe Conzo & DJ Disco Wiz on “The Get Down”

Posted on August 27, 2016

Best known for a series of posh, over-the-top cinematic extravaganzas including Moulin Rouge!, Romeo + Juliet, and The Great Gatsby, Australian film director, screenwriter, and producer Baz Luhrmann has turned his attention to the small screen with The Get Down, a twelve-episode Netflix series, which premiered on August 12, 2016. Originally budgeted at $7.5 million per episode, the show ended up costing at least $120 million, making it among the most expensive series in television history.

Set between 1977–79, The Get Down is a fictional account of life on the streets of the South Bronx as the twin stars of Hip Hop and disco crossed paths in ways no one could have ever imagined. Attracted to this pivotal moment in American culture, Luhrmann found himself an outsider with no firsthand knowledge of the scene so he brought Nas, Grandmaster Flash, Nelson George, and Kurtis Blow, among others, into the fold to produce and consult on the project. The production was troubled with a series of starts, stops, and stalls that lead to scripts being written, discarded, and revised to such an extent that, according to Variety, some writers had taken to calling the show “The Shut Down.” Variety went on to describe The Get Down as a cautionary tale for Hollywood, but Netflix indicated they had no regrets.

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Categories: 1970s, Books, Bronx, Crave, Music, Photography

Into the Groove: The Jazz Portraits of Herman Leonard

Posted on August 5, 2016

Photo: Duke Ellington by Herman Leonard. Gelatin silver print, 1958. National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution © Herman Leonard Photography, LLC.

In August 2005, Hurricane Katrina hit and laid to waste so many lives in the city of New Orleans. The home and studio of photographer Herman Leonard (1923–2010) was destroyed when the 17th Canal Levee broke near his home. The storm claimed 8,000 silver gelatin prints Leonard had made; fortunately, Herman’s crew had gathered the negatives and placed them in the care of the Ogden Museum of Southern Art. But Leonard’s time in New Orleans had come to a close after nearly a quarter of a century on the local jazz and blues scene. Leonard relocated to Studio City, California, where he spent his final years re-establishing his business.

And what a business it was. Leonard recounted his early years in an interview with JazzWax, recalling, “I opened my first studio on Sullivan Street in New York’s Greenwich Village in 1948. I worked free-lance for magazines and spent my spare time at places like the Royal Roost and Birdland. I did this because I loved the music. I couldn’t wait to be with Lester Young at a club and hear him and photograph him playing his music. I hoped that on film I could preserve what I heard. It didn’t hurt that I got into the clubs for free. My photographs helped publicize the clubs, so owners let me in.”

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Photo: Billie Holiday by Herman Leonard. Gelatin silver print, 1949. National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution © Herman Leonard Photography, LLC.
Read more at http://www.craveonline.com/art/1017217-jazz-king-photographs-herman-leonard-national-portrait-gallery#tz6wkDjUMWC5zHPO.99

Categories: 1960s, Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Manhattan, Music, Photography

Malissa “Mali” Hunter: The Book That Changed My Life

Posted on January 11, 2016

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As an artist, leader, and host, Malissa “Mali” Hunter is a Renaissance woman. As General Manager and vibe technician at the world famous Tree Sound Studios in Atlanta, GA, Hunter has been a force in the music industry. She began hosting a series of industry parties that feature farm-to-table organic family-style dinners prepared by Ms. Hunter for her guests. But Ms. Hunter is more than an executive in the entertainment and advertising worlds; she is an artist in her own right, having received her first Grammy Award nomination for her role in the “New Flame”, song with Chris Brown, Usher, and Rick Ross in 2015.

I’ve long admired Ms. Hunter’s ability to integrate art, business, and life into one free flowing stream of creative, positive energy. Curious, I contacted her to ask what was the book that changed her life. Then my phone rang. Ms. Hunter was on the line, excited to speak about about Carly Simon’s memoir, The Boys in the Trees (Flatiron Books), which she had been project managing, working on the completion of the audio book and the orchestrating the entire press tour.

Ms. Hunter revealed: “Reading this book has changed my entire life. Looking at her made me feel there was a reason things happened they way they have. Anything I have ever done, it’s because I wanted to help a friend. Reading her book, I learned about myself and the music industry. My journey is a lot like hers. Listening to her story of heartbreak that had been happening gave me awareness, like, ‘You’re not the only one.’ Reading her story made me more grateful for my upbringing, the tragedy that had happened in my life, and the things I had gone through as a kid.”

Boys in the Trees begins with Carly Simon’s storied childhood as the third daughter of Richard L. Simon, the co-founder of publishing giant Simon & Schuster, to a meteoric solo career that would result in 13 top 40 hits, including the #1 song “You’re So Vain.” She was the first artist in history to win a Grammy Award, an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award, for her song “Let the River Run” from the movie Working Girl. The memoir recalls a childhood enriched by music and culture, but also one shrouded in secrets that would eventually tear her family apart. Adding to this, Simon’s romantic entanglements with the likes of Mick Jagger, Warren Beatty, and Jack Nicholson fueled her confessional lyrics, as well as the unraveling of her storybook marriage to James Taylor.

Ms. Hunter observes how the memoir inspired her, after seeing all that Carly Simon went through. “Her book has helped me to get to know her as her manager, to help her and protect her. It has given me that extra push to do right by her because no one has in the past.”

Categories: Books, Music