Tony's Influence

Def Jam Presents Scarface: Origins Of A Hip Hop Classic

I only recently came across this short documentary that looks at the immense impact and influence the movie Scarface has had on hip hop.  With contributions from many of the major artists who have used Scarface references within their rhymes, the film takes a look at the parallels between the life of Tony Montana and many of those who create hip hop.

There Be Pirates!

This is only a 10 minute mini documentary, but it begins to spotlight the importance of UK pirate radio in the early 80’s and how it brought black music to the masses. Anyone who grew up in a major city during these times is likely to know the importance of pirate radio. It was the only way most of us could hear hip hop music in its early days and right up until the shift towards internet radio, it remained a key method of keeping up to date with the true underground scene. 

As someone who was raised listening to these stations, and was then later a part of them, it would be great for me to see something like this expanded into a full length documentary. These early innovators who set up the masts, funded the equipment and took the risks are as critical to our hip hop history as the original DJ’s and emcees. For the UK, pirate radio was the equivalent of a Bronx DJ throwing a party in their local parks.

Comic Underground

It's widely known that Shock G of Digital Underground drew all of the artworks used for their early 12"s and albums, so it shouldn't come as any surprise that as well as being a gifted producer and dual personality emcee,  he's also a pretty good artist too.
But I was completely unaware that he had produced a comic book that never saw publication, and only recently have some of his original sketches from 1999 come to light.  The comic was called The Assholes: Hole Invasion and personally I found the content particularly amusing (see image above for a good example!).

Further images and information can be found here.

More Bounce Than Spring

Well March has been a busy month for me, and it still feels more like winter than spring, so this is a brief wrap up of my internet travels over the last 4 weeks.  Despite my lack of free time, there are still some gems to bring to your attention in case you've been sleeping (or hibernating from the extremely cold temperatures!).

Rubble Kings

No, this isn't the new TV series on Discovery that follows demolition guys blowing up buildings, despite it sounding like it could be.  This looks like it could be a really interesting documentary when it comes out, as it looks at the New York city street gangs of the late ‘60s & ‘70s and their influence on hip-hop culture.  If you grew up watching films like The Warriors then this is the era and events that influenced them.
Unfortunately the film needs financial support before it can be released, but I'm sure after watching this short trailer you'll agree it's an essential chapter of history that needs to be told.  Thanks to 238Beats for promoting this.

More goodness after the jump......