when did i say anything about herc rapping bruv
nikka fukk is u talkin bout without kool herc hip hop would be def poetry jam..
aint nobody tryna hear that float like a butterfly sting like a bee shyt in no party
MG: The jive talk that you did – did it just come out of you?
CM: No. To be honest, what gave me that idea, I was walking late one night about a quarter to three somewhere in Denham
Town. And I hear this guy on the radio, some American guy advertising Royal Crown hairdressing. (affecting an American accent) “You see, you’re drying up with this one Johnny , try Royal Crown. When you’re downtown you’re the smartest guy in town when you use Royal Crown and Royal Crown makes you the smartest guy in town.” That deliverance! This guy sound like a machine! A tongue twister! I heard that in 1949 on one of them States stations that was really strong. I hear this guy sing out pon the radio and I just like the sound and I say to myself I think I can do better. I would like to play some recordings and just jive talk like this guy
“The Jives of Dr. Hepcat” by KVET-AM DJ Albert Lavada Durst, published in 1953.
I was reading Beth Lesser’s amazing Rub-a-Dub Style: The Roots of Modern Dancehall, which is available for free download here, and I found a quotation from Clive Chin that set me off on a wild goose chase through the roots of toasting. I have long had a fascination with the connection between toasting and hip hop and have written about that in this blog before, and presented on it at conference after I had the pleasure of interviewing DJ Kool Herc last year, but I hadn’t thoroughly ventured back to jive–until Beth Lesser.
Clive Chin, writes Lesser, remembers toaster Count Matchuki carrying around a book. “There was one he said he bought out of Beverly’s [record shop] back in the ‘60s. The book was called Jives and it had sort of slangs, slurs in it and he was reading it, looking it over, and he found that it would be something that he could explore and study, so he took that book and it helped him.” Lesser writes that this book of jive may have been a boo, written in 1953, The Jives of Dr. Hepcat, which was published by Albert Lavada Durst, a DJ on KVET-AM in Austin, Texas. This version (read the entire copy here) featured definitions for words and phrases commonly used by jive talking DJs like “threads,” which are clothes; “pad,” for house or apartment; “flip your lid,” for losing one’s balance mentally; and “chill,” to hold up or stop. Durst wrote in the introduction to his book, which sold for 50 cents, “In spinning a platter of some very popular band leader, I would come on something like this: ‘Jackson, here’s that man again, cool, calm, and a solid wig, he is laying a frantic scream that will strictly pad your skull, fall in and dig the happenings.’ Which is to say, the orchestra leader is a real classy singer and has a voice that most people would like. For instance, there was a jam session of topnotch musicians and everything was jumping and you would like to explain it to a hepster. These are the terms to use. ‘Gator take a knock down to those blow tops, who are upping some real crazy riffs and dropping them on a mellow kick and chappie the way they pull their lay hips our ship that they are from the land of razz ma tazz.’
Cab Calloway’s “Hepsters Dictionary: Language of Jive,” 1944 version.
I decided to search further and found there was another popular book of jive written before Dr. Hepcat, although it is likely that Matchuki obtained Durst’s version given the era and the content. But Cab Calloway had his own publication of jive called “Cab Calloway’s Hepster Dictionary: Language of Jive” which was first published in 1939 and then revised to add more words in a 1944 printing. Calloway was the original emcee, the master of ceremonies, the hepcat, who understood jive and brought it to those who wanted to become part of this culture. As frequent band leader at the Cotton Club in front of Duke Ellington’s band during performances that were broadcast all over the continent, and as star in a number of feature films, Calloway brought the language of Harlem, jive, to audiences uneducated in the dialect of the black musicians. He established jive as a form of discourse.
Interior of Cab Calloway’s “Hepsters Dictionary”
Some of the words in these dictionaries, and certainly the word “jive” itself, appear in the toasts of Count Matchuki, Lord Comic, and King Stitt. The style is similar as well, scatting over the music, punctuating the rhythm with verbal percussion, and boasting. Next week I will blog about the jive-talking American DJs like Vernon Winslow, Tommy Smalls, and Douglas Henderson, who influenced the Jamaican toasters since these similarities are fascinating as well.
Last week I wrote about the connection between toasting and jive talking from Cab Calloway and Albert Lavada Hurst, which writer and historian Beth Lesser brought my attention to through her work. This week I continue this connection between the jive talking DJs in America and toasters like Count Matchuki, Sir Lord Comic, and King Stitt and I focus on a few of the key DJs during the 1950s.
Dr. Daddy O
One of these jive-talking DJs was Vernon Winslow who broadcast his show, “Jam, Jive, ‘n’ Gumbo,” from New Orleans with his character, “Dr. Daddy O,” and partner DJ Duke Thiele who portrayed the character of “Poppa Stoppa.” Winslow explains, “Poppa Stoppa was the name I came up with. It came from the rhyme and rap that folks in the street were using in New Orleans. Poppa Stoppa’s language was for insiders.”
Vernon Winslow, also known as Dr. Daddy O, was the first African-American disc jockey.
Tommy Smalls was a DJ in New York known as “Dr. Jive,” though he got his start in Savannah, Georgia. His catch phrase was, “Sit back and relax and enjoy the wax. From three-oh-five to five-three-oh, it’s the Dr. Jive show.” He was known as the “Mayor of Harlem” and unfortunately, in 1960 he was one of the DJs arrested, along with Alan Freed, in the payola scandal.
Tommy Smalls plants a kiss on Dinah Washington.
Dr. Jive
And Douglas Henderson, known as “Jocko” broadcast from a number of cities with his show, “Rocket Ship.” Henderson was also known as the “Ace from Outta Space.”Author Bill Brewster writes of Henderson: “Using a rocket ship blast-off to open proceedings, and introducing records with more rocket engines and ‘Higher, higher, higher…’ Jocko conducted his whole show as if he was a good-rocking rhythmonaut. ‘Great gugga mugga shooga booga’ he’d exclaim, along with plenty of ‘Daddios.’ ‘From way up here in the stratosphere, we gonna holler mighty loud and clear ee-tiddy-o and a bo, and I’m back on the scene with the record machine, saying oo-pappa-do and how do you do?”
The Ace from Outta Space, Douglas Henderson
Notice any similarity between the jive talking of these DJs and the toasts of Lord Comic and Count Matchuki? Some of Matchuki’s toasts have the same language as the jive of these DJs. Matchuki’s toast include “When I dig, I dig for mommy, I dig for daddy, I dig for everybody,” and “It’s you I love and not another, you may change but I will never,” as well as, “If you dig my jive / you’re cool and very much alive / Everybody all round town / Matchuki’s the reason why I shake it down / When it comes to jive / You can’t whip him with no stick.”
Count Matchuki, born Winston Cooper in 1934, is widely considered the first toaster. He was raised in a family that had more money than others so he grew up with two gramophones in the home and was exposed to swing, jazz, bebop, and rhythm & blues. He says that he got the idea to begin toasting over records after hearing American radio. He told this to Mark Gorney and Michael Turner as they recount in a 1996 issue of Beat Magazine. “I was walking late one night about a quarter to three. Somewhere in Denham Town. And I hear this guy on the radio, some American guy advertising Royal Crown Hair Dressing. ‘You see you’re drying up with this one, Johnny, try Royal Crown. When you’re downtown you’re the smartest guy in town, when you use Royal Crown and Royal Crown make you the smartest guy in town.’ That deliverance! This guy sound like a machine! A tongue-twister! I heard that in 1949. On one of them States stations that was really strong. I hear this guy sing out ‘pon the radio and I just like the sound. And I say, I think I can do better. I’d like to play some recordings and just jive talk like this guy.”
Count Matchuki
Sir Lord Comic, whose real name was Percival Wauchope, began as a dancer, a “legs man.” He began toasting for Admiral Deans’ sound system on Maxwell Avenue in 1959 and his first song was a Len Hope tune called “Hop, Skip, and Jump.” In Howard Johnson and Jim Pines’ book, Reggae: Deep Roots Music, Sir Lord Comic recalls, “When the tune started into about the fourth groove I says, ‘Breaks!’ and when I say ‘Breaks’ I have all eyes at the amplifier, y’know. And I says, ‘You love the life you live, you live the life you love. This is Lord Comic.’ The night was exciting, very exciting” (Johnson Pines 72). Lord Comic’s first toast, he says, was, “Now we’ll give you the scene, you got to be real keen. And me no jelly bean. Sir Lord Comic answer his spinning wheel appeal, from his record machine. Stick around, be no clown. See what the boss is puttin’ down.”
Sir Lord Comic
One article in the Daily Gleaner on May 1, 1964 advertised Sir Lord Comic’s performance at the Glass Bucket Club, an upscale establishment. “Sir Lord Comic will be at the controls with his authentic sound system calls,” it stated. Some of his recorded songs include “Ska-ing West,” “The Great Wuga Wuga,” “Rhythm Rebellion,” “Jack of My Trade,” and “Four Seasons of the Year,” among a few others. Sir Lord Comic’s “The Great Wuga Wuga” was likely inspired by the jive talk of Douglas “Jocko” Henderson who spoke of the “great gugga mugga.” Additionally, Henderson’s show, “Rocket Ship,” became a song recorded by the Skatalites with Sir Lord Comic toasting over the instrumentals, calling out the title of the song to begin the instrumentals and continuing with his percussive techniques.
And if i don't know, what makes you think early rappers knew him?
nah the main difference is rap being over a beat break
Did you somehow miss my post about Count Matchuki and where he jacked his style from?
Hip To The Jive And Stay Alive: An interview with Count Matchuki
http://www.dancecrasher.co.uk/interviewsdiscogs/hip-to-the-jive-and-stay-alive/
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Jive Talking and Toasting
Jive Talking and Toasting - Foundation SKA
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Jive Talking and Toasting part two
Jive Talking and Toasting part two - Foundation SKA
what does shyt being popping have to do with who was first? and when we say rapping are we talking jive talking or rhyming over a beat?
. This is 1968 in America
Cat's in Jamaica never toasted over any break beats
go to 3:00 mins into the video below to hear herc's take on how mcing or rapping started
@ 22:43 in this video, Herc gives an example of what Coke La Rock and himself were doing on the mic. If you notice, it' freelanced with no actual syncopated rhyming going on
You're not gonna find anything from jamaica in the 1960's that sounds more like rap than that Pigmeat Markham track. The breakdown one more time
Rapping and the Dancehall style (they call it Deejaying in Jamaica) are cousins and here is the connection
black american oral traditions---->Jive/Patter---->Scatting--->Jazz/tribal poetry-->Rapping
.
Jive/Patter + scatting-->Toasting--->Deejay===Dancehall style
The Jive/Patter is what connects them but the two styles basically evolved independently of each other. Modern Rapping is the evolution of pre-existing black american practices while Jamaican Dancehall styles evolved out of Toasting which evolved from BlackAmerican Jive/Patter that they heard Black American radio DJ's doing.
Black America
1920's
1930's
his is pretty much the same flow, cadence and delivery as Rapper Delight, the first commercial Rap song
1940s
These 3 would a type of Jive talking
Gospel cats were even flowing in the same period
1968 Jive talk over a true Funk break!
Jazz related
Scatting (1920s)
Jazz-Tribal Poetry (1960's-1970s)
1971
what's called "toasting" in Jamaica is what we called "Jive Talk" in America. What we called "Toasts" in America is like the album 'Hustlers Convention"
and...
Chuck Berry flowing in the early late 1950's/1960's
Modern Rap 1979
vs
Jamaica
Jamaican Toasting (between 1960's-1970's)
Movements - Count Machuki
SIR LORD COMIC - JACK OF MY TRADE
king stitt--dance beat
U-Roy - Version Galore
Modern Dancehall "Deejay" style
Yellow Man - Over me (1981)
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Now that can some examples from above. The biggest difference is the American examples are more steady flowing and syncopated with the rhymes while the jamaican examples are more freelanced and not syncopated/rhyming to the steady beats. Read below.....
" Rather than riding the beat with a constant flow of syncopated syllables as rappers have since the late 70s, Jamaica’s DJs of the 60s and early 70s and hip-hop’s earliest DJs/MCs would pepper songs with short phrases, often in the form of rhyming couplets, employing the latest slang (including scat-filled routines), and often in a relatively free manner — i.e., without relating too directly to the rhythm of the track playing on the turntable (but frequently connecting to the track’s theme or to specific lyrics or connotations the song may have)."
wayneandwax.com » Kool Herc: A Biographical Essay
A bit more on the differences between the Disco Dj's and the Herc scenes and how they impacted the formation of HipHop
From the article below:
"In contrast to Herc's pulled-ups and needle drops, disco dj's favored smooth segues from track to track. They also tended to rap in a more mellifluous style, relating directly, if casually, to the steady beats of the music they were playing, and stringing together long verse like presentations of their own set of stock phrases rather than the freer, more fragmented interjections of the Herculords and their streetwise colleagues. The next generation of hiphop Dj's and Mc's would synthesize these distinct strands, refining (if not outright commercializing) "street" style while bringing in a harder edge to the smooth surfaces of club rap and disco djing."
jesus christ breh, u win
You're not gonna find anything from jamaica in the 1960's that sounds more like rap than that Pigmeat Markham track. The breakdown one more time
Rapping and the Dancehall style (they call it Deejaying in Jamaica) are cousins and here is the connection
black american oral traditions---->Jive/Patter---->Scatting--->Jazz/tribal poetry-->Rapping
.
Jive/Patter + scatting-->Toasting--->Deejay===Dancehall style
The Jive/Patter is what connects them but the two styles basically evolved independently of each other. Modern Rapping is the evolution of pre-existing black american practices while Jamaican Dancehall styles evolved out of Toasting which evolved from BlackAmerican Jive/Patter that they heard Black American radio DJ's doing.
Black America
1920's
1930's
his is pretty much the same flow, cadence and delivery as Rapper Delight, the first commercial Rap song
1940s
These 3 would a type of Jive talking
Gospel cats were even flowing in the same period
1968 Jive talk over a true Funk break!
Jazz related
Scatting (1920s)
Jazz-Tribal Poetry (1960's-1970s)
1971
what's called "toasting" in Jamaica is what we called "Jive Talk" in America. What we called "Toasts" in America is like the album 'Hustlers Convention"
and...
Chuck Berry flowing in the early late 1950's/1960's
Modern Rap 1979
vs
Jamaica
Jamaican Toasting (between 1960's-1970's)
Movements - Count Machuki
SIR LORD COMIC - JACK OF MY TRADE
king stitt--dance beat
U-Roy - Version Galore
Modern Dancehall "Deejay" style
Yellow Man - Over me (1981)
.
.
.
.
Now that can some examples from above. The biggest difference is the American examples are more steady flowing and syncopated with the rhymes while the jamaican examples are more freelanced and not syncopated/rhyming to the steady beats. Read below.....
" Rather than riding the beat with a constant flow of syncopated syllables as rappers have since the late 70s, Jamaica’s DJs of the 60s and early 70s and hip-hop’s earliest DJs/MCs would pepper songs with short phrases, often in the form of rhyming couplets, employing the latest slang (including scat-filled routines), and often in a relatively free manner — i.e., without relating too directly to the rhythm of the track playing on the turntable (but frequently connecting to the track’s theme or to specific lyrics or connotations the song may have)."
wayneandwax.com » Kool Herc: A Biographical Essay
A bit more on the differences between the Disco Dj's and the Herc scenes and how they impacted the formation of HipHop
From the article below:
"In contrast to Herc's pulled-ups and needle drops, disco dj's favored smooth segues from track to track. They also tended to rap in a more mellifluous style, relating directly, if casually, to the steady beats of the music they were playing, and stringing together long verse like presentations of their own set of stock phrases rather than the freer, more fragmented interjections of the Herculords and their streetwise colleagues. The next generation of hiphop Dj's and Mc's would synthesize these distinct strands, refining (if not outright commercializing) "street" style while bringing in a harder edge to the smooth surfaces of club rap and disco djing."
