Welcome back to Cutting Room Jams! With luck and time permitting, this marks a return to a regular biweekly publishing schedule. Below, you’ll find lists of my work from the past few months as well as a breakdown of research methods for a short item on Salt-N-Pepa.
As I write, the Paris Olympics nears end, and the men’s and women’s breaking competition has concluded. (Canada’s Phil Wizard and Japan’s B-Girl Ami won gold.) It’s the first time this core hip-hop element has appeared in the Olympics and perhaps the last: the organizers for the 2028 event in Los Angeles opted not to stage a second edition. “Despite breaking’s roots in the United States – and its global popularity – it’s received little official support in this country, where cultural policy is left largely to the marketplace,” wrote Jeff Chang in the New York Times.
The presence of a distinctly American art form inspiring an international sporting event resulted in viral trolling – thanks to a poorly-received performance by Australian dancer/scholar Raygun – and fraught, conflicted reactions. “France’s sudden embrace feels like a mixed message to break dancers here, many of whom come from Paris’s African and Arab suburbs,” wrote Les Carpenter in the Washington Post in regards to the banlieue residents that have long suffered from racism and neglect. Others questioned whether the event was a sign of cultural appropriation and a poor imitation of breaking’s roots in Black and Brown youth from the Bronx, New York during the 60s and 70s. Perhaps that ship has sailed, given how the rap industry has de-prioritized breaking since the late 90s, allowing the likes of Red Bull to corner the market. “Some of this breakdancing discourse goes in the file called ‘hip hop heads being precious about things they stopped paying attention to years ago,’” observed Open Mike Eagle.
The phenomenon of Black Americans imagining art forms and then abandoning their visions, only for global audiences to transform those castoffs into shelf-stable products for mainstream consumption dates back centuries. As Jay-Z rapped on “Off That,” “If you drivin' it, I drove it/You got it, 'cause I sold it.” Today’s bleeding-edge freshness is yesterday’s fads. “Take it off! Take that Kangol off!” chanted De La Soul on “Take It Off.”
Meanwhile, innovation in Black street dance endures, whether it’s the Fisherr dance or turf dancing. These expressions of movement in all their temporary virality and regional variety are unlikely to find a place at the Olympics, no matter how athletic they’re rendered. But one wonders if the culture could evolve more strategically or, at least, find ways to protect and sustain itself from corporate takeover. In the meantime, breaking’s newfound spotlight, much like hip-hop culture’s spread around the world, can feel like a bittersweet triumph, even while admiring fantastic artists like Japan’s Shigekix and U.S. dancer B-Boy Victor. “Men’s breaking final was to ‘The Mexican,’” wrote Christopher Weingarten in reference to the British rock single-turned-foundational Bronx breakbeat. “Tell me hip-hop isn’t beautiful!”
Professional Work
Here’s a list of what I’ve written since February 4, the last time I published a full edition of this newsletter.
Rolling Stone
“Schoolboy Q Is Still a Mystery. That’s What Makes Him Great” (March 1)
“Metro Boomin and Future’s ‘We Don’t Trust You’ Is Solid but Nothing Special” (March 25)
“Vince Staples Shows a Softer Side on ‘Dark Times’” (May 24)
“The 25 Most Controversial Rap Albums of All Time” (June 30)
“The 100 Best Album Covers of All Time” (July 20)
“Ye and Ty Dolla $ign’s ‘Vultures 2’: It’s Time to Unsubscribe from the Kanye Disaster” (August 5)
The 66th Grammy Awards Program Guide
The Wire
HipHop & R&B (March 2024)
Arthur Baker Presents Breaker’s Revenge: Original B-Boy and B-Girl Breakdance Classics 1970-1984 (June 2024)
Ghostface Killah, Set the Tone (July 2024)
HipHop & R&B (September 2024)
New on Humthrush
May the Lord Watch: The Little Brother Story: “May the Lord Watch: The Little Brother Story substitutes lengthy, single-camera interviews for a compelling, dynamic film.” —>
Kings from Queens: The Run-DMC Story: “Kings from Queens: The Run DMC Story gives testimony about a history that most fans of a certain age will know by heart.” —>
ShrapKnel & Controller 7, Nobody Planning to Leave: “Nobody Planning to Leave, a collaboration between ShrapKnel and producer Controller 7 unfolds as a kind of fragmented tapestry.” —>
Your Old Droog, Movie: “Your Old Droog's Movie isn't quite a God-tier film, but it's a solid excursion with quality production and ‘nutty bars.’” —>
The Best Rap Singles
“The 60 Best Rap Singles of 1984”: “Hip-hop in 1984 brought Fresh Fest superstars Run-DMC and Whodini, Melle Mel's breakout year, and the beginning of the Roxanne wars.” —>
“The 125 Best Rap Singles of 1994”: “By 1994, hip-hop had clearly evolved into a generational movement. But its innocent sensibility was lost in the process.” —>
Researched: Salt-N-Pepa’s Hot Cool Vicious
In June, I pitched RS on a list of controversial rap albums, an idea inspired by the anticipated arrival of Eminem’s new album, The Death of Slim Shady (Coup de Grâce). When my editor accepted it, I spent a day or so compiling a draft list for his staff to look over and changed some picks based on their comments. Then I spent the next several nights writing 4100 words, turning them in on June 27. The process from assignment to completion took 11 days which, given how many words I wrote, is a fairly quick turnaround. The accelerated timeline was possible because most of the blurbs were fairly easy to research and churn out.
However, an entry for Salt-N-Pepa’s 1986 debut, Hot Cool Vicious, proved difficult. Growing up in Sacramento, I remember seeing a local TV segment about cheerleaders banned from performing the group’s breakout hit, “Push It.” But I couldn’t find any information about it on the group’s Wikipedia page or a Google search. I subsequently looked in newspaper archives, which proved tricky – just try using “salt” and “pepa” as database search terms.
Eventually, I found a clipping on the controversy. It centered on a Cordova High School cheer squad in Rancho Cordova.
When wire services like United Press International picked up the “Push It” story, they brought unwanted national attention to the school.
While looking for information about the “Push It” drama, I stumbled onto an incident I didn’t know about: some New York radio stations refused to play the first single from Hot Cool Vicious, “I’ll Take Your Man.” Cheryl “Salt” James called it a “double standard”: “If it had been recorded by a guy and titled ‘I’ll Take Your Girl,’ there would have been no problem.’”
I spent a few enjoyable hours digging into grainy news clippings on Salt-N-Pepa, then distilled my findings into a modest 149-word blurb for the “Controversial Rap Albums” list.
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Rest in peace to Mike McGuirk.