BORN IN THE BRONX

The book "Born in the Bronx: A Visual Record of the Early Days of Hip-Hop" captured me straight away after flipping it open! This timeless book, released in October 2007, takes you back to the time and place where one of the most powerful youth sub-cultures ever was born – hip hop, an expressive mouthpiece and product of The Bronx and it’s people.

"Born in the Bronx" was edited by Johan Kugelberg and features an amazing catalogue of photos shot by hip hop's first and Cold Crush Brothers' exclusive photographer Joe Conzo (see picture) in the late 70's and early 80's. You get impressed by many great photos of hip hop icons like Jazzy Jay, Grandmaster Flash, Kool Herc, Cold Crush Brothers, Kool DJ AJ or Busy Bee, but you can see some snapshots of people in the Bronx or b-boys in a battle as well. This book also shows you the improvisational artwork of party flyer-designer king Buddy Esquire and label scans of rap records from the early 80's in the essay "The Humble Beginnings of Hip Hop on Wax". Starting with a foreword by Zulu Nation founder and hip hop pioneer Afrika Bambaataa, this book also introduces some old school heroes like Grandmaster Caz, Grandwizzard Theodore or LA Sunshine and contains a nice hip hop timeline by Jeff Chang, author of the critically acclaimed book "Can't Stop Won't Stop: A History of the Hip Hop Generation".

My advice: Buy this fascinating book and witness the early days of hip hop – a time when hip hop was a non-violent, revolutionary and explosive movement until it got perverted by the music industry. You won't regret it for sure.

In addition to this book you should defenitely look for the 2006 released special edition vinyl of the original unedited battle between the Cold Crush Four and the Fantastic Romantic Five. This battle took place in 1981 at Harlem World and is considered as the greatest old school hip hop battle of all time.
The "Cold Crush Brothers vs. The Fantastic Romantic Five" 12" was part of a limited to 250 hand numbered edition book-picture-record promo set that contains a book of Buddy Esquire flyers, a book of photos from Joe Conzo, the hand numbered battle record, a signed and numbered Joe Conzo photo and a signed and numbered Buddy Esquire flyer. This set already fetched prices of $200+ on ebay. I don't own a copy of this set myself (yet), so many thanks goes out to my man Kid Dynomite for helping out with some fresh photos and a soundclip of the battle.





Keep your eyes open for this amazing promo set on auction sites... And whenever you spot a copy don't hesitate to click on "buy it now" or throw a high bid in - regardless of which price, this set is worth your hard earned money!


Benny aka ABWS