(If you haven't already, you can check out the prologue here.)
I remember it like it was yesterday: when my oldest brother, an avid record collector at the time, came home with a copy of "The Adventures of Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel". It was one of the first times I had ever heard mixing, and the first time anyone had put out a record with scratching on it. I remember wondering what that sound was, thinking that Flash was intentionally moving the needle across the record (gimmie a break - I was eight years old). It's something I would have never tried, but I was still fascinated with the sound.
Some time later, my mom decided that she could trust me enough with the stereo equipment to actually let me play the records and not "let one of the older kids play it". (You can read about how my mom influenced my love of music here.) Maybe a year after that - I think I was twelve - my brother came home with Herbie Hancock's "Rockit", the song that brought scratching into the mainstream. I still didn't know how the sound was created until I saw Hancock and Grand Mixer D.ST. perform it on Saturday Night Live. My eyes were glued to the TV as D.ST. simply moved the record on the turntable back and forth, and I thought, That's all?!
That's when I knew what I wanted to be when I grew up.
I'm sure I wasn't the only aspiring DJ who used their mom's record player as a learning tool of sorts. She caught me several times scratching on it, usually with that copy of "Rockit". Yes, I was scolded, spanked, or otherwise punished everytime she caught me, but that didn't stop me. I had ambition, dammit! (Or maybe I was just hard-headed. Whatever.) Hell, I even went as far as giving myself a DJ name: Grand Mixer C. (I know, I know. But if you ask your favorite DJ about his/her first choice, they'll tell you something just as corny, if not more corny.)
As time went by, Hip-Hop became a major distraction - well, that and the Thriller album. I began to hear and see televised performances from groups who had DJs I would come to idolize: Will "Fresh Prince" Smith had DJ Jazzy Jeff, Run-DMC had Jam Master Jay, LL Cool J had Cut Creator - the list goes on and on. Even a neighbor of ours was a DJ! But it would still be years before I got to live out my dream (partly because said neighbor wouldn't allow me to touch his equipment, either. Damn).
Fast-forward a few years: Sometime in the late 90s, I met a DJ who had no problems letting me try my hand at mixing and scratching. I don't think I took the lessons too seriously because I didn't believe, after so much time had passed (I was now in my mid-20s), that I would actually become a DJ. After a few months, the lessons stopped for reasons I don't really remember.
May, 2000: I went out to this slightly-bigger-than-a-hole-in-the-wall bar in New Orleans called the Audubon Hotel on St. Charles, not far from Lee Circle. A pretty low-class joint (at the time) considering its location, but good for cheap drinks and real Hip-Hop. Anyway, after a burst of Budweiser-induced courage, I asked the DJ if I could spin a few joints, and for whatever reason - maybe he was in desperate need of a restroom break - he said yes. What followed was the sonic equivalent of your average DJ trying to mix while tumbling down a flight of stairs - or at least that's how I heard it. However, a few songs later, the DJ (who we'll refer to from here on out as "DJ True") walked up and asked, "How come you didn't ask me to get on before?" Maybe he heard a good set, or maybe he just heard potential.
Nevertheless, after that night, things changed.
NEXT: The Music and the Madness
