A champ like Tyson, a Captain like Kirk, no. Employee of the Month, cause yo, I do work.

I cannot unlisten to the sounds of Travis Scott’s “Goosebumps”, but I can at least explain to you why MC Ren has been asking for years for other artists to stop “Putting wack records in the make / By using R&B f*%#ing singers in the god damn breaks.”  I have read  Shea Serrano’s “The Rap Year Book: The Most Important Rap Song From Every Year Since 1979, Discussed, Debated, and Deconstructed” cover to cover and I am happy to say that not only did I know the tracks but had educated opinions on each one.  And at the peak of when I was booking new and upcoming bands, I can proudly say that I booked Major League Entertainment recording artist Tribeca at both the Middle East and S.O.B’s.  I want my boys to look back on this blog and understand that I know something about music – maybe not how to play, but how to listen and discuss hip-hop and be a connoisseur.

I am always trying to teach my boys something new:  how to run a pick & roll in basketball; the proper way to answer a knock on our front door and my love of hip-hop music from the era of approximately the fall of 1989 until the summer of 1998.  Even though I live in Pittsburgh and my boys know the names of Wiz Khalifa and Mac Miller, I am trying to explain to them that before those performers there was the 1991 release of the “The Low End Theory”.  Then there was the April 1992 release of “Check Your Head” or later that same year in November 1992 when “Bizarre Ride II the Pharcyde” was released.  It continued with  Guru's Jazzmatazz, Vol. 1 in 1993, “It Was Written” in 1996 and “The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill” in 1998.

I distinctly remember my cousin Jason and I running into Mister Cee near the train platform in New York City’s Penn Station.  I was so excited to see a DJ that I had seen on “Showtime at the Apollo” in person.  However, maybe it was my Charles Oakley jersey, or the style of my high top Converse sneakers that I was choosing to wear at the time, but with a stack of vinyl records in hand, he vehemently denied being the person that I knew who he was.  And although Mister Cee did not view me as someone who was striving to be an authority on hip-hop, I now believe in my ears and what I am able to pass along to my boys.

I do not make beats like my cousin Daniel and the mix-tapes that Jason I made as DJ Feldi and Kool Mark Dee are only alive for those who still have a tape-deck, but I still know what you should be listening to:  Jonwayne’s “Rap Album Two” and Oddisee's "The Iceberg".

Thanks for reading.