Hip Hop Origins 27 Vivid Images From 1970S And 1980S New York

These fascinating hip-hop origins photos show how the music and the culture that sprang up around it were first born.

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1 of 28The Eastwood Rockers breakdancing on the sidewalk. 1984.Eddie Barford/Mirrorpix/Getty Images 2 of 28Breakdancers and b-boys on the street. 1981.PYMCA/UIG via Getty Images 3 of 28The Sugar Hill Gang performs on stage. Circa late 1970s.Michael Ochs Archive/Getty Images 4 of 28Afrika Bambaataa on stage. 1980. David Corio/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images 5 of 28Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five. 1983. Walter McBride/Corbis via Getty Images 6 of 28Breakdancers in Brooklyn. 1984.

Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images 7 of 28Man walking down the street with his boombox in his hands. 1980.PYMCA/UIG via Getty Images 8 of 28LL Cool J riding the bus in Queens. 1985. PYMCA/UIG via Getty Images 9 of 28Breakdancers and b-boys on 5th Avenue. 1981. PYMCA/UIG via Getty Images 10 of 28Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five perform on stage. 1984.Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images 11 of 28Fab Five Freddy during a portrait session. 1983. Laura Levine/IMAGES/Getty Images 12 of 28Breakdancers and b-boys on 5th Avenue. 1981.PYMCA/UIG via Getty Images 13 of 28Afrika Bambaataa in silhouette. 1980.David Corio/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images 14 of 28Breakdancers at The Roxy. 1981. PYMCA/UIG via Getty Images 15 of 28Abandoned, burnt-out shops in the South Bronx. 1977. Alain Le Garsmeur/Getty Images 16 of 28Rapper Doug E. Fresh on the microphone. 1980.Al Pereira/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images 17 of 28Two men sporting hip-hop/graffiti fashion. 1975.Allan Tannenbaum/Getty Images 18 of 28South Bronx teenagers in front of abandoned burnt-out tenement buildings. 1977. Alain Le Garsmeur/Getty Images 19 of 28Hip hop dance party at a club in Hunts Point. 1983. Ted Thai/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images 20 of 28Musician Kurtis Blow performing. 1980. Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images 21 of 28South Bronx residents playing cards in an abandoned luncheonette. 1977.Alain Le Garsmeur/Getty Images 22 of 28Abandoned burnt-out shops in the South Bronx. 1977.Alain Le Garsmeur/Getty Images 23 of 28Hip hop dance party at Disco Fever. 1983. Ted Thai/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images 24 of 28Hip hop dance party at a club in Hunts Point. 1983. Ted Thai/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images 25 of 28Dancers from the Rock Steady Crew pose in Midtown Manhattan. 1981.Frank Russo/NY Daily News Archive via Getty Images 26 of 28Run-DMC at a video shoot. 1984. Waring Abbott/Getty Images 27 of 28Conga drummers provide music for South Bronx residents as they clean up abandoned buildings on Charlotte Street. 1980. Allan Tannenbaum/Getty Images 28 of 28Like this gallery?Share it:

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“Superheroes With Microphones”: The Birth Of Hip-Hop In New York View Gallery

Two moments in hip-hop history, four years apart, the first involving Jimmy Carter: It’s October 5, 1977, and President Carter is in the South Bronx. A whopping 600,000 people lived in that part of the borough at the time, most of them African-American.

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1 of 28The Eastwood Rockers breakdancing on the sidewalk. 1984.Eddie Barford/Mirrorpix/Getty Images

2 of 28Breakdancers and b-boys on the street. 1981.PYMCA/UIG via Getty Images

3 of 28The Sugar Hill Gang performs on stage. Circa late 1970s.Michael Ochs Archive/Getty Images

4 of 28Afrika Bambaataa on stage. 1980. David Corio/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

5 of 28Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five. 1983. Walter McBride/Corbis via Getty Images

6 of 28Breakdancers in Brooklyn. 1984.

Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

7 of 28Man walking down the street with his boombox in his hands. 1980.PYMCA/UIG via Getty Images

8 of 28LL Cool J riding the bus in Queens. 1985. PYMCA/UIG via Getty Images

9 of 28Breakdancers and b-boys on 5th Avenue. 1981. PYMCA/UIG via Getty Images

10 of 28Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five perform on stage. 1984.Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

11 of 28Fab Five Freddy during a portrait session. 1983. Laura Levine/IMAGES/Getty Images

12 of 28Breakdancers and b-boys on 5th Avenue. 1981.PYMCA/UIG via Getty Images

13 of 28Afrika Bambaataa in silhouette. 1980.David Corio/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

14 of 28Breakdancers at The Roxy. 1981. PYMCA/UIG via Getty Images

15 of 28Abandoned, burnt-out shops in the South Bronx. 1977. Alain Le Garsmeur/Getty Images

16 of 28Rapper Doug E. Fresh on the microphone. 1980.Al Pereira/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

17 of 28Two men sporting hip-hop/graffiti fashion. 1975.Allan Tannenbaum/Getty Images

18 of 28South Bronx teenagers in front of abandoned burnt-out tenement buildings. 1977. Alain Le Garsmeur/Getty Images

19 of 28Hip hop dance party at a club in Hunts Point. 1983. Ted Thai/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images

20 of 28Musician Kurtis Blow performing. 1980. Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

21 of 28South Bronx residents playing cards in an abandoned luncheonette. 1977.Alain Le Garsmeur/Getty Images

22 of 28Abandoned burnt-out shops in the South Bronx. 1977.Alain Le Garsmeur/Getty Images

23 of 28Hip hop dance party at Disco Fever. 1983. Ted Thai/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images

24 of 28Hip hop dance party at a club in Hunts Point. 1983. Ted Thai/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images

25 of 28Dancers from the Rock Steady Crew pose in Midtown Manhattan. 1981.Frank Russo/NY Daily News Archive via Getty Images

26 of 28Run-DMC at a video shoot. 1984. Waring Abbott/Getty Images

27 of 28Conga drummers provide music for South Bronx residents as they clean up abandoned buildings on Charlotte Street. 1980. Allan Tannenbaum/Getty Images

28 of 28Like this gallery?Share it:

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“Superheroes With Microphones”: The Birth Of Hip-Hop In New York View Gallery

“Superheroes With Microphones”: The Birth Of Hip-Hop In New York

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Carter is there to survey what documentarian Bill Adler calls “the American poster child for urban decay.” Filmmaker Shan Nicholson, whose Rubble Kings documented the conditions in the South Bronx at the time, says disorder reigned on many levels:

Carter’s visit made millions of people around the world aware, many for the first time, of what Nicholson calls a “pressure cooker” of unbelievable violence and crime, against a backdrop of blight and rubble right out of a war zone.

What the world was still largely unaware of at the time, however, was how a new generation of young people from the Bronx were expressing themselves and laying the seeds of a “mass cultural renewal” in the rubble, to quote journalist and academic Jeff Chang, author of Can’t Stop Won’t Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation.

Which brings us to moment number two: rewind to August 11, 1973. At 152 Sedgwick Avenue in the West Bronx, 23-year-old DJ Kool Herc (birth name Clive Campbell) throws a “Back to School Jam” in a rec room at an apartment complex. Later known as the first “hip-hop” party ever, the event was unique at the time because Herc of course did more than just play records.

Using two turntables and a mixer, Herc prolonged instrumental beats and blurred funk tracks together so that people could dance — and breakdance — even longer. While they danced, Herc would boast and encourage the crowd on the microphone, occasionally in rhyme — a primitive form of rapping.

And thus, as the Bronx burned, Herc and his peers brought young people in, away from the heat, to pass the time in a peaceful way. But Herc and his ilk also inspired others to form and refine, through decades of renewal (and presidential photo ops), a brand new subculture, as Rebecca Laurence notes:

The gallery above is a collection of portraits of these early hip-hop pioneers — “superheroes with microphones instead of guns,” to quote Rahiem of the Furious 5 — mixed with snapshots of the decaying landscape of the Bronx at the time. These images capture a neighborhood with “a potent mix of anger, aspiration, hope, and despair” that changed music forever.

After this look at hip-hop origins, learn more about gang culture in the Bronx during the late 1970s. Then, take a trip back to the infamously turbulent summer of 1977 in New York.

These fascinating hip-hop origins photos show how the music and the culture that sprang up around it were first born.#

These fascinating hip-hop origins photos show how the music and the culture that sprang up around it were first born.