I gotta shift back to Music Writer Joe for a second. That’s the contiguous beauty and mystery of Kurtis Blow. Who is this unnamed “they?” Hoopers? Rappers? Just everyone in general? We might never know. The masterpiece begins with a beautiful chorus of women explaining exactly what they are doing (playing basketball) and what “we” love (that basketball). So let’s dive into “Basketball.” I’ll try to stop myself from going line-by-line since I don’t want my EICs and Copy Chiefs to hate me more than they already will for my overly-long analysis. Songs like “The Breaks” and “Christmas Rappin" use classic tropes and repetition, and it’s no coincidence that those are two of his most popular songs.īut alas, no matter how much I pine to describe the arts, I’ve been cursed to be a sportswriter. He incorporates old-school hip-hop style with parts of pop music that, by design or not, make his music a lot more marketable. I mention this because, well, you can tell the superiority in every note while listening to Blow’s music. He was one of the first true originators of hip-hop to take the genre from parties in the Bronx to the recording studio - emphasis on “true” because the Sugar Hill Gang are frauds. Most historians will tell you that Blow was one of the first commercially-successful rappers and one of the first to sign to a record label.
Bird was the Most Valuable Player, Michael Jordan was the Rookie of the Year and the Knicks, even with a rookie Patrick Ewing, went 24-58 - some things never change.Īnd then, one fateful day in the Bronx, hip-hop godfather Kurtis Blow decided to absolutely bless the world with, in my opinion, the greatest song of all-time in the aptly-titled, “Basketball.”īlow was an expert in selling his music before most hip-hop artists were.
#Kurtis blow basketball chorus vocoder full
The year was 1984, the air was crisp (probably, I wasn't there), spirits were high (again, probably) and the NBA was looking good with the Magic/Bird rivalry in full swing.
The NBA wasn’t unpopular beforehand, but, for reference, it wasn’t until 1986 that the NBA Finals were shown live rather than on tape-delay.
There’s even the song that tells the story of how former Backstreet Boy Aaron Carter beat 15-time NBA All-Star Shaquille O’Neal in a game of one-on-one, which to this day is nothing short of traumatizing.īasketball and hip-hop grew together in the 1980s as the foundations of hip-hop were laid out by Bronx natives like Grandmaster Flash and DJ Kool Herc, the NBA was truly breaking into the mainstream with Magic Johnson & Larry Bird. Rappers haven’t been shy to name-drop their favorite athletes or teams, whether it’s Kanye West mentioning LeBron James or the Beastie Boys referencing Anthony Mason (RIP). Music and basketball are forever intertwined specifically, hip-hop and basketball.