The Godfather Of Hip Hop Needs Your Help

I was born in Brooklyn and returned there when I was 20 years old in 1981.  Hip hop was a vibrant, thriving music form at that time.  If you really wanted to hear the music, you had to go out to the parks and recreation centers where it was being created.  Club Negril, a Manhattan reggae club changed all of that.  They sponsored a once a week hip hop night.  Club Negril was the greatest hip hop spot in New York at the time  It might have fit 150 comfortably.  I met DJ Kool Herc at Club Negril.  I'd be surprised if he remembered me, I was one of a million people who has had a brief conversation with him over a life time.

The two things that I remember about him were A.) his great humility, rare in hip hop.  B.) He was afforded massive respect from a very tough crowd.  The people from the streets respected him.  They even called him, the "godfather of hip hop."  Unfortunately, the rest of the world hasn't shown him that kind of love.  The headlines tell us that Herc is very, very sick and also financial incapacitated.

Isn't it amazing that someone could create a multi-billion dollar industry and yet never profit from it financially?  I can't even imagine how heart breaking that must be for Kool Herc and other artists who created the blueprint.

Say a prayer for DJ Herc.  And if you can, send a check.  Go to Davy D's website or
www.allhiphop.com.  They'll tell you how.

What Would Tony Soprano Do?

The Sopranos was one of the greatest gangster epics in history.  Tony Soprano was ruthless about his paper, wasn't he?  He had no problem whacking his own relatives if they broke the code or messed up some money.  Soprano was a serial adulterer but there two people in his life that he really loved.  Tony loved his children.  In one episode, Meadow came to her dad with the story of a grisly old gangster who had verbally disrespected her.  Tony's face doesn't show much emotion in the moment but he saves his most savage beating of the entire 6 series epic for that fool.  Tony loved his daughter and demanded that others respect her.  He might have shot, stabbed or run over a zip code full of people but he never raised an angry hand to his children.

The Sopranos is only television but there's a point here.   No matter who you are, no matter what your beliefs, we have to protect our children.  What type of society have we become when we can ride by the commercial sexual exploitation of our children and not even bat an eyelash?  Oakland has become a epicenter for child prostitution.  What are you prepared to do?  What would Tony do?