Breaks in the Air

The Birth of Rap Radio in New York City

John Klaess

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English

Duke University Press
27 September 2022

Radio; Rap & Hip-Hop; Social & cultural history; Ethnic studies

In Breaks in the Air John Klaess tells the story of rap's emergence on New York City's airwaves by examining how artists and broadcasters adapted hip hop's performance culture to radio. Initially, artists and DJs brought their live practice to radio by buying time on low-bandwidth community stations and building new communities around their shows. Later, stations owned by New York's African American elite, such as WBLS, reluctantly began airing rap even as they pursued a sound rooted in respectability, urban sophistication, and polish. At the same time, large commercial stations like WRKS programmed rap once it became clear that the music attracted a demographic that was valuable to advertisers. Moving between intimate portraits of single radio shows and broader examinations of the legal, financial, cultural, and political forces that indelibly shaped the sound of rap radio, Klaess shows how early rap radio provides a lens through which to better understand the development of rap music as well as the intertwined histories of sounds, institutions, communities, and legal formations that converged in the post-Civil Rights era.

By: John Klaess
Imprint: Duke University Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm,
Weight: 318g
ISBN: 9781478018872
ISBN 10: 1478018879
Pages: 232
Publication Date: 27 September 2022
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

Preface ix Acknowledgments xiii Introduction. Breaks in the Air 1 1. Deregulating Radio 19 2. Sounding Black Progress in the Post-Civil Rights Era 32 3. Commercializing Rap with Mr. Magic’s Rap Attack 63 4. Programming the Street at WRKS 88 5. Broadcasting the Zulu Nation 116 6. Listening to the Labor of The Awesome 2 Show 139 Epilogue 162 Notes 175 Bibliography 193 Index 215

John Klaess is an independent scholar based in Boston.

Reviews for Breaks in the Air: The Birth of Rap Radio in New York City

Not to be missed, musicologist Klaess has written a fascinating chronicle of hip-hop radio stations. . . . Klaess's book is a must-read for all those interested in tracing hip-hop's sociopolitical/racial chord back to its airwaves origins. -- Alessandro Cimino * Library Journal *