Mr. Super Bad

I only got to see James Brown perform once. It was 2006. Sun City hosted his last appearance in Arizona. This was a bit weird to me because Sun City is a retirement community about an hour from Phoenix. "Why would he play there?", I remember thinking.  Anyway, I was pretty excited so I along with the homie Chino D, & his wife at the time, Marcia headed to the Sundome aka MCEC to party with Mr. Dynamite himself. On the way over, Marcia and Chino get into an argument and she bounces leaving Chino to completely wild out with me, and trust me, Chino loves to wild out! This experience was different to say the least. No crazy traffic in the parking lot, no long lines, no aggressive security, everything was very smooth and laid back. The 7000+ seat facility was pretty packed but very chill. With this being a James Brown show I was surprised I didn't see anyone else I knew and most of the patrons were older caucasian couples. James reached everybody and when you consider how creative african culture is, it's not a surprise, God Made Us Funky!
     When the show started, The band jamed out for 20 minutes before James ever took the stage. I have never seen such funkiness! Trust me, it was crazy! When James took the stage, well, I think you know the rest...
      James passed away a few months later. I was honored to have experienced him live. I've been to a LOT of shows and I would have to put this in my top 3.



I love when there's a merch booth to buy goodies at a show and let me tell you, James had the most amount of merchandise I have ever seen. You name it, he was selling it. JB bath and hand towels, calendars, t-shirts, hoodies, posters, CD's, pencils, photos, tank-tops, jackets, women's underwear, sun-glasses, sweatbands, tour programs, caps, ties, costume jewelry, stickers, baby clothes, this guy was selling everything. He also had 2 types of JB laundry bags. Here's the one I copped.


  

  

Is Brooklyn In The House?!

Here's a super rare Brooklyn Hip Hop flier from 1981. Master D was a Brooklyn Dj legend and held it down for his borough from the late 70's through the 80's. This party was all about BK talent.


10 GRAND!

Super Happy to announce that this blog has just surpassed 10,000 visitors in less then nine months of going public. Thank you!

photo by Justin Bua

Thank You Marvin!

What can I say, the best version of "I Want You" just happens to be a rehearsal Marvin had somewhere in Europe. I miss you Marvin.


On Location With GMF


The photo shoot for this Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five album was less then two blocks away from my Air BnB spot in Harlem. This is a historic location as far as I'm concerned.




Hidden Agenda #6

I was interviewed by Hidden Agenda Magazine back around 2008-2009. This mag focused on music, art, poetry, & pop culture. This issue quickly became a collectors item because it was full of graffiti
and street art. Here are some highlights from the interview on me.


Toxic Waste-How did you get into the art of Dj'ing?
Darrell D-It started in high school. I used to be in this rap group called Prime Time with two other homies, Cosmo Chill & Whiz Doc D. Back then I was known as Delirious D. So we used to rap, you know, do talent shows, we were on TV a couple of times. As I went through high school, as I approached my senior year I realized I couldn't be a grown man running around trying to rap. So I naturally just started Dj'ing because I was already buying records. I figured that as a Dj I could still always be seen. I could always be current. I could still perform in front of people. And, because i'm playing music,I would never get old or go out of style.. I would always be current. So it was a way for me to stay in the spotlight and keep performing without being a rapper.  



What about collecting vinyl? 
Back in high school they were still pressing everything on vinyl. When you were buying stuff back then you had the option of buying it on vinyl or cassette. So I was already buying vinyl at the point when I stopped rappin and started Dj'ing. I already had a few crates. As far as being a collector, I remember right around the early 90's is when I first noticed. I remember going to this music store called Mainstream Music in my hometown of Milwaukee and I went to buy the new Stetsasonic "Blood Sweat and No Tears" album and the new LL Cool J ''Mama Said Knock You Out" album. I noticed 90% of the vinyl they were selling in there was gone! There was just a few bins of vinyl left. That's right around the time record companies stopped pressing so much vinyl. The CD revolution was starting to creep in and get real healthy. It was at that point that every record pressed became a "collectable". And because record companies were only doing that first run, that one pressing, that was it. So if you didn't get it when it came out, there was a good chance you wouldn't see it again. So that's when I became a collector.



How many records do you have in your collection?
I have around 100 crates.


So you're not originally from Arizona right?
I am originally from Milwaukee, WI. I moved to Arizona in 98.


Some call you an old school Dj. Could you elaborate on that?
Well, I've been called an old school Dj. I don't have a problem with that. I think being an old school Dj makes me a classic Dj. I think it makes me a real Dj. Right now you got a lot of synthetic Dj's. Those that didn't really go through the school of Dj'ing.


Do you have any influences?
Early influences include three cats from my hometown. Rock Dee, Dr. B, & Fresh G. During my high school years these were the three guys I was peepin. Rock Dee was the first Dj in my town that I ever saw doing some crazy battle routines. I had only seen that crazy stuff being done on the DMC videos, and now here's this guy doing it in front of me. I didn't even know that somebody from my city had those kinds of skills. He was a great mixer plus he knew his records like the back of his hands. He could do these really quick mixes. He didn't even need to cue the record. He would just grab the needle, drop it, grab the pitch control and mix. I would ask him,"how do you do those mixes so fast?" He would simply reply,"I know my records". That always stuck with me. Because of him I can say that I always made it a point to be familiar with my records as much as possible. Then there was Dr. B. He was defiantly a creative cat. You could tell he spent a lot of time in his lab putting records together. I mean this guy could perform magic with some records! When you heard him dj, you could tell that he had put time and thought into what he was doing. And then there was Fresh G. He was the cleanest mixer I have ever heard in my life. You could ask any of the cats back home and they will tell you the same thing. He was just incredibly clean. Everything he did was just clean! Other influences would include Jazzy Jeff, Cash Money, Funkmaster Flex, Rob Swift, Tat Money,and my favorite Dj is Kid Capri.

What was it like spinnin back in the day?
Oh man! I remember back in the day when you could throw on A Tribe Called Quest Award Tour" or Prince "Housequake" and the dancefloor would go insane! You could play "More Bounce...",Planet Rock",or like "The Big Payback" or even Jazzy Jeff "Summertime" and people would lose their minds. You have your hits now but it's not the same. I miss the old days. Dj'ing is exploited now. You see Dj's in cartoons, T.V. commercials, on billboards...I've seen Dj's in Target and Sprite commercials. Anything corporate america can exploit and make money off of they will. Hip-Hop is no different,Rap is not different. Music is beautiful and I don't know what I would do without it. When I look through my record collection I'm amazed at the emotions that some of the albums give me. James Brown, Gladys Knight, Arrested Development, Teena Marie, I just zone out to the albums. It's very emotional to me.

Recent Digs- Dj Z-Trip

My mixtape game is pretty serious. I'ts not every day(month or year for that matter) that you can track down a classic, pre-serato, dj mix cassette. When they do pop up you gotta strike quick and strike hard.   Z-Trip only released around 10 mixtapes and they're all limited and pretty hard to find. Here's two I was able to recently add to my collection. 1)Live on the Krispy Bisket Radio Show  2) B-Boy Breaks Vol.3



The Heat-Luther and Anita Live

In 1988, following the release of her multi-platinum selling album, Giving You The Best That I Got, Anita Baker embarked on a world tour to support the album's release. The tour kicked off in September. In that same year, Luther Vandross kicked off a three month tour of the United States in support of his platinum selling album, Any Love. His tour also began in September. In October, both artists joined forces to co-headline shows billed as: The Heat-Luther And Anita Live. I was 17 at the time and living with my sister and brother-in-law. As a gift to my sister, her husband got tickets to the show(including one for me!), and a limo ride to the show. The show opened with comedian Sinbad who proceeded the rock the crowd. This was the night that I fell in love with Anita. Man,I wanted to meet her so bad that night! Her show was pretty explosive. Luther's show was as great as they come. Those that have seen him live know what I mean. He even had a young talented Lisa Fisher("How Can I Ease The Pain") as one of his back-up singers. This was the first time I've ever seen grown women in their 30's,40's,& 50's screaming and goin nuts at a show. This one chic even tried to run up on stage but never made it. Security swallowed this chic up quick and she was never seen or heard from again.....or something like that. Anyway, you don't see shows like this anymore.