About the Hip-Hop Radio Archive
The Hip-Hop Radio Archive aims to digitize, preserve, share, and contextualize recordings of hip-hop radio from the 1980s and 1990s from commercial, college, community, and pirate stations of all sizes, telling the stories of the shows and the people that made them.
In 1981, Mr. Magic (RIP) launched Rap Attack on WHBI in New York City which, when it moved to WBLS in May of 1982, became the first hip-hop show on commercial radio. Throughout the 1980s, countless other hip-hop shows sprung up in New York, from Red Alert and Chuck Chillout on KISS FM to Marley Marl on WBLS. Tapes of these early hip-hop radio shows became currency among hip-hop fans both inside and outside the reach of New York City's radio signals. Before national video shows and the Internet, radio was the way recorded hip-hop spread.
By the time the 1990s arrived, it became difficult to find any major market without a station (college, if not commercial) that had a hip-hop show. Smaller artists from regional hip-hop scenes now had ways of spreading their music when they couldn't afford to shoot a video for Yo! MTV Raps. Hip-hop's international spread was also being represented by shows on Capital Radio in the UK, Kolorszok in Poland, and throughout the rest of the world.
This project's primary purpose is to preserve the recordings that may only exist on cassettes recorded by fans in their bedrooms. There have been so many great music blogs over the last decade that relied on file sharing sites to spread classic hip-hop radio shows and while those sites are great for short-term sharing, they're not a place where files will survive long-term. These sites and the files on them are in danger of just disappearing, erasing petabytes of content all at once. The Internet Archive is the solution: hosting by a non-profit organization that's been around for over 20 years and is dedicated to digital preservation.
The secondary goal of this collection is to trace the spread of hip-hop via radio over the 1980s and 90s by providing regional and historical context for the episodes.
Please spread the word, contribute tapes to the project, and most of all: enjoy the music. Whether you're a young kid looking to dig into the classics or an old head looking for a specific episode of a favorite show, this is your spot. The archive is still in the early stages so every new episode helps.
Future Plans
What you see here is just the start. Here's a rundown of what's planned:
- More shows - Build up historical NYC recordings, get a wider representation of regional shows around the US, and start to tell the story of hip-hop radio outside of the US.
- More detail - Expand the histories about each show and DJ/host in the database and the metadata on each episode.
- Audio interviews/podcast - Interviews with the DJs and hosts behind the shows.
Special Thanks
Thanks to those that have helped out with contributions to the site, including: A. Bomba, DJ A-L, DJ Butterfingers, DJ Diablo, DJ Problematik, DJ Step One, DJ Vicious "D" (Philly's DJ Dino), The DJ Without a Name, Dutch, Filthstep Productions, Flush, G, Irish Craig - RandomRapRadio, Jason Scott, JTPE, Maitland Jones, Miguel D'Souza, Robert Sacchinelli, Steve Covello AKA Weevie, Ted, the University of Massachusetts Boston's Joseph P. Healey Library, and everyone who's digitized a tape that appears on the site. And of course, super fat dookey shout outs to the original radio DJs that brought hip-hop to the airwaves and the tapers, tape traders, and hip-hop heads that saved these recordings from obsolescence.
Notes
The Hip-Hop Radio Archive site does not actually host any audio files. All files are stored at the Internet Archive or at other music blogs or file sharing sites. If you are the copyright holder of a work in the Hip-Hop Radio Archive and wish to have that work removed, please submit a request via email for that work to be taken down. Your notice should include proof of copyright ownership and clear identification of the work (preferably with URL).
The Hip-Hop Radio Archive is not affiliated with the Internet Archive or Cornell's Hip-Hop Archive, although both are amazing.
The Hip-Hop Radio Archive doesn't accept monetary donations or advertising revenue.
More Hip-Hop History
Cornell Hip Hop Collection / Troy L. Smith Collection of Hip Hop Party and Show Tapes, 1977-1986; Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections, Cornell University Library / Universal Hip-Hop Museum / Hiphop Archive & Research Institute / Massachusetts Hip-Hop Archive, Joseph P. Healey Library at UMass Boston / Northside Hip Hop Archive
More...
Some additional technical details are available and I wrote a post on Medium in honor of the archive's launch. Additionally, I did an interview on the Radio Survivor show in June 2018.