Just wanted to switch coasts and give a little taste of what was happening in the East. 5th Platoon definitely represented for the New York turntablist scene. As you know, we at Hip Hop Lives try to give better representation for Filipino Americans who are NOT on the West Coast. I'm always sad that many West Coast Filipinos (or...people in general) don't even know about the 5th Platoon.
This short video definitely exemplifies the spirit and the loyalty of the underground hip hop community that Kuttin Kandi speaks about in her tribute to Fat Beats.
Speaking of Fil Ams in ads, the good folks at SOULFIESTA got me hip to this AT&T ad with DJ Neil Armstrong. The JabbaWockeez got electrolytes, Neil got megabytes. Also, picked up Neil Armstrong's new Sweeet Part 2 from Fat Beats. As always, Neil delivers a clean and innovative mix of your favorite jams from today and back in the day. Not my most favorite of his mixes, but yall can blast it in your ride or at work. Cabbage patch in yo cubicle. Jerk at the gym. Hollow back in yo Honda. What have you.
For some reason, Neil got a knack with remixing Alicia Keys songs. Remember that Alicia Keys, Beres Hammond, Al Green mix in WarmFuzzy? Those first 4 minutes deserve an award. Sweeet Part 2 remixes "No One" with a Little Brother beat.
Jam tracks for your listening lobes. Click to enlarge. Via Culture Kings.
Come vibe with Deejay Mike Rizzy, who be bangin out the hottest ride out jams while bring us back in the day of high top fades and rat tails at mikerizzy.com. Don't sleep on the New Jack Swing mix!
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Who is Deejay Mike Rizzy?
What's going on? I'm DJ Mike Rizzy 1/5 of the Kuya Tribe VA DJ Crew from Virginia Beach. Lived In Virginia all my life from a military family. Other than that hip hop is basically my life with a little bit of nba basketball and food on the side.
Who is the Kuya Tribe?
Kuya Tribe actually started around the mid 90's. I'm actually not an original member i'm just kind of carrying the torch. But the whole inspiration behind Kuya Tribe is DJ Kuya D. Kuya D and Delinger are from Queens New York and later moved to VA where i met them. But Kuya D had a large impact on the filipino party scene in NY in the early 90's and carried it over to VA. Kuya D used to be in a crew with DJ Roli Rho of 5th Platoon before 5th Platoon was around and they used to do a whole lot of parties all around New York. So basically it mostly started in New York with Kuya D, Delinger, Ir-Y, Mad Ryan, J-Rule, and Rik Guyver who you know now as the famous film director Rik Cordero. They had a pretty large buzz of their own with their mixtapes during the late 90's and spinnin at a bunch of spots. Eventually i linked up with Kuya D and Delinger and we did pretty much all the clubs around the Virginia Beach/Norfolk area then added Disko Dave and DJ Vaperz to our roster.
Why do you take time to make mixes for mikerizzy.com?
I was fortunate enough to have an extremely talented circle of friends around me that excel in all different types of professions. A few of my friends founded a very succesful Forex trading website (babypips.com). The other DJ's in my crew (Kuya D, Delinger, Disko Dave, Vaperz) are some of the most talented dj's i've ever seen. My roomate Josh Verdes (myspace.com/joshverdes) is an extremely skilled musician. And another good friend of mine happens to be a pretty well known blogger by the name of HappySlip. So being around these people really inspired me to find my own outlet to express myself musically. Also like i said earlier, i'm really a hip hop junkie to the fullest extent so i wanted to find a way to showcase the music that i personally like and not play just what's on the radio.
Who introduced you to hip hop?
What really introduced me to hip hop was MTV and BET. I was that little kid at home standing next to the VCR recording all my favorite hip hop videos. I was lucky enough to come up and witness what they call the "golden age" of hip hop. Rakim, Boogie Down Productions, Kane, Lyte, Latifah, Slick Rick, Public Enemy, the whole native tongue movement, the list goes on and on. That's all it took. No looking back after that. I really didn't start dj'n until about 98. I met DJ's Kuya D and Delinger and the rest of the original Kuya Tribe crew around 95 or so and I would always try to learn on their set. It took me to graduate from high school until i could finally afford my own set of turntables and do my thing.
We know about Chad Hugo, Timbaland, and Missy Elliot but not many people know that they are from Virginia Beach. Why do you think that is?
The hip hop scene in Virginia Beach is big. This city is mainly a military town so you really have a big melting pot of people from all over which is why we can listen to Dre and 2pac, then listen to Nas and Jay, then onto TI, Wayne, etc. But the thing is that i think we get overlooked a lot. All those artists you just mentioned Chad, Missy, Timbaland they all got their starts from being discovered by other major artists. Teddy Riley discovered Chad and Pharrell, Devante from Jodeci discovered Timbaland and Missy and that's another i noticed about Virginia Beach. I read interviews from Phonte of Little Brother and he mentions how your home state really doesn't support you until you get noticed everywhere else and i kind of feel the same way. I know it's probably not like that as much in New York or California but i know for a fact a bunch of these other states don't want anything to do with you unless your on MTV or something like that. Which is why i decided to make the podcast because i know there's people out there that's into the same music that i am.
How are Filipinos involved with hip hop in Virginia Beach?
In the hip hop scene most of the filipinos i've come in contact with are either DJ's, Graff Artists, or B-Boys. I don't really know too many filipino mc's. I probably know a lot more singers and dancers than anything else. Photo: Ir-Y, Mad Ryan, and Rik Guyver (Rik Cordero) of Kuya Tribe
Do you think there are big differences in Filipino DJs in California and those in VA Beach?
In my opinion there's a huge difference between dj's in California and Va. Beach. For one there's a much much much larger DJ community in California. There's a large filipino population in Virginia Beach but there really isn't that many DJ's. A lot of the DJ's from this area don't really do it anymore. There were definitely a lot more DJ's in the late 90's than now. But the styles between us and Cali are really different. A lot of the west coast dj's i've heard have more of an upbeat club style to their mixes. I can really only speak for me and my crew but we're more New York influenced and play mostly boom bap type stuff. We don't really play a lot of crunk or snap music. Honestly i can't stand it but that's just me.
How do you think being a military town makes VA Beach unique in terms of your hip hop community?
Being from a military town really gives you an appreciation for all different types of cultures and music. My crew has has been spinnin all over this area for a long time and we get all types of requests from all eras of hip hop, to reggae and soca, to house, electronica, you name it. So i think to be a succesful dj in this area you really need to have a well rounded knowledge of music.
What would you want people to know about the hip hop scene in VA Beach?
I just really want people to notice that there's more than Timbaland and Missy out here. There's people out here that really live hip hop and have respect for all the elements of it. But at the same time I'm glad that innovative and trendsetting musicians like Timbaland, Missy, Neptunes are from VA and made a huge impact in the game. It could be a lot worse. D'Angelo, Skillz, Chris Brown, and Trey Songs are also from VA don't sleep on them.
What do you think are the new innovations made turntablism and DJing?
You know i was the first person in my circle to make the switch from vinyl to digital. And at first I would be a little bitter towards dj's that started on Serato and just copied hard drives from people. When i was coming up it was hard enough just to afford turntables then on top of that you had to save a whole bunch of money just to rack up enough records to do a gig. So to see people just people giving away like 20 gigs of music upset me at first but i got over it. But technology is really changing the game. They're coming with all these midi consoles now so pretty soon you won't even need turntables. I love my technics to death but i know how much easier life would be if i only had to bring a laptop and small console to gigs. I remember breaking my back carrying a coffin and 10 crates to each gig. There's also a growing popularity of Video DJ's so that might really be on the rise. But other than that i probably see a lot more people adding effects and synths and stuff like that to their sets and a bunch of other little things to set themselves apart from other dj's.
What's your next move in the DJ game?
I'll definitely be producing a lot more music for HappySlip. I have a bunch of artists i'm currently producing for so i'll be putting out a bunch of music in the future and also i'm going to be concentrating on doing a lot of out of town gigs. On top of that i'll still be giving the people new mixes on a regular basis so check for me.
Thanks to Ninoy Brown’s interview with The Roots and Snoop Dogg music video director Rik Cordero, I thought it would be neat to compare the Fil Am hip hop scenes on the West and East coasts. Here is a little snippet from the interview illustrating Rik’s experiences as a Fil Am immersed in hip hop in New York: “I don’t really gotta ask, but you’re Filipino, right? Has this part of your identity influenced any part of your career?
Yep, I’m Filipino, first generation Fil-Am. I think my identity has influenced me a great deal. Like most Fil-Ams growing up, we have no clue where the hell we fit in, but what’s cool is that for me, I just turned it into a way to observe. There’s no box for me so I’m just roaming around. I was also heavily influenced by the Filipino music scene on the East Coast, so some of my early influences were 5th Platoon, ISP and the whole DJ movement. I DJ’ed too, under the name Rik Guyver and our crew was called Kuya Tribe Productions. We did the FIND (Filipino Intercollegiate Network Dialogue) conferences and all that.
I also really look up to all of the Filipinos who seem to navigate through the entertainment terrain. Almost all of them are exceptionally talented and really down to earth individuals. I met Pharrel Williams recently, but Chad Hugo couldn’t make it ’cause he was sick, and I was kind of disappointed because I wanted to meet him so bad.”
As with Samahang Pilipino, Pilipino American Coalition, Kababayan, Southern California Pilipino American Student Association, Friendship Games, and other West Coast Fil Am college student community spaces, FIND is definitely an important center for East Coast Fil Am youth congregation. I miss my FIND folks! I hope my Florida people still roll deep at the FIND conferences. So big ups to FIND for providing an important space for Pin@y community building, artist networking, choreographed dance gluttony, and um, “partying opportunities.” FIND and other Fil Am student college spaces provide creative forums for Pin@y hip hop artists/performers (a good example is Kaba Modern. Another is the seminal Unity Fest (?) party that Samahang Pilipino at UCLA provided embattled youth during the early 1990s). These community-building resources are something both the West and East Coasts share in terms of hip hop cultural formation among fellow Pin@ys.
As Rik demonstrates, 5th Platoon is a big influence for Fil Am hip hoppers on the East Coast. I constantly hear this from Pin@y DJs on the East Coast, but as 5th Platoon member Kuttin’ Kandi and many others will testify, there was a whole lineage of East Coast Fil Am DJs that set it off before 5th Platoon stepped on the scene. This prompts the need for more research on Fil Am hip hop artists/performers on the East Coast, much like Oliver Wang, Dawn Mabalon, Lakandiwa De Leon, Antonio Tiongson, Elizabeth Pisares, and others have done for Pin@y hip hop artists/performers on the West Coast. We KNOW there was a huge Fil Am hip hop scene in NY/NJ for a long time, so dare I ask, did the Fil Am hip hop scene (DJs or dancers) in NY/NJ PRECEDE the West Coast scene (which is often marked by Fil Am mobile DJs appearing in the Bay and LA around 1978)?
5th Platoon crew circa 1998
5th Platoon 10 year anniversary documentary
Even though it is given that the West Coast (especially the LA Area, SF Bay Area, Seattle, and San Diego) and the East Coast (especially New Jersey and New York) are home to historic hip hop scenes in which Pin@ys have been creative and critical artistic agents, I realize it is important to expand the discourse from a traditional West Coast/East Coast (heavily West Coast) dichotomy that assumes these are the only regions that contain vibrant Fil Am communities. This expansion is important to me because I grew up most of my life in the dirty-dirty South, where Uncle Luke, 69 Boys, Miami Bass, and Latin Freestyle dominated the airwaves in the 90s, and where Mystikal, the Hot Boys, and No Limit exploded in our region before Dirty South music took over the entire nation. Therefore, let’s get some words from those from the South (does this include Virginia and Maryland?), Midwest, Hawaii, Alaska, and overseas.
As a side note, it is my firm belief that Fil Am hip hop cultural formation developed out of the migration of Fil Am youth between different military towns where concentrations of Filipinos reside (including those in Hawaii, Japan, GUAM, and Puerto Rico). Virtually all of my interviewees for "Hip Hop Mestizaje" coincidentally had fathers in the U.S. military (Navy or Air Force). In One Tribe, M. Evelina Galang writes a neat (fictional) story about Fil Am youth culture in Virginia Beach, VA (a huge military town home to the world famous Happy Slip, and also Chad Hugo, Pharrel, Timbaland, and Missy Elliot).
So what are the differences between West Coast hip hop scenes and the scene on the East Coast and other regions? Focus on footwork flavor versus perfection in power moves? Funk style versus wild style graffiti?
Enlighten us.
(Make sure to subscribe to Ninoy Brown's blog "FOBBDEEP." Don't sleep!)
==================== UPDATE: 3/20/08
Maybe the reason why many of us are so mute about this topic, is because we really haven't thought about Filipino communities east of California? We really need to begin documenting this history. Styles over power moves, boyeee!
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