Kurtis Blow on Telling the Whole Story of Hip-Hop

What are the similarities between being in the pulpit and being on stage MCing?

It’s controversial, as a matter of fact. I get some traditionalists that holler and say, “This is not a show. When you’re in church, this is not a show, buddy.”

But it is a show.

If you ask me, it’s the greatest show. It’s God’s show. It’s the greatest show on earth, amen.

I was thinking I’d never go down that road. I wanted to be a rapper. I wanted to get out there and entertain people and be an entertainer, but the similarity is there. It is communication. As a matter of fact, the most passionate parts of communication that you can ever get into is being a preacher and delivering that word, amen.

I remember I went to Ecuador to do a concert. We had about 6,000 people out there. I was onstage and went into my gospel raps. I recorded five gospel albums. I’m doing some gospel rap out there and then I break into a whole sermon and start preaching and asking the people if they wanted God in their lives. 

This is Ecuador. I had to have a translator do this for me. The translator said, “If you want God in your life, throw your hands in the air.” Everybody in the crowd threw their hands in the air. Now that’s an altar call.

What does it take to be a success in life at a later age? I feel like it’s different than finding success when you’re in your 20s and 30s.

For me, honestly, I was blessed and fortunate enough to find success at an early age, in my 20s. Of course, being the first rapper signed to a major label and having the first certified gold rap song in the history of hip-hop, which was “The Breaks.” It’s an incredible song. I’ll never forget the miracles that happened. 

“The Breaks” was a song that was geared to have a lot of breaks in it so that all the beat boys and break dancers could do their thing. Then they started calling that dance “break dancing” after “The Breaks.” Just changing the world, being one of the guys who was a pioneer, like Davy Crockett. A lot of people experienced hip-hop by seeing me early in the 1980s. It was just a blessing.

Tell me about the hip-hop museum that you’re part of. What’s going on there?

The Universal Hip Hop Museum is a project we’ve been working on for about seven years now. It’s a brick and mortar location in the Bronx. We’re going to have this location where we will be able to tell the whole story from beginning to present of hip-hop. What a great, great blessing that will be to solidify our history in one location for everyone in the world to come and check out. 

I wonder what you’re dealing with in terms of how to represent the history of hip-hop properly. What kinds of questions do you run into? There are different artifacts, different stars that one person may think need to be elevated but another thinks not. How do you tell the story properly?

Diplomacy is the biggest thing. If you talk to these individual artists who were around in the Bronx and Harlem during that time, they all talk about what I call the “I, I, I syndrome”: “I did this. I did that. Me, me, me.” You just have to be diplomatic and make sure you know that it’s the classic ego. Everyone was blessed. There were pioneers who were there and they have their recognition that is deserved. You have to listen to them and go through it.

André 3000 of OutKast once expressed doubts that he’d want to still be performing at 50. Do you think that because hip-hop is such a youth music and such a youth culture that there is some contradiction? Is it strange or somehow a little off to be on stage rapping after you’re 50?

Well, I say this, I thank God that I can rap my songs in church. Not many rappers can say that because they’re out there making songs that they can’t rap when they’re 50. It just doesn’t make sense. They’re cursing and using profanity. I’ve made over 200 rap songs myself and never use profanity. You can have a rap career, a rap legacy and not offend people.

Kurtis Blow, 60, recorded the first rap singles, with “Christmas Rappin’” and “The Breaks.” The latter was the first rap single to be certified gold. In later life, Blow became a minister and is also chairman of the board of the Universal Hip-Hop Museum, under development in the Bronx.