a little back ground for me....white kid, 7 years old in 1985 hears a track called "Walk This Way" on the local pop radio station....parents hated it, friends didn't like it, and my older siblings said they are ruining a perfectly good Aerosmith song.

i said fuck em...what do they know?

at age 7, begging my 17 y/o sister to buy me Raising Hell while she was buying the latest Poison cassette

it only grew from there...

run dmc, beastie boys, ll cool j, BDP, PE, and so on...through all the phases hip-hop took in those mid-late 80s.

around 90/91, i wanted to learn about "old school" hip hop. at Target, they used to have these Rap Masters cassettes for like $2.99. they were my first exposure to Sugar Hill, Treacherous 3, Funky 4 Plus 1 More, etc....

at this same time, i hit middle school and finally met people who also liked hip-hop. our love of music transcended color. it didn't matter i was white, i knew about hip-hop and that's all that mattered. tradin tapes with my boy Travis in math class...."you got the NWA?" "yeah, you got that new De La?" "yup, how about that Blacksheep?"

those were the days....i had more TDK and Memorex cassettes than i had meals in a year.....

i seriously can't remember a day in my life since i was 7 when i didn't listen to hip-hop, so yes, it truly is the soundtrack to my life

and Poetx, probably the best post i've seen on hiphops legacy, thank you