Breaks in the air : the birth of rap radio in New York City / John Klaess.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Klaess, John, 1990- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Rap (Music)--New York (State)--New York--History and criticism.

Rap (Music).

African American radio stations--New York (State)--New York.

African American radio stations.

Radio stations--New York (State)--New York--History.

Radio stations.

Radio broadcasting--Deregulation--New York (State)--New York.

Radio broadcasting.

Radio in popular culture--New York (State)--New York.

Radio in popular culture.

Radio broadcasting--Deregulation.

New York (State)--New York.

Genre:

Criticism, interpretation, etc.

History.

Physical Description:

xiv, 218 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Durham : Duke University Press, [2022]

Summary:

"Breaks in the Air provides a social and cultural history of rap music on Black radio in New York City from the late 1970s to the late 1980s. Radio shows were crucial in the growth of hip hop in New York, and Klaess explores the intertwined histories of sounds, institutions, communities, and legal formations converging in that post-Civil Rights period. John Klaess offers a careful analysis of the city's three crucial commercial radio stations-WBLS-FM 107.5, WRKS-FM 98.7, and WHBI-FM 105.9-drawing on an archive of tape recordings of the stations' broadcasts. Klaess moves from a history of deregulation in the broadcasting industry to the ways that American racial politics inflected the broadcast of rap and looks at how these radio stations engaged with this unique historical situation, how technologies both aided and limited their broadcasts, how their broadcasts were received, and what the public broadcast of this music and culture meant to young people of color in New York"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Deregulating radio

Sounding Black progress in the post-civil rights era

Commercializing rap with Mr. Magic's rap attack

Programming the street at WRKS

Broadcasting the Zulu Nation

Listening to the labor of the Awesome II Show.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Other Format:

Online version: Klaess, John, 1990- Breaks in the air.

ISBN:

9781478016236

147801623X

9781478018872

1478018879

OCLC:

1286794646