The Breakfast Club - INTERVIEW: Grandmaster Flash Master Class: Quick Mix Theory, Slipmats, Sampling + More

Episode Date: December 15, 2023

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We got a special guest in the building. Come on, man. One of the architects of this thing we call hip-hop, man. One of the people who helped lay the foundation for this thing we call hip-hop. We wouldn't have jobs if it wasn't for this brother right here. I wouldn't be a DJ if it wasn't for this brother. At all. And most people out there, most DJs out there wouldn't be DJs if it wasn't for this brother. No, all DJs wouldn't be DJs. if it wasn't for this brother and most people out there most DJs out there wouldn't be DJs if it wasn't no all DJs wouldn't be if it wasn't for this brother ladies

and gentlemen Grandmaster Flash welcome thank you good morning black man thank you thank you for having me man I appreciate it come on man happy to have you absolutely really appreciate this man you know we celebrated the 50 years of hip-hop uh you know this year and Envy and I was on the radio having a conversation and it just felt like you know this year and envy and i was on the radio having a conversation and it just felt like you know the architects like that era of the 80s you know wasn't getting honored properly and none of us are here if that if that foundation isn't laid you said the 80s the 70s the 70s yeah the 70s from the beginning and the 80s i feel like weren't getting on it you know properly how do you feel about Grandmaster Flash? And that's one of the reasons why I feel that it is paramount

that I do lectures. I do corporate tours and lectures. And I've been doing them for private people, but now I kind of want to do this for the public so they can understand that this thing didn't just fall out of a tree. It didn't just go from the 70s to where we are. You know, there was four DJs that did this. Kool Herc was on the West.

AB was Bronx River. African Mayhem. DJ Breakout was the North. I was the East. And pretty much, this is how it really started. And you got to realize this, ladies and gentlemen, we did this with no internet, social media no apps no quick hardware where it would just work a lot of these things as i was telling you envy i had to do this with nothing going into the backyards and you know

getting old receivers and old turntables and stuff and kind of like jury rigging my sound system. For people listening, when he says the West, the South, the North, he's not talking about West Coast. He's talking about New York. The Bronx. The Bronx. I wanted to clear that up. And also, I was talking to, of course, Grandmaster Flash behind the scenes.

A lot of you didn't know, where we had the ability to go to these stores and buy equipment, he had to actually make it. So his first sound system actually came from old cars in a junkyard he would pull the speakers out of the cars in a junkyard and make sound systems to play at parks and parties and wherever wherever it was so you had to actually know electronics and it just wasn't just about djing right so what what got you into wanting to be a dj i know you were telling me the story behind the scenes that you know you just intrigued by electronics in your house when your mother or father plugged something in

and you wanted to understand how it works. You would start effing up the crib pretty much to figure it out. Yeah, when I was a toddler, everything in the house that was electrical, I was intrigued on how did that happen. So I used to unscrew the backs of the stereo in the living room, my sister's hair dries, the table radio, all these things. And also what got me into this, when I was a toddler,

my dad was a collector of records. And I'm on this respectable airwaves, so I will just say when I got caught touching his vinyl as a toddler, he used to heavily reprimand me right I can say that yes you can absolutely and what I used to do as a kid I waited for him to go to work and when the door slammed I went back in that closet and the rule was you know don't touch the brown box in the living room and I used to watch Dad when he came home from work, how he operated it. So I figured out how to get into this closet

where his stuff was, and I would take this square thing that had a black disc, and he would put it in this brown box, and sound would come out of it. That was probably my first love. But then moving forward, guys, when I heard a drum break from one of the most important black artists of that time,

his name was Curtis Mayfield, move on up. That break, and you and I can relate here, that break was about, I'd say about five minutes of just the drums. And I thought all records was like that. So when I started collecting my records, the drum break was like five, 10 seconds.

So what also got me into the DJing is I used to watch the disco DJs like Maboya, Flowers, Pete Jones and I noticed that their transitions were glass smooth but then my boys knocked on my door at my mom's house and said we want to take you to this other side of town to watch these other DJs. And respectfully, I was wondering, why is it that everything that he was doing was a train wreck? He was playing incredible music, had the incredible sound system. But why was he playing like that? You know, because the rules and the laws, you know,

especially if you got people on the dance floor, the idea is to keep everybody in unison. Correct. They should not be trying to find the beat as you transition. So from that point on, it's when I came up with the quick mix theory, you know. What is the quick mix theory?

From a mathematical perspective, I took Sonics and threw it out the window because if i play a song i hear it a certain way if i if i put the headphone on your ear you hear it a certain way and shaw you hear it a certain way so i said to myself i'm going to take that out of the equation and i'm going to just collect records from all genres pop rock jazz blues funk disco R&B Foreign American and just listen to the drum Break and I found that unlike Curtis Mayfield These drum breaks on these other records always all was short That made me quite angry. I was disappointed. So in mom's house, I came up with a hand mechanic, fingertips to vinyl, fingertips to crossfader DJ style that is used by every hip hophop DJ on planet Earth.

And I figured out a way of counting the bars as the vinyl went forward and how many times I would have to rewind it back to get back to the top of the break and take that 10-second break and make it seamlessly 10 minutes. So if you're on the floor and I'm playing a Michael Jackson drummer break,

I'm playing that for 10 minutes and I'm going to flip to a London break or a German break or whatever break. And this became the way. And then what happened was these incredible people called hip hop producers took this style of the seamless loop. And I'm going to show you that on the wheels of steel understand me saying your quick mix theory turned into what people call look sampling basically correct yeah bring it back from the beginning number one thing you'll learn from this interview with grandmaster flash is he's not just a musician when it comes to turntables. He's actually, no disrespect, he's a nerd and geek.

Like he wants to understand the mechanics of it. Most people just want to understand the success of it and be successful and be a big name, but he actually understands the mechanics of music, DJing, transitioning, records, record players, mixes. And this is just for having a 30-second conversation with him, I figured that out immediately. What I find so interesting about this, in the last five minutes, you explained where DJing started,

and where hip-hop production started. So when people call you an architect and say you're one of the founding fathers of hip-hop, that is why. Absolutely. Thank you. And I gotta tell you, it's like, I've been listening to a lot of the press, you know, from last summer to now. And this particular area of who, what, where and why is not talked about.

Why aren't we talking about what Bam did? And quite frankly, the gang thing was really bad back then Shaw and if he didn't calm that down there would have not been no block parties you know I'm saying and then as DJ breakout in the north he came up with a sound system where he used garbage cans as his bass bottoms who hurt had an amazing sound system I had the shittiest sound system, but I had a hand technique that people wanted to see. So it's just these kind of things where I go around doing these corporate tours. It's called the birth of a culture, corporate tours. And I've been doing a lot of

these things privately, but I think that now I have to go to the universities, to the YMCAs, and do this public. I'm going to do two major lectures, one in Manhattan and one in the Bronx, where it's going to be free. And I want people to really mechanically understand how I came up with this quick mix theory and how it connects to where we are right now. I'm going to keep it real with you. I didn't create hip hop. I didn't coin the word. I created the tools that allow hip-hop to transcend from where it was to where it is and with how these tools like the beatbox the turntables the quick mix theory the extending of a bed of music so a human being can speak on so it's a rapper could be born these are the

things that I did and these are the things that the rapper could be born. These are the things that I did and these are the things that the world is not talking about. Let me ask you a question. Especially this year because it feels like the focus is on the artist, but it should be a lot more focused on the DJ. And the producer. All of the above. I was going to ask, you know,

how do you feel when you look at something that you created, right? And you created out of love, right? Because what you said just now, you didn't say it was money. You didn't say, I did this because I wanted money. You said, I enjoyed it. I love listening to music.

I love playing in the park. And then you see in this, the commercial success of hip hop, right? I sent Charlamagne something this morning about Karis One saying why he didn't want to perform at the Grammys. He felt like the Grammys never respected hip hop. So why come now?

How do you feel when you see the commercial success of hip hop and all these brothers and sisters making money and all these companies making money off of hip hop, but some of the founders are not making the money that's deserved because if it wasn't for you guys, nobody wouldn't be able to make that money. That's a twofold answer.

Just think, MV, this thing that I did could have missed. And if this all would have missed, I wouldn't be here talking to you right now. So that's one side of it. It exploded. But there are some companies out there giving away hundreds of thousands of dollars i've seen this on the internet just recently but there are those men that are in the in the hood

that didn't have the commercial success nobody's saying hey here's five hundred thousand dollars for you or a hundred thousand dollars they're not saying that like there are those who lost their life that are not even here to even enjoy this and they have families right you know so for me i have to until god takes me i have to go around and mechanically break this thing down i think that people should interview the producers. Like, that just boggles my mind because they're the ones that really know how the record is made. They're the ones that stays in the studios for two and three days

to make sure the record goes from start to finish before the masters is handed in. So for me, and people should know more about Kool Herc and their team. They should know who Coke the Rock is. Like, they're going around saying he was a rapper. He's a DJ. I used to watch him. You know, and then there's Timmy.

Tim is the original clock. Kent, you know, people should know who Breakout's team is. Baron, you know, and Bamb body and Jazzy J and Grandmaster flash and grand was it theater like all these people in all these names you don't hear nothing that's right talk to about them when people are putting out this press they're not even coming to ask, well, Flash, what do you think? And respectfully, I'm going to say this. For you to really firsthand know what this is, you have to be at least 60 years old.

And I'll be kind and say 58, 57. That means you had a firsthand eye shot of seeing us do this. If you are 30 or you're 40 and you were saying that you are a hip hop extraordinaire person, nine times out of

ten, if you ain't talking to Flash, you ain't talking to Herc, you ain't talking to Bam, you got secondhand information and you got to realize you're't talking to bam you got secondhand information and and you and you got to realize you're feeding the babies like incomplete information and this is one of the reasons why because i tour 150 countries a year so financially i'm good i'm cutting all that in half because i gotta go to these universities i gotta go to these ym I got to go to these YMCA's and I got to teach these babies of where this thing come from. Because what saddens me is this. If you are from

a black family, you know who Miles Davis is. If you're from a white family, you know who the Rolling Stones is. Why is this so much of a blur of who, what and why, where and how when it comes to hip hop? Why is that? I think we got to be the generation to do that because to your point, if you're 60 years old now, you're probably a grandfather, grandmother. Our grandparents weren't listening to hip-hop, you know? Okay. But now we got grandparents and grandfathers,

grandparents who were listening to hip-hop, and then parents who grew up in hip-hop, they can tell their kids, hey, this is where it started. Right. Because like you said, most, if you're in the age of 40 to 50, a lot of them, hip hop started with Run DMC. Right.

LL Cool J. Yes. That's where it started from. Because even me, my parents weren't into hip hop, but I was. But the first record I ever bought was Run. Yeah, my dad was 70 something.

He didn't like hip hop at the time. He was like, you need to listen to James Brown. Temptations. James Brown is the original rapper. Four Tops. He didn't like hip-hop at the time. He was like, you need to listen to James Brown. James Brown is the original rapper. He rhyming. He didn't know nothing about hip-hop. He didn't want to hear none of that. Correct.

I think for me, and this is such a wonderful time period, but just think of it like this here. And sometimes this makes me want to cry sometimes is come August, like the mayor gave me August 4th, and Kuhn Hurricane is August 11th.

Come August 12th, there's going to be a brand new trend. So we have to get it right now as a black art form that has done so much for so many people. Of course. We have to get it right between now and August 11th, or it's going to go down in history incomplete or incorrect. And that scares the crap out of me. So it's safe to say you don't believe the DJ gets the respect they should when it comes to their contribution to hip-hop.

Absolutely not. Because especially the hip- hop DJ that understands the quick mix theory and the mechanics, which I will show you, is because that led to the sampling and that led to these records being made and that's what we're celebrating. So we're celebrating the entire cake, but let's

go back and celebrate the eggs and the flour and the water and the vanilla, how the cake was made. The process. The process. Let's celebrate that.

Let's see some of the process, Grandmaster. Let's do that. Yeah. Actions speak louder than words. Now, can I go write the theories? Of course, of course. All right, I'm going to need a pen. I need one of these pens.

You got a sharpie? He got a sharpie. He got one. He got you. He got you. I want to say to you, Envy. Yes, sir. I appreciate you, man.

You said something a couple of minutes ago that you thought I would be insulted. I grew up as a geek. I was not hip. I was afraid to rap to chicks. I stayed in my house grabbing junk from the junkyard and trying to piece together somewhat of a sound system. And then I came up with a mathematical equation to what is hip-hop, and I called it black math. Okay.

Quick mixed theory. Black math. It was impossible for me to write a sonic equation because a sonic equation would then fall under kinetics and then it would have been really deep for me to write this so I wrote it from a mathematical perspective the brain captures a melody in four bars and that's why I called it the quick mix theory. It's black math. Every DJ uses the hand mechanics of this DJ technique. This got me in so much trouble because I was putting crayons on the record, putting my hand on the records.

Connoisseurs wanted to nail me, disrespect me. They really hated me, Char, because they would put the record inside of a little white paper and use a velvet brush to clean it off and they would carefully put it inside the jacket me fuck that so i got a lot of flack for doing this so now here's vinyl one i'm a horrible drawer so good we get it we get it a mix in the middle vinyl two I'm a horrible drawer So good We get it, we get it A mix in the middle Mm-hmm Vinyl 2 Mm-hmm

Vinyl 2 So This one The crowd's listening to this It's going Clockwise And this is the one That has to go counterclockwise.

And this particular style of DJing that every hip hop DJ has adopted makes the tone arm 99.9% useless. But I would watch those DJs that did this heavy on the tone arm and every time they would transition, it was a train wreck. Four bars forward

is equal to six counterclockwise revolutions equals full loop extraction. Every DJ and every hip-hop producer that made sample-based music uses this theory. And me and Envy, we were talking earlier, and he said something to me. music uses this theory. And me and Envy, we were talking earlier, and he said something to me. Some people have never seen Turntable. That's right. That's real.

I've got so much to do. I've got so many places to go, Shaw. So many people, because I don't know if Breakout's going to get an interview or if Kool Herc or Coke is going to get an interview or Bam. So right now it's pretty much on me. So the race is on until August. So now with this process, for people that don't know, that's not a DJ, what you're basically saying is back in the day you came up with this formula

because there were no instrumentals, so you had to create your own, right? Or the drum break. Or the drum break. DJs what you're basically saying is back in the day you you came up with this formula because there were no instrumentals so you had to create your own right or the drum break or the drum break so short you had to make it longer so people can actually dance and the transition will be like how transitions should be so what you hear now when somebody especially New York where most DJs slam music meaning you'll go from a fast record, 100 tempo, to a 70 tempo with no transition, and you slam it. So this was a creation where people wouldn't stop dancing, and the party would go thoroughly through, and people wouldn't even miss a step, which a DJ is supposed to do.

And with this, meaning forward, four bars forward, six bars backward, you would go six bars backward to go back another four bars, and bring this side, bring the left side six bars back. For the four and six, that was the inversion. The four and six factor is what I called it. And I say four plus six is ten. So if there was a rapper in front of me and he needed a quiet area of the record

where the singer wasn't singing and it was at least people playing with the drummer and I'm gonna play a few of those things. Show us that. Can you answer one question? Of course you know they talk about Grandmaster Flash and the Furious 5 you know produced the message but they said you first DJ to get a Grammy by the way but that yes but I've read some things where they said you- First DJ to get a Grammy, by the way, but that- Yes, but I read some things where they said you had nothing to do with the production of it. Okay, I had something to do with all of it because that company chased me to get my group.

The Furious Five. The whole group. Gotcha. There was a club I played called Disco Fever, and I brought hip- hop to this club and Sal Abatello gave me, I wanted a Saturday. He gave me a Tuesday. Of course.

So most clubs do that. He gave me, I called it terrible Tuesday. Off night. Right. But in about two months time, I was, why wouldn't they do this Saturday?

Thank you, Sal. You know, so for me, the message probably I had least to do with, but I had most to do with it because it was my group. And I'm sure they used your technique, right? Yeah, they used my technique to make all their records. The message was an original record, but they knew when they had the Sugar Hill Gang,

they heard of us in the streets. The streets was already ringing. Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five. So she used to come to Terrible Tuesdays, every Tuesday, just to see how it was going down. So- Who was she? Sylvia is she Sylvia Robinson okay you know so owner of sugar hill did I have anything to do with that record minimal but I had everything to do with it because she needed to have us so here we are I want to have one more question for you get on the turntables

how do you feel about DJs today with the auto mixing buttons and the different programs that make it easy for them to call themselves DJs? I'm using Serato right now. Or even CDJs. Right. And you know what it is, put it this way, I'm a scientist first, I'm a geek first. So I've been pushing the envelope for 52 years. So I respect anybody that's doing it, but follow the laws of the art, transition. I think the things that drive me crazy when I go out,

which is every now and then MVs, you know, I'm listening to the DJ and the train wreck thing, you know, that there really drives me crazy. A lot of today's music is really one tempo bass, so it's easy to go from one to the other. So how are you crashing this record into this record? With us, back, we had to use the pitch quite a bit

to make this record beat match with this record. These records here are almost coming out of the oven. They're all the same tempo almost so i don't understand why is it that these people who play today don't beat match that there makes me totally crazy and it goes against the laws of what we learned let's see what let's see some transitions man let's do it if you can the first thing I guess if you can what you talked about the first how you would make your own instrumental backing let me play the first record that got because some people think that there was another DJ that inspired me I came from a totally different perspective scientific and mathematical so I came from nothing with

my style gotcha nobody put me on I envy this record was the groundbreaking record, Why I Wanted to DJ. Curtis Mayfield, 1970. How old were you? 12 going into 13. Wow. I'm 66 now. Bless. Break is still going.

Yep. The break is still going. The break is still going. Five minutes, right? This record was... So for life for me, I was, why is that? Why is everything else so short? And when I started playing other genres of record, because I was raised in a home where,

depending on which system was on the stereo, I would hear Motown, disco, funk, jazz, blues, R&B. I grew up where music had no color. A dope jam could be a white jam, a black jam, a foreign jam, an American jam. So Charlamagne, I said I was gonna I needed your help right okay oh could you come over here please Shaw before I play try to scratch this record so listen now yeah try to try it back. Yeah, try to bring it back. But be gentle with your fingers and try to just go.

Right. Back, back, back. I practiced before. Just try to go back. Try to go counterclockwise. You're too hard. You're too hard. Nice, nice.

Right, now, now. No, that's wrong. He's a heavy. He's a heavy. Okay, stop. So, my mother was a seamstress. Right? So, I was lucky to touch

polyester, rayon, cotton, silk, leather, suede, felt. You created the slip mat?

Yes, I did. Oh my goodness. You created the slip mat too? That's crazy. So let me tell you, let me break it down. I'm going to pop the collar for you.

So when you buy the turntables it comes with a rubber piece right yes the rubber piece you you cannot dj with so all dj's have to toss it so you had a slip mat we didn't know where a slip mat was so back then the record came in a in a plastic package we would open up the plastic package and make our own slip mat the slip mat is on this one but But that was Grandmaster Flash's idea. I just told you, so. You got a mic right there, Flash. Flash, you got a mic right there.

When I ran into that problem, right, I grabbed an album and I ran to nearest material store and I touched rayon, silk, cotton, polyester, leather, felt. Now the problem with felt is when you put it on your, when you buy a portion of it, it's limp. So when my mother wasn't looking, first I would cut it out the size of an album right and I would my mother was a look and I went up in the closet in her cabinet in the kitchen and I got spray starch and I made it so that it was stiff but I called it a wafer and the reason why I called it a wafer is because during Easter mom would dress us up to

go to the church in the neighbor church, and you know that little white, that white thing they give you during Easter? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I called it a wafer, and it went from what that is to this. Damn. You didn't get to trademark any of this, the corporate right any of this, did you?

I wish you trademarked that, Jesus Christ. But wait a minute, but wait a minute, it doesn't end there, because I still got some resistance on a certain table with just this. So when mom would make baked chocolate chip cookies,

she would use this paper that felt like wax. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So now I put the plastic, the wax on the platter, and I put this on top of that. So now the platter moves comfortably clockwise while I can go counterclockwise. That's crazy.

That's what you trademarked that. This was the ending factor of the quick mix theory. See, these are the things I need to teach people about, that this thing did just fall out of a tree. I look at some of this press today, and they're like, all right, hip-hop is 50, and there was this party, and boom. Is that it? They're skipping the whole process.

But it's skipping the whole process, but it's skipping the whole process of people who actually put in the energy and work. So for me, I had no idea, right? You just follow other DJs and other DJs, what they do, they open up the thing, they get rid of that rubber piece, they cut the plastic, and that's how you DJ.

But if it wasn't for Flash's mind of thinking this way, most DJs wouldn't have that. Now come here. Now. Now put your hand on it gently. See? Now it's still moving. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, my gosh.

And that's the problem. Everybody thinks they're DJs. That's the problem. Let's play some music now. Let's do it. Let's do it. So now people don't realize, like the producer, Dre, Premier, Pete Rock, Battle Cat. Like I could go on and on and on.

This sampling thing, this is how the sampling thing tied in to the DJing. Let's take this sample. The name of this song is called Sweet Teals by Seals and Croft. Now all this is, the extra, but... Bust around and put my hands where mine's to see. Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. Let's just say careful, y'all. Jesus. That was the bullshit.

Wow. We didn't let it go there. So now, using a quick mix theory, with the producers, there's just two new machines that come into play. The computer and the sampler. So it would take that same, let's say, quantity of information, put it onto a floppy disk, put it into the computer and the sampler,

and hit the space bar until the computer looped this. It's the same thing that I was doing circularly, but now it was with the new technology. Correct. So let's go. Flip mode. So if you're listening, he's bringing it back and forth without a loop sampler. He's doing it from his hands in a way that you can't even tell he's doing it so if you want to dance for you would never know what i was doing correct and this is the difference between using the tone arm with djs that come from our same community and train wrecking

versus the quick next theory where the arm is 99.9% useless. Let's go to... While he's going to the next thing, I always want to tell people too is, now DJs have it a lot simpler because they have Serato, so you can actually see the keys of where you can do it. Back then, he would actually have to memorize where it was on the wax,

or he would have to put a piece of cassette tape... They do it on the crayon. On the crayon, and draw it on the record to know where he would have to go back to now i see why dj used to sweat so much in the 70s and 80s god rest his soul Christopher was my rapper and I was his DJ, DPO Lynch. Wow. Now if you listen, he's bringing it back using the quick mix theory. He's DJing.

There's no sample. It's just him. Wow. Let's go a little deeper. Wow. And a lot of these samples, so when people say to me, well, Flash, do a hip hop set. I'm playing white music. I'm playing black music. I'm playing foreign music. I'm playing American music. say to me, well, Flash, do a hip-hop set. I'm playing white music. I'm playing black music.

I'm playing foreign music. I'm playing American music, pop, rock, jazz, blues, funk, disco, R&B, because this is what we had before it became modern. Correct. This is all we had. So let me ask you a question while you're doing this. So a lot of these loops that you're going back and forth with that you were playing at the clubs, these are loops that you would be doing at a party that I'm sure one of these producers heard you do it and say oh i'm gonna sample this and

make it's a record probably got you probably because there's no way now i can hear somebody hearing that buster rhymes record without a dj playing it but like that's gonna be a smash like that had to be i heard this and this is why the dj is so important like i just don't understand These are the things people need to really understand. What is so important about the producer and the DJ? You people that are press people, you're not talking about this. You're not coming to ask me anything. You ask me, i'll tell you oh

you just flash you teach him just blaze you boost the out of this record, oh my god. Wow. Who to just blaze. And this is just like a, this is a nobody. This record was probably went double lead. But it takes the genius of a producer to know what this is. And this is what the record really sounds like. We didn't give a fuck about that part right there, ladies and gentlemen. This is what you call digging in the craze?

This is what I call it. I'm texting all the young DJs that work here, like, y'all should really be in here for this Grandmaster Flash lesson. I told you that. I'm texting Isla, like, you should really be here. I told you that. So now, Fame, let's take it a little deeper. Just please, you're a sick individual, man. Your mind is crazy. Can I go a little deeper, y'all? Please.

You gotta go to the mic, though. You gotta go to the mic. I gotta ask one question. We're not editing nothing, Flash. We're not editing nothing. And I gotta ask one question. They gonna see this just like this. I gotta ask one question too, Flash.

Fame, yes. Why don't, you know, when I was battling DJing and doing that, I would turn the turntables the long way so I wouldn't hit it when I was scratching. Why do you keep yours the regular way? Because most DJs turn it the long way. That's the way I, when I was creating this, this is the way I learned it because I watched the disco DJs and they were always forward. Gotcha.

It's just that when I watched the DJs that were in our young community, they were forward too. But it was just somewhat of a nightmare. So now I wanna go analog with no help, no net. This is where you have to learn how to drive. If you didn't know how to drive, don't get in the car, just don't do it. This is a straight analog, no laptop, no nothing.

This is where your forearms would be strong. Your forearms would be strong because you had to carry crates to the club. So, the mark. When I did this to records, record connoisseurs, DJs that were using the tone-arm style, hated my guts. Like, who do you think you are

putting your fingertips all over the records? Now, what I'm going to do is, and I got to show this to you, Envy. Remember I was telling you, four bars forward? Yes, six bars back. And then when I went four revolutions back, I was in the wrong place. I walked away for like a month because I was stuck. Why is it, if four bars are going forward, why can't I go four bars counterclockwise?

Right. And it was in my face. 33. And a third. The third can constitute for the additional two extra ones I have to go back to re-arrive to the top of the break. So I used How many times this line

Passes the tone on and I knew I would be back at the top of the break and this is the seamless loop That the producers adopted to put into the computer. This is the quick mix theory at its purest That's great. What a 33 and a third. That's why he call himself that. I'm sure. DJ 33 and a third. I don't hear this cueing. Sleuthog guy, 33 and a third. That's crazy.

Why he setting that up? You got it? Okay. Nope, I don't hear it. Turn it up a little bit. Might be the levels on there. Okay. Is it good? The ground is humming a little bit.

The ground is humming. Let's check that ground real quick. You don't know how to do that no more. Of course I do. I don't believe you. You might have to lick the back of the needle one good time too. Yeah, two, two. Oh, he...

I'm a DJ, Flash. Don't let him mess you. I'm a DJ. I'm a DJ. I'm going to test your heart before you get out of here. I'm a DJ. I want to see if you still know how to do that. This is where I started.

This is where I started. Don't get nervous. I still got two artists in the crib. I want to see if you know how to still do this. I still got two artists in the crib. Okay, he's going to. Now, yeah, sometimes we hook up and the grounds are not right. Or the RCA's are a little off.

Yeah. Did you lick this yet? Yep. See that? You got to lick the back of it for the connection to be good. Because I won't lick. Oh, you know, I won't do that. You know, we ain't doing that.

Most DJs lick their finger and then touch the back of it. It's like blowing a cartridge on a Nintendo game. You would you think you gotta do it pause licking and blowing huh yeah we good now okay it works see okay so guys the sleeves the seamless loop still got a little hum on the right side. I'm gonna play a couple of records ladies and gentlemen and this is the quick mixed derby at its deepest. Four bars forward, six counterclockwise. Let's go. I want to count. One, two, three, four, five, six, check. Throw. One, two, three, four, five, six, check.

Throw. Wow. Check, throw. And this works with pop, rock, jazz, blues, funk. Once I figured out that third, we call this hip hop. They call it rock in their family. We call this hip hop. Come up next. Just get ready to count. One, two, three, four, five, six, check. Throw.

One, two, three, four, 5, 6, check, throw. The 4-6 stick works on any race, creed, color, group. Wow, wow. Wow. One, two, three, four, five, six. And if I ain't sure, one, two, three, four, five, six. Check. six check one two three four five six check the 4-6 thing works on any type of record with a beat but then sometimes there's an exception to the rule. Maybe it's only two bars. And

if it's two bars, now it goes from four bars, six counterclockwise, check, go. One, two, three, check, go. One, two, three, check, You just gotta explain one thing to me, right? I'm lost. Wow. I get it, but I'm gonna ask a question. Four bars forward, right? Yeah. But it's not really four bars because it's 33 and a third,

so that extra third makes up for the sixth when you bring it back. Right, if you do the math. Gotcha. Wow. So, I want you to understand, give me, this is what stuck me. This is what got stuck.

One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. I'm in the wrong place. I'm in the wrong place. I walked away from this thing, I'm like, damn, what is wrong? And I was staring at it all the time. God is good. Demetrius, why don't you think DJs follow that, right?

And I'm going to ask you why, right? Because can I touch your equipment for a second? Sure, sure, of course you can. If you still know how to use it. Hey, shut up. If you still know how to use it. So for most DJs, right, what they used to do is,

So when you do that, right? Yeah. What they would have to do is, you have to go, go until you don't hear it anymore. Right. But in the scene. But sometimes it breaks in the middle though. Right. But you know what the advanced science to go, go until you don't hear it anymore. Right. But you see, But sometimes it breaks in the middle though.

Right. But you know the advanced science to this, and I didn't go into that, is, you have to know how it sounds going backwards. Right. Like good times is a perfect example. It goes, like you go, good times. Mm, mm, mm.

I'm moving along. But you go, and then you hear good, good backwards. And then you know you're at the top of the guh of good times. You gotta learn records how they sound backwards but that's the advanced form of it. I'm trying to keep it very basic and just what it is. I love it because more DJs will really understand it. So this right here right?

This part right here, what I used to see you do all the time, right? Where you're crabbing, right? Or flashing. Where did that come from? That came from the hand mechanics of the quick mix theory because here's how I see it. Whether you are cutting or seamless looping or rubbing the record back and forth with the fader

open scratching or if you are crabbing all it is just an advanced form of opening and closing the panteometer which is the crossfader correct and why did you why did you create that I mean it's amazing sound I did it when I used to battle but what made you say this is a sound I'm creating with the sounds You know, I mean, let me say something. I was okay, you know, but when I heard Jeff scratch bastard Newmark to my jazzy. Yeah. Yeah one of the best They like I am the inventor of the hand mechanics But all it is if you think about it's just a matter of when you open and close the fader and what you're doing with the

vinyl so now so when you are crabbing you're moving a vinyl little faster but you're opening and closing the pantyometer quicker but it's all the hand mechanics the hand mechanics is mine and the levels like you did this kid by the name of cubert like he absolutely he's not even he's not even human and and and uh jeff yeah y'all would y'all could make people dance by bringing the record backwards and crabbing and it was it was the most amazing thing i've ever seen and cubert definitely and the bad thing about cubert is you really didn't see cubert right you just heard his tapes right so incredible I didn't even met Qbert shout out to my first successful student

Graham was at Theodore yeah how do you how do you correlate counting the bars on the turntable to MCs counting bars in the booth it's the same thing okay it's actually the same thing it's just that that when they're speaking, they're counting their verbal bars, I'm counting musical bars, and what's paramount, Shaw, is I have to keep it steady. So I can't, not while they're saying their rhymes, I gotta keep it really steady. And this is what the seamless loop is. So the seamless loop is so the seamless loop is what he called

cutting and the thing that really bugs me with people they say I want you to scratch this is scratch it is just one of the elements it's more like cutting it's like actually a scratch becomes very important when you're scratching against the music that's already playing or if you're crabbing against the music that's already playing you know saying or you're transforming against the music that's already playing, or if you're crabbing against the music that's already playing, you know what I'm saying? Or you're transforming. So these are the things, guys, that I really have to go to the universities.

Absolutely. Go to the YMCAs, and really show people that this thing called hip-hop didn't just fall out of a tree, Shaw. It just didn't. You did a Birth of a Culture Masterclass at the Kennedy Center, right? Yeah, I did. How was that?

I got two encores. It was absolutely wonderful. So now I'm going to be doing Birth of a Culture lectures in the corporate world, but I'm going to do some public ones too because people need to understand much respect to the first party, but there was much more to get us here. And that's where people need to understand that this thing took engineering, mathematics, ingenuity, and taking this item and squeezing it with that item to make this all work.

Because I come from a time when it was none of this. Absolutely. You know what I'm saying? And that is what I would wish the press would come ask us. Come ask us. So who made all of the money off all of these things that you created, Flag? All of them did. Wow.

I'm talking about as far as trademarks, copyrights like who act all of them except me but you know something people ask me this question if i had to do all over again i'd do it all over again of course the love same way because i love what i do i'm like this thing has got me in more trouble with my significant other my children you know i i i not proud that I had to leave my children so much to tour and to leave, to get away. But other than that, like, I'm madly in love with this. And that's, it's just that right now during this pivotal time before this thing disappears on the 12th of August, I got to get where I got to get.

And I got to teach these young journalists and the people that do these kind of things like the babies, like listen, this is what it was. What about a book? I know you got the Adventures of Grandmaster Flash, but what about a book with detail? I'm going to do another one. A lot of this, and because see, the thing is and i fall victim to it too it's like you learn something

and a lot of times we're so microwave happy like we want it fast we want to do it now that we don't necessarily learn the history of where it came from you know which is sad but in my defense back then we didn't have there was no internet there was no way to learn right i mean unless i was in the bronx or in the park you know as a kid i couldn't learn but now with with this society there's ways that you can actually learn where this came from and where it's like the fact that you invented the slip mat you know even though you don't get props for it or money for it but that's amazing and i think people should understand that because all djs use a slip mat that use turntables you know i mean right and some of those things I think that should be understood you know for me a lot of people say well you know

I get no money for it you know and this is how I see it guys people happily celebrate their birthday correct I don't give a damn about that. When God takes me, my death day, what am I going to leave for the babies to take it to the next level? Right. My death day was more important than my birthday. And my birthday is on the most famous day of the year, which is January 1st. Wow.

You know what I'm saying? So before I'm out of here, I got to make sure that the producer and the DJ is respected. Because if you think about this, if I was the engine and the producers were the fuel, the canopy was made very, very easy for the rapper to sit in it and blast off. And that needs to be talked about. Where this thing came from. How did it come about?

We need to talk about this. And this is a black art form, and I'm hoping that this is another form like jazz that go through one thing and all of a sudden it goes left. As long as I'm living, that ain't going to happen here. And I thank you guys for allowing me to be here, man. I do got one more question. KRS-One said that he refused to be a part of the Grammys 50 years

of hip-hop special because it took so long for the Grammys to acknowledge hip-hop. What do you think about that? And did you get the call? I got the call. Yeah, I got the call quite a few times. I know Harvey Mason Jr., you know, personally, I respect a man's point of view if that's their point of view, you know, but I think for me, I need to be on as many big media situations as

possible because I'm really like the last of my kind that's speaking. And after me, there's probably no one. So I thank you guys here. I thank you. I thank you for answering my DM. Absolutely. Come on, man.

And we're here. And Envy, it's always a pleasure, man. Always a pleasure. Grandmaster Flash, y'all. Ladies and gentlemen, they follow you in all that stuff. Thank you. Thank you, man.

And I'll be doing these lectures these corporate lectures birth of a culture lectures look for me and i'm going to do two free ones one in the bronx and one in manhattan probably during black history month in february okay grandmaster flash grandmaster flash ladies and gentlemen make sure you follow them on instagram all socials at dj flash forever on all socials at dj flash on all socials at DJ Flash forever and you just turn around I just want to read the back of your hoodie man

because the hoodie's monumental it says the first DJ to make the turntable an instrument first DJ to have a rapper first DJ to be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame first DJ to be on Sirius XM

first DJ to get a Grammy first DJ to get a Polar Prize Grandmaster Flash and the first DJ to give a history lesson about DJ to get a Polar Prize. Grandmaster Flash. And the first DJ to give a history lesson about DJing on The Breakfast Club. That's right. Grandmaster Flash, ladies and gentlemen. It's The Breakfast Club. Good morning.

Thank you. In the morning. The Breakfast Club. Had enough of this country? Ever dreamt about starting your own? I planted the flag. This is mine. I own this.

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