Review of Chuck D`s Hiphop Hall Of Fame

Introduction

The biggest gold chains in history are on show complete with gold teeth and bad ass sound systems. Hip-hop covers the activities of breakin`, rhyming, grafitti, DJ`s and MC`s. This DVD, Volume 1, is more a focus on old school MC`s and has interviews with Ice T (talking about The Rhyme Syndicate), Chuck D, Too Short, KRS1, Spider D and Ice Cube amongst others. We get a taste of the syncopated and rhythmic sounds that make good rap almost hypnotic.

There is a rap stereotype which people think covers violent lyrics, gangstas and the ghetto. While this sense of marginalisation, poor economical social conditions and gang related problems did much to fuel the early disenchantment of blacks and Hispanics in the 70s, it isn`t all doom and gloom. Sure, there are and always will be stories about the hard life, but rhyming is a just another way to express feelings and tell stories. It`s a big part of musical culture and has influenced a whole breed of today`s artists who rap about loving life, love, having fun and disowning hardcore gang culture. Move forward in life and feel positive.

Video

Presented with a 4:3 fullframe video transfer, the quality is a bit soft but is okay throughout. There`s some home video footage mixed in which looks a bit grainy, but it`s nowt to complain about. The only problem I have with this DVD however are the dropped frames. A hand-held camera is used, which is fine, but for every second of footage shown, there seems to be a few dropped frames, which results in a headache inducing jerky image. This might be okay for 4-minutes on MTV, but it`s not acceptable in a 45-minute documentary.

Audio

DD5.1 audio is the order of the day and while it sounds clear, it`s not a surround mixed track so you`ll get nothing bustin` out the rears. It`s all focused from the front and is audible without problem. There isn`t a great deal of music in the programme, which is a bit surprising, but the snippets here and there sound okay.

Features

The menu choices should be clearer as to what you`re choosing. In the Bonus Material you`re faced with a circular menu split into 6 options, but these aren`t labelled with what it contains.

• KRS 1 live in concert (9:51) - A home video style shoot with the man on stage.

• Fab 5 Freddy Futura (9:31) - An old video which is pretty cool to see and hear, but it`s old and the sound is hissy making some of the rhyme indistinct. Still good to see though and it has a good beat.

• The birth of contemporary rap music (14:15) - Narrated by Davey D this 14-minute extra is very interesting. It starts with the origins and is very listenable, however all good things end and 14-minutes isn`t enough! More of this quality documentary making would be great.

• Chuck D reading list - "The Science of Rap" (KRS-One), "Keepin` it Real" (Ice T), "Bring the Noise" (Michael Gonzales and Havelock Nelson), "Rap: this game of exposure" (Walter Goodridge) and "The beat/go go`s fusion of funk and hip hop" (Skip Lornell, Charles C. Stephenson).

• Davey D`s interviews in New York City (5:04) - Some blokes that think they can rap give it some, but I`m not impressed and I don`t know who would be.

• Time for samples. We get snippets of: Illegal Thought Process "Death", Jay McElfresh "Didn`t Care if We Made The Charts", The 2awk "United Static Association", Illegal Thought Process "Love", Johnny Juice "Up In The Bronx", Schooly D & Chuck D "psk", A Grav Lab "Spacewalker". This is a nice extra since you get to listen to some music you might not ordinarily get to hear. I like a lot of the stuff here so I`m sold.

Conclusion

What this DVD isn`t is a potted history of MC`s and thankfully what this DVD doesn`t contain is any Vanilla Ice or MC Hammer. You get a flavour of the time with anecdotes from old hands in the scene, but it feels somewhat unstructured. There`s no sense of chronology so we get all the interviews pieced together without too much thought. I like the scene and it interests me, but having seen the superb The Freshest Kids and "Scratch" (b-boy`s and DJ`s/turntablists respectively) and then seeing this, I can`t help but feel this comes up short.

The extras are okay, but these really should form part of the main programme in telling the story we want to hear. If you really want to know about the origins, then listen to "The birth of contemporary rap music" first, then play the main programme, which will fill in and reinforce the interview footage. The dropped frames of the video transfer are off putting but I found that leaving it to run in the background and just listening rather than watching too much worked fine.

If you like the hip-hop scene then this is a DVD worth seeing, but with a street price of £18 and a run time of about 75-minutes, I can`t in all honesty say it`s worth buying. Renting it might be the better option. If you want to do a little reading, check out the official Afrika Bambaataa website.