DJ Jazzy Jeff discusses his appearance in DJ Hero, passion for music, the possible impact that the game may have on future DJ’s. Sitting through the forced commercial is a little painful, but it’s worthwhile if only to hear Jeff talk about his days as a "bathroom DJ."
Notable Quote:
"I’m very, very excited that DJ culture is finally getting its due."
I don’t play video games – and I wasn’t real crazy about the concept of this game when I heard about it …
but 2 things made me think that maybe this game is not so horrible…..
first, we hosted a DJ battle, put out thousands of flyers, blasted everywhere we could on the net and hit up everybody we knew – $150 prize, no entry fee- ONLY 2 DJ’S SIGNED UP!!! when we do mc or beat battles, we’ve had to turn people who wanted to enter away, but only 2 dj’s signed up….what happened to all the bad ass dj crews?
second, I watched 3 hip hop documentaries this week (netflix rocks) Freestyle, Scratch and The Freshest Kids – every single flick made me remember that without the dj, non of this hip hop shit would have ever happened the way it did, but now dj’s hardly get any respect; everybody wants to be a rapper or get a free version of fruity loops and call themselves a beatmaker – not very many kids now have ever even heard of Kool Herc which is kinda tragic really – maybe this will spark some interest again
I dunno what my point is exactly, but all I’m saying is that if this games can make a couple dozen kids want to get real decks, than fuck it, that’s what it took
I really hope that this does get people interested in learning real DJ/turtablist skills.
I had to laugh at that last quote though: “definitely may have a career”.
What Term said! I definitely feel the DJ’s roll in hip hop has been marginalized to the point that it seems now having a DJ perform at a hip hop show is kind of an afterthought.
In a lot of ways, DJ’s need to take a bit of the blame for this. There is no no shortage of turntable technicians out there who can pull off quadruple click flares and whatever is the next scratch trick to perform, but have no soul and no idea how to rock a party. Jeff is a great ambassador for the art of DJing, because he covers all bases, his cuts are always on point, her innovated techniques when he was coming up and can always rock a crowd.
I’ve been to a few recent shows with and without DJ’s performing with the MC’s, and the difference a show can have when there’s a decent DJ backing up the crew is huge. Trouble is, there’s too many lazy DJ’s who can’t scratch the hooks live and just cue the record up and maybe do a little jugga jugga before dropping it in.
I didn’t know Jazzy Jeff was in this game, I’m waiting for the other one, where the turntable actually spins and it has mpc pads on it…but shout out Jazzy Jeff he’s a dope DJ>
I have definitely run a head to head competition and concluded that the beckers cpa from Morgan to be the top standards.