Can diversity be found in a Hip Hop Club?

Most early hip hop was dominated by groups where collaboration between the members was integral to the show. 30 An example would be the early hip hop group Funky Four Plus One, who performed in such a manner on Saturday Night Live in 1981. Hip hop music was both influenced by disco music and a backlash against it.

According to Kurtis Blow, the early days of hip hop were characterized by divisions between fans and detractors of disco music. Hip hop had largely emerged as "a direct response to the watered down, Europeanised, disco music that permeated the airwaves",3233 and the earliest hip hop was mainly based on hard funk loops. However, by 1979, disco instrumental loops/tracks had become the basis of much hip hop music.

This genre got the name of "disco rap". Ironically, hip hop music was also a proponent in the eventual decline in disco popularity. DJ Pete Jones, Eddie Cheeba, DJ Hollywood, and Love Bug Starski were disco-influenced hip hop DJs.

Their styles differed from other hip hop musicians who focused on rapid-fire rhymes and more complex rhythmic schemes. Afrika Bambaataa, Paul Winley, Grandmaster Flash, and Bobby Robinson were all members of this latter group. In Washington, D.C. go-go emerged as a reaction against disco and eventually incorporated characteristics of hip hop during the early 1980s.

The genre of electronic music behaved similarly, eventually evolving into what is known as house music in Chicago and techno in Detroit. Prior to 1979, recorded hip hop music consisted mainly of PA system recordings of parties and early hip hop mixtapes by DJs. Puerto Rican DJ Disco Wiz is credited as the first hip hop DJ to create a "mixed plate," or mixed dub recording, when, in 1977, he combined sound bites, special effects and paused beats to technically produce a sound recording.

The first hip hop record is widely regarded to be The Sugarhill Gang's "Rapper's Delight", from 1979. 35 However, much controversy surrounds this assertion as some regard "King Tim III (Personality Jock)" by The Fatback Band, which was released a few weeks before "Rapper's Delight", as a rap record. 36 There are various other claimants for the title of first hip hop record.

By the early 1980s, all the major elements and techniques of the hip hop genre were in place. Though not yet mainstream, hip hop had permeated outside of New York City; it could be found in cities as diverse as Atlanta, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., Baltimore, Dallas, Kansas City, San Antonio, Miami, Seattle, St. Louis, New Orleans, Houston, and Toronto. Indeed, "Funk You Up" (1979), the first hip hop record released by a female group, and the second single released by Sugar Hill Records, was performed by The Sequence, a group from Columbia, South Carolina which featured Angie Stone.

Despite the genre's growing popularity, Philadelphia was, for many years, the only city whose contributions could be compared to New York City's. Hip hop music became popular in Philadelphia in the late 1970s. The first released record was titled "Rhythm Talk", by Jocko Henderson.

The New York Times had dubbed Philadelphia the "Graffiti Capital of the World" in 1971. Philadelphia native DJ Lady B recorded "To the Beat Y'All" in 1979, and became the first female solo hip hop artist to record music. 38 Schoolly D, starting in 1984 and also from Philadelphia, began creating a style that would later be known as gangsta rap.

The 1980s marked the diversification of hip hop as the genre developed more complex styles. 39 Early examples of the diversification process can be identified through such tracks as Grandmaster Flash's "The Adventures of Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel" (1981), a single consisting entirely of sampled tracks40 as well as Afrika Bambaataa's "Planet Rock" (1982), which signified the fusion of hip hop music with electro. In addition, Rammellzee & K-Rob's "Beat Bop" (1983) was a 'slow jam' which had a dub influence with its use of reverb and echo as texture and playful sound effects.

The mid-1980s was marked by the influence of rock music, with the release of such albums as King of Rock and Licensed to Ill.