The Get Down

On August 12 Netflix will be bringing a new visual show call “The Get Down” (a story of the South Bronx and the elevation of Hip Hop in the 1970’s).  With so much of it being kept a secret until it air date it is very hard to give a good analysis on the whole show. Only thing I can tell is an underdog story and the underdogs are the people of the South Bronx. The Bronx at that time was hell zone with  poor circumstances from living in housing projects that were burning down to the ground daily,  trying to find a job, having gang’s run the city with a different gang around the corner from the other , no school funding, drug’s being becoming the everyday norm, and suffer from  police brutality as well. With everything that was going on in this dark era had all the signs that there was no hope at all to overcome the everyday life struggle trying to get by. But all that change with one man who brought the city together in an old fashioned way that has always brought people together. Just as the same in the slavery days as the slaves work on the field shouting out chants that became lyrics to the everyday struggle they were facing. These words and emotions became music (Soul music) in the worst time in American history. And Clive Campbell a.k.a Kool Herc became somewhat of a savior,   coming from the west indies of Jamaica he  brought the same formula that was used every weekend at block party in Jamaica to the South Bronx with big sound systems that they used to hook up in the street corner lights. And for the Bronx the shouts and chants would could from sixties and the seventies music that would help unit the city and bring back hope into the lives of some many people who were living in the ghetto’s. With all that range, anger and deep buried emotion it all was express in four different ways; which were DJing, Mc’s, Breakdancing and Graffiti artist. And these four elements became the structure of Hip-Hop.  

If they knew it or not the South Bronx would be the next step progression in American cultural that would transcend into world cultural since the 1920’s (the roaring twenties). People think of the 1920’s just as the prohibition era and Al Capone but most people don’t know it is also the decade that move art forward with Martha Graham, Charlie Parker and Pablo Picasso. Martha Graham in dance who brought modern dance into forefront, creating a new style that broke away from ballet. Pablo Picasso in art who brought modern art that was different than the renaissance era. .and Charlie Parker who brought a whole new style in Jazz called bebop. All three of these individual’s help push their art form out of the statics quo out of the box that they were cage into. And that is the same thing that happen in South Bronx as from  pushing out of that darkness and creating a four connecting  spectrum that is  The Dj’s ,Mc’s, break dancer’s and the graffiti artist that broke down a wall and made a new lifestyle. To some people they will just see this as just a show but it is much more than that. The Get Down to me is showing how kids who came from poverty to create the last American art form that is still aspiring people around the world today. So with everything being kept a secert until August 12 it’s highly important to know a brief history of this monument culture and how it came about because it is American history.