Scratch: The history of 'turntablism' and roots of hip hop music/culture

On part two of Buddy and Leanne's discussion of music documentaries, they talk about the 2001 film Scratch, by Doug Pray.

REFERENCES
• Rockit, live performance by Herbie Hancock, 1984, cited by many dj's as inspiration
• Rockit, music video
• Bill Laswell, YouTube video about the legendary bassist and music producer
• River Market Antique Mall, Kansas City, antique shop
• Dada, early 20th century art movement

CREDITS
◦ Director, April Roy
◦ Manager, Jerena Boyd Bey
◦ Digital Branch Manager, David LaCrone
◦ Graphic Designer, Levi Hoffmeier
◦ Editing, Buddy Hanson and David LaCrone
◦ Music, Franny Finstrom Clark

Transcript

Brush Creek Film Review - Episode 5

Buddy: Welcome back everyone. This is episode five of brush Creek film review. I'm your host buddy Hanson here today with

Leanne: Leanne Kubicz

Buddy: Hello everyone and welcome back to brush Creek film review. This episode is a continuation of episode four, where we talked about rude boy, the story of Trojan records. And in this one, we're going to focus on another excellent music and culture documentary called scratch released in 2001 and directed by Doug Pray.

I don't remember when I first saw this. It's not available currently on Kanopy or hoopla. It, we do have the DVD at the Plaza library and the DVD might actually be better. Cause one of the things you don't get from Kanopy, and hoopla at least not that I'm aware of is, you know, the nice thing about DVDs is a lot of times they'll have additional supplemental material, extra interviews behind the scenes stuff, you know, all, all the kind of extras . I think it's.

Cool that we have the DVD. If you liked the film, there's some good extra stuff on there. That's worth checking out. But anyway, I don't remember when I first saw this, honestly, it was. Early two thousands sometime kind of at that time when I was buying a ton of music and really kind of expanding my horizons from the teenage years to my twenties and, you know, I had some good friends that had much better taste in music than me that were introducing me to all kinds of great stuff.

I think at the time I was really into DJ shadow. Are you familiar with DJ shadow? 

Leanne: Yeah, absolutely

Buddy: big name in hip hop, kind of newer hip hop, two thousands or late nineties, maybe. Yeah. Okay. But, so anyway, this film came out in 2001. I saw it sometime, probably 2003, 2004. And this is an excellent film, excellent historical reference for anyone that's interested in hip hop music and hip hop culture and culture is a big keyword with hip hop.

It's one of the big things they talk about in this, the film is really kind of focused on turntables as a musical instrument and how that started. You know, there's some great stories about that, but it's also, they kind of lay out what they call the elements of hip hop. Those that aren't familiar, the elements of hip hop are graffiti break, dancing, deejaying, emceeing, the way you talk and the way you dress.

Fashion is also kind of an element of hip hop. It kind of starts at the beginning with turntables who is involved in that, how that started, and then it goes through all these interviews with all these different dJs and hip hop artists. And what's funny is as, as the story unfolds and they're talking about turntables and everyone's telling the story of when they first heard of turntables scratching a record.

So many of these DJs tell a very similar story about Herbie Hancock and his track, which was called "Rocket"That was featured in the 1984 Grammy awards ceremony. And this particular show really had a massive influence on an entire generation of future artists mix master Mike Qbert, DJ shadows, Z trip Grandmaster flash, who was kind of, you know, one of the early artists, grand mixer DXT was the DJ that was actually scratching records in "Rocket,"

the track that was performed by Herbie Hancock for that particular show. And. Pretty impressive. Like how many people saw that performance and how many kids, you know, were watching that. And, uh, there's some great interviews where they, they talk about their experience, seeing that performance and having this expression of like, what is this instrument?

You know, this guy's scratching a record and it's making these really crazy sounds. And what is that? You know, I want to do that. So, uh, so scratch talks about that and talks about how turntables developed as an actual musical instrument, and not just. A thing that your parents tell you, you know, you're not allowed to touch the record player because the needle on the record player is real sensitive and you're going to break it.

You know, there's a really good stories about that, but then it walks you through how turntablism evolved and how artists have developed music through this one strange instrument. So, yeah, I really, I really liked this because it, you know, before I saw this, like I, you know, it was really kind of a rookie with hip hop.

I knew a few artists from the eighties.  I didn't know anything about turntables.  this, this gave me a lot of really great backstory for hip hop and where it comes from and how it started. There was a famous radio DJ named Steinsky big fan of hip hop. He's featured throughout a lot of the film and a lot of hip hop DJs and artists talk very fondly of Steinsky because.

Steinsky ran a radio show and gave like mad props to hip hop artists gave publicity, played their music. He's kind of an interesting character that's featured in the film and he tells a great story about the first time he, uh, went to a hip hop show and kind of related to stuff you were talking about, Leanne would sound system and, you know, the experience of going to a show, you know, he tells a great story about, you know, how, uh, he, he went to the show and he was.

So kind of overwhelmed and blown away by the sound in the room. But, you know, he was there with, with his date that night, he buys his date, a couple of drinks and he's like, okay, are you good? You know, are you comfortable? Okay, I'm going to go over here and I'm going to listen to this because this music is incredible, you know?

So, so that's really fun for me personally, the big takeaway was this particular track that came out by Herbie Hancock. What's interesting about the film. One of the things I walked away with is, you know, it does its best job to talk about hip hop explains a backstory about turntables as an instrument, but then like coming out of that, you know, as I started to learn more about hip hop and other kind of related types of music, there were some other artists that are kind of hinted at in the film, but maybe aren't featured.

And one of them is actually the producer who he's a really famous, very well-respected bass player named bill Laswell, bill Laswell for anyone that follows anything with electronic music, experimental hip hop, drum, and bass. Anything in that vein bill Laswell his name is all over the place. You know, he was actually the producer on rocket, which he's not featured in this film.

He's, he's a little bit of, I think he's, uh, a very modest, humble artist. And you know, if you dig around on YouTube, you can find information about him.  but he was someone that I'd kind of discovered many years later that is actually worth checking out. If you don't know about bill Laswell. But anyway, that's kind of just a fun little fact that bill Laswell, was involved in that Herbie Hancock track that, uh, was so influential in, in hip hop music and turntablism as an art form.

So yeah, I recommend this film for anyone that's interested in a type of music that has many different arms and legs attached to it. You know, it's not just about music, it's, you know, it's about the culture and yeah, it's a great film. So Leanne, what were your thoughts when you saw this for the first time?

Leanne: It was like old, New York was so weird because I'm from that area. So we moved here seven years ago. So I was there at that time. And like, it's just like, yeah, like nobody lives in Brooklyn in 2000 or in the nineties. Like that was not a place to live. Now. That's like the hot place. That's just so crazy to me.

You know, those things like how it's completely and utterly changed in 20 years. And it's just weird to how like they interview. Guys from Jurassic 5 in it. And this movie came out in 2000. So you figure it was in production in 99 or something like that? 98 99 in 2000. That's when Jurassic 5 became like big or being on the middle, like.

College circuit. I don't know how you would call it that they quality control came out that year. That was like the hot like album it's turn of the century. And they were not just turntablists anymore. They were band, you know, and when I've seen Jurassic 5, they're like a legit band with like several members and stuff

Buddy: yeah. I didn't know that much about Jurassic 5 at the time. So it's funny because it was a couple of years later that I discovered Jurassic 5. It got really into them. And then I kinda like, I was watching scratch a couple of years later and I was like, wait a minute, Jurassic 5 in this film?

Like, I love Jurassic 5 you, but you know, and I, but like you said, they're, they're younger and,  they're kind of,  just getting started. So. So yeah, Jurassic 5 is awesome. Great band. Yeah. That's the thing with hip hop and, and so many movements and music is the diversity is just incredible. I mean, as they're doing these interviews with all these DJs and hip hop artists, and Steinsky the nationality, the diversity.

The gender, you know, it's just all over the map. When you're talking about hip hop, it reminds me of like food culture,  you could be with a group of people that you have nothing in common with, you know, you could be working with a coworker that maybe you don't work with very often or hanging out, you know, with a group of people that, you know, you don't know very well and you dress differently and you don't have anything in common.

And, you know, when it comes to food, when you, when you get into a conversation about food, it's such a universal language. Like it's an easy bridge to tie different people in different cultures. And in groups together, it's a conversation stimulator. And I, I love that about. Different types of music and different types of culture in music, the way that race and ethnicity and people, when it comes to the art form, it has this magical way of building bridges between different people in different groups and bringing people together.

Diversity is an important part of libraries and our job at the Kansas city public library, something we all value and cherish and. And so anything that helps tell the story of culture and powerful forms of diversity, I think is, is all good stuff. 

Leanne: Right. And the obsessive record collecting. I think that's really interesting, like go into that.

Like, it's almost like we've been CISM, you know, it's like these people are like really into it, like to a crazy extent. So that's kind of cool to see that 

Buddy: Were you familiar. I think it's cut chemist, cut chemist as a DJ for a dry one of the two DJs for drastic five, right? Yeah. Yeah, Kevin is, he's a really funny guy in the film, but he's just, he's a character, but he's talking about DJ shadow and how he, he calls it the spidey sense.

You know, DJ shadow has the spidey sense because, when he produces his albums, he always has these. Really fantastic collections of vinyl records. And then they shift over to DJ shadow and DJ shadow walks you through this huge record store that has this just treasure trove of, wall-to-wall records that out in the basement and he's climbing over stacks of records.

And so digging is, is a term in and hip hop. That means literally digging through stacks of old vinyl records to incorporate sounds and instruments from those records in the scratching, the turntablism. So I like that story a lot and that whole explanation about digging. And it reminds me a little bit, I, I don't know about you, but I love I'm a big fan of like antique stores and thrift stores.

And, uh, we actually have this one little strip in, uh, off of Wornall road has like, you know, several really good. Thrift store is city thrift and red racks. And then there's an antique store up on. Have you ever been to, uh, you know, the river market area? There's a, a place that my grandmother has been taking me to for years.

It's called river market antiques. Have you ever been there, 

Leanne: like give deal with my furniture from my houses from there? Because I had, my house is like a, like 125 years old. So like not a lot of stuff to get in this place is itty bitty, you know, like just the, the doors and everything. So, yeah. We kind of have to buy antiques because, uh, That place.

Isn't that big. Yeah. Yeah. So I I've gone there and you go into the basement there and they got all sorts of cool. Uh, that's usually it's well, that's usually where they had kept the, uh, uh, vinyl and stuff like that. And also in other little places up in there, or what have you, yeah. 

Buddy: For anyone that hasn't been there, check out river Market, antiques, and the river market area.

It's a really cool antique store. And I mean, you could spend a whole afternoon there cause it's huge. 

But anyway, The only reason I'm mentioning river market antiques and thrift stores is when they're talking and scratch about digging and record collecting and how vinyl is used in hip hop to discover new material for scratching and sound effects and stuff like that. It reminds me of my own digging through antiques and kind of a fun little activity.

Leanne: Yeah. And it doesn't always have to be done like that anymore. Like, I mean, turntables now aren't always using vinyl, One of my dear friends is a very, he's an important turntablist in New York, uh, area Marcus pin. And, uh, he like, he does a lot of things with like digital, especially right now.

He is literally stuck in his house for the past few months, you know, quarantine. So that kind of thing. So, but he, every day he does his, uh, he practices, he puts it up on bandcamp, even at his wedding in February. He literally had a set in the middle of the way. I mean, it was amazing. He, he did it, he did a whole set and it was amazing.

So, you know, there are still, there are people who are doing it still this day, you know, and you know, he has a lot of records. Of course, my gosh, he still does stuff because I mean, just recently, he just, the past day he did a new track where he took like a speech from, uh, a recent speech from somebody and kind of like put it over somebody else's music.

And it's amazing. It's really cool. What people are doing now with turntablism. 

Buddy: Yeah, hip hop music is essentially fragmented older music. You know, that's through scratching records and mixing that with drum machine and they explained this in scratch how a lot of DJs will have two records. You know, if they find a good record that they want to use, they'll try to find a copy of that record because.

There are things that you can do when you have a two records on two turntables mixing and matching and alternating sound between the two that make it possible to do some of those sound effects. So the actual scratching techniques, you know, it's this whole art form that is in some ways, it almost reminds me of collage art, you know, I'm trying to think of like a movement in art.

Like Dada comes to mind like the poems and stuff from like art history Dada poets would take a published poem and they would chop it up and literally break it down into all the parts of the poem. They throw it into a bag, mix it up, dump it out and then rearrange it. So it was this totally new piece of poetry based on another poem.

Hip hop reminds me of that. It's got that collage cut and paste, you know, a lot of DJs in hip hop artists. They're kind of like. Each and every one of them is like a music historian. They, they know so much about the records in their collections. You know, they have these massive treasure troves, you know, massive archives of records because you almost have to have like a library of music to make hip hop music, which is fascinating.

Leanne: It made me think of like the, like some of the DJs I see over time who are like really amazing who aren't in this because of like the time period, this came out 2000, 2001. So like I saw Kid Koala once, and that was wild. That was so much fun. I mean, that was crazy. Cause he opened for radio heads. So that's like for radio, you're huge.

That's huge. So, and that was at Liberty state park, which is where the, um, that's in New Jersey where the statue of Liberty is. So it's like you stand like in the park, in front of the statue of Liberty and then like the city's ripe New York city I should say is like in the distance behind you. Um, but that was about, that was about three weeks before September 11th.

So like, that was the last time I saw that view. So that was really special. Um, and Kid Koala I'll just, you know, There was no house to bring down. So you're outdoors that he did bring the house out. He's amazing. Uh, I mean he had like three or four tuntables it was crazy. Yeah. And one time there's this hip hop, uh, fan, uh, lack the Newark, New Jersey.

Some people say they're avant avant-garde. Yeah, they are. They bring their own PA to a show. Uh, they don't use the, the old clubs they'd bring their own. And they tell you, like, watch out, like wear your protection. Because within 10 minutes I felt like my ears were like bleeding out. Like it was insane.

I've never heard anything like it. And their DJ DJ still, um, he was, I've never seen anybody play this way. He he'd be like, scratch the record, like maniacally, or like put his face on it. Almost like it was a vocoder and like put his mouth on the needle and like scratch the record like that. And he'd like, Start like headbanging and stuff like that.

He was wild. He was so wild. And then you were just like, had your hands over your ears. Cause it's so intense of a band what they're doing. Um, they put out several albums on ipecac records, so that's a pretty average Oh yeah. Mike Patton's label. So that was amazing to see them. I saw them at Irving Plaza in 2003.

Uh, unfortunately DJ still has passed away since then in 2018. Um, so yeah, so, but I'm really glad I got to see that that's really fortunate because. It's bizarre to see somebody play like that, but it's also like really cool, cause they're doing the elevating, the art form to make making different, you know, so that was really wonderful to remember that kind of stuff and be like, yeah, that was, that was cool.

That was a moment. And it's also, this is such an intramural sort of music. It is cool that there are sort of like tabs, like guitar tabs, so to speak. For it. Um, so you can replicate the music because it's a sort of improvisational music at times. So it's cool that there's tabs and things that people can produce it in the future.

Reproduce it. 

Buddy: Yeah. I I'm glad you mentioned shows, you've been, do kind of forgot about some of the shows I've been to. I think hip hop, it was the type of music I was interested in, but it kind of launched me into another genre, which was drum and bass. Like I was talking about earlier. Drum and bass is actually one of those hybrid movements and music really kind of founded on like jungle and electronic music and definite roots connected to hip hop, you know, but I'm glad you mentioned the shows you've been to.

Did you ever see Jurassic 5? 

Leanne: Yeah, I saw him what, like four years ago at grinders. Uh, so that's when you know the, it under normal circumstances, we would be having outdoor concerts at grinders. So that was really fun. That was a great time because meet and greet and everything, it was really nice. Like I met a chemist at the hall.

It was just like, I was like, hi, I'm nervous here I am. Um, so that was, that was really cool. Um, but they were, they were so much fun and they're even like, we're from the Midwest. Don't be, don't act like you're too cool. Cause they made us do like. Like sort of like crowd participation with a lot of crowd participation.

That's, that's generally normal in a hip hop show. Your arms were, would be up in the air for like five hours and you must wave then, like you don't care because that's a hip hop show. So yeah. And you get exhausted. I hip hop shows, but it's fun. It's a good time, you know, that's the point of going out? Yeah, 

Buddy: I haven't seen a lot of hip hop per se, but I saw the first like turntable artists that I saw that really impressed me was diesel boy.

Who's actually from Philadelphia. I lived in Philadelphia for a year and there's a real famous drum and bass record store. I don't know if it's still around it. It was called six one, one records, I think. And diesel boy lived right around the corner from me there, but I saw him actually in Milwaukee at a place called the rave.

That was. Just a big concert hall. I mean, there was nothing, but like it had like a taller stage, but it kind of looked like an airplane hangar, the show itself he's spins, I think for that show, he was spinning four. He was using four different record players and it was interesting to watch him. Cause I mean, you know, he's just surrounded by record players and he's constantly, you know, mixing this and that.

And, uh, that was incredible. Uh, seeing him live a DJ that I always, that I've always wanted to see. They very briefly mentioned him in scratch. And my understanding is that he wasn't interviewed for the movie because he's from Japan and he does not speak English. Um, I don't know why they, they didn't interview him and do subtitles, but I think, I think he's a little shy because I have not, I don't think I've ever seen an interview with him, but anyway, his name is DJ crush.

He makes some of my favorite hip hop music, real melodic. A lot of the sounds that he mixes into his music is pulled from Japanese culture and Japanese music. So, yeah, really interesting DJ crush. Can you think of any of their artists, patrons could check out the library. I know we have a good collection of stuff.

Can you think of anything? Have you checked out anything recently? 

Leanne: Well, I mean, Gangstar, you know, DJ premiere, that's kind of like, like my husband's really into that. So that's like, you know, kind of by proxy, I live with him, so that's happened too. I like it too. And she just put something out recently, as far as I know, I'd say like, see, it's, it's interesting.

Cause this is like turntablist, which is. Different than having a group, because then that like had changes the thing. So it's like, Hmm. There's a lot of hip hop groups. I can say, like have, get this up and get that album. But strictly just DJs that's that's a little. Tough to say, but there are same thing.

Like take notes on that when you're watching the bill or look at the, just like the, you know, the credits, whatever, and then start putting those keywords in. And then you'll definitely Hoopla is probably your best bet, I think, in finding these artists and like these albums, but even the CDs though, we have some crazy, like, very, very amazing that rare CDs that are in the question that you're just like, wow, I can't believe that's actually here.

So just look around it. You'll probably find it. 

Buddy: Yeah, mix master. Mike is, uh, another one of the other DJs. I really liked that's featured in the film and he was a teacher for BC boys, right? Yeah. He's an incredible DJ. And he's featured in the film. He's all over YouTube and DJs is like him and Qbert those two particular DJs they're really into like education.

They really liked. Teaching other people how to spin records and how to scratch. So yeah, you can actually check out Beastie boys stuff, mix master Mike Qbert, DJ shadow and DJ crush actually are two of my favorites. Yeah. Like Leanne said, take notes throughout the film or, you know, when the film ends go back and because we have the DVD at the Plaza library, you can skip ahead to different sections and jot down the artists and I'm sure you can find them in our collection.

Yeah. And then hoopla. Hoopla too. Actually DJ crush. Uh, you can't get through hooplah hoopla actually has all sorts of great stuff. DJ shadow, I think might be on there. Might have to double check that, but yeah, hoopla is great for 

Leanne: music. 

Yeah. It's almost daunting. Like you're like, Oh my gosh, I can't believe there's so many entries.

Like it's kind of awesome. It's like overload, but it's great. 

Buddy: So just to wrap up, comparing these two films and these two different types of music and culture. It would be fun to kind of pan out, compare and contrast the two Ska and sound system and hip hop and turntable and the culture, you know, the people's story of these two films.

What do you think they have in common? Do they have anything in common or are they totally different? Like what do you think? 

Leanne: And one's an American story and one's a British Jamaican story. So. Even though, you know, like rude boys about Jamaica and Britain, because of the popularity of the movement, it has translated into America and internationally.

So it's kinda, it's kinda different because you know, like Scratch come from an American perspective. More and it's, it's about a time and, you know, Rudeboy is a historical document, you know, it's like, it's, it's, it's, you know, it's a story about like, this is what happened and scratch just feels more like a slice of life kind of thing, but, you know, rude voice was your straight story.

Like, this is what happened. Correct your company. This is what happened with these people. So it's a little different, the feel of it is much different. It's like, with Rudeboy you're getting a standard, like story. Like this is the story scratches, a little more nebulous, you know, a specific record company.

So therefore it's like a very different feel I'd say. Yeah, yeah. Tattoo. Yeah. That's a good point. 

Buddy: Immigration is a big part of this story of Trojan records, right? 

Leanne: Oh sure. Oh, absolutely. I mean, that's what it's all about. I mean, because when Jamaica became independent and sixties, like that's when the others, a lot of immigration going.

Uh, Jamaicans were able to go to England. So like huge amounts of people, like hundreds, thousands of Jamaicans, bits of England. Uh, so like they talk about how like, interculturally, like people had to deal with like, you know, immigrating, they have sort of a different history than me too. So it's a different type of racial interaction, so to speak.

Yeah. In that regard, it's like, it's. The culture is different because we just have different type of, kind of countries, you know? So I think like the way the cultures work are different. 

Buddy: Yeah. I th I think that the parallel for me was just the mixture in ethnicity and diversity, even though there, like you said, cause that's a good point.

You know, rude boys is, it's a specific story about a specific culture and a specific time period and a specific record company with scratch. We're bouncing around to zooming in on like a particular instrument and then all these artists. That developed this type of music all over the United States, really, although there's a couple of parts of the U S where hip hop really kind of started.

But the thing that stands out for me is the diversity, the different artists and the melting pot of culture and ethnicity between one musician and the next, you know, I think there's a lot of. Blending and mixing of culture and ethnicity and hip hop. I don't know how you feel about that, 

Leanne: but I mean, America is different where we have super racial lines and things like that.

So I don't think it blends as seamlessly as, as it does in that world. It's a little different, I'd say there's a lot more barriers in our world just cause we have like worst segregation and things like that and culture and who goes where and things like that. So these are a little different. Okay. Just from my perspective, it's like integration wise, you know, at least for like the audience.

I don't know. Cause every time I go to a hip hop show, it's like, it depends on which the band you're going to see. You know, like sometimes it's know young kids. Sometimes it's like old jazz heads. It depends like, kind of weird. It's like hippies. So it, it really depends. Like I would never say like, Oh, when I go to a hip hop show or whatever, there's going to be like, I don't know what the audience is going to be.

Like. I have no idea. 

Buddy: I see. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. What I liked about both of these films, I guess, to wrap things up a little bit here, we're talking a lot about culture here and I don't know, Leanne comparing the music and the culture. That's. That we get to learn about through these films. I, how does this compare, you think to other, other types of culture, other types of music, I mean, what is it about this particular story that appeals to you?

What do you think will appeal to folks that are new to this? I mean, what, what is it that you learned from this that is different than other cultures or, uh, what's the difference? 

Leanne: The documentary itself is just very well made. Definitely. Like the structure itself is, is well-made. And it's like, there's so many new documentaries, either just being pumped out, like crazy, like, you know, everything on Netflix, but this is actually a good one, documentaries are very popular right now.

Yeah. But they're not, they don't tend to be good.

Buddy:  There are definitely some good ones, but yeah, I agree. 

Leanne: There's a lot of just pumped out stuff. That's just out there. 

That's like some are better than others, for sure. Yeah. Yeah. 

And this one's actually like really well constructed. And I think it's just like, you know, nothing about this music.

You'll told me to get into it just because the way that it flows, it's a really wonderful flow. And this is something that people should know about too. Like Jamaica is like our neighbor to the South. We have a very similar history to them. We have a similar history of England, obviously, so we should know about them.

They're our neighbors. Sort of, so, you know, we, and we had a lot of Jamaican immigrants in our country too, so we should like, kind of know about them and what they do and how they've enriched our lives with all of these wonderful music. 

Buddy: Yeah. You mentioned this earlier, how Bob Marley is not really discussed in this film.

And I actually really liked that cause I same thing. I think Bob, Marley's awesome, but. For some reason like reggae and reggae culture is so deeply tied to Bob Marley that it's, he's kind of front and center on a lot of reggae themed, radio shows. And it's like, there are other things. To the culture and the music.

And I really liked that this film is related to that, but different and tells like this whole story with, by giving you a backstory that excludes some of the names of the artists that you might be more familiar with, just because in our culture, that's the thing that's kind of maybe the dominant Bob, Marley's kind of a very dominant, popular figures.

So, yeah. So I liked that the film shows something new that, you know, had you not mentioned it, I'd never would have heard of this, you know, Cool. It was like a whole, whole new story to me. 

Leanne: Yeah. I mean, Bob Marley, when he was home, he had a totally different trip. It's semi religious. I mean, that's why he's like totally different.

It's like, you can't even compare it to it's like, yeah, he had a totally different trip and what he was doing. So yeah. I mean, it's good that, that he's not excluded. They talk like they eventually in, but he's not part of this movement and his music is totally different and it's. They're both incredibly important, Jamaican music and world music, but they're not the same story.

Absolutely not. That's a cool thing that, you know, like Jamaica's culture is, is incredibly important because it's everywhere, you know, it's spread across the world. So 

Buddy: Closing thoughts for a scratch. Are I like any documentary? That's. Telling you a story about something that just from like an educational perspective, isn't very well covered.

I think I've mentioned this before in the previous episode or the first episode, I think maybe in the first episode I was talking about electronic music and the synthesizer story, you know, Don Buccla,  moog synthesizers. And I just really appreciate documentaries that cover these specialized cultural topics.

That for some reason, maybe at a college level, you learn about some of this stuff. But yeah, I mean, people, it takes people that are really passionate about the music and the culture and the stories. To put together these fantastic documentary films. So whenever I see something like scratch or a rude boy kind of makes me think like, gosh, how, how lucky we are to have people making films like this, because these are like really important stories.

I mean, culture is, is a valuable. Essential core human characteristic. And, and it's a big part of the library, obviously because we're at the core of the Kansas city community. And, uh, culture is a big deal to us as librarians. So yeah, I guess every time I see a really good documentary film like this.

Whatever the topic is like, uh, when it's really well done and covers something that, you know, I've, I've never heard of before. I always had that feeling of like, wow, I feel really privileged to that. We have this particular resource or, you know, that I worked with other librarians and said are open-minded and exploring different types of culture and different stories.

Uh, because when we come together at work and we are sharing our references, you know, like, These are the kinds of things that we get to learn about and it's fun. And it's, it's fascinating. And of course, as a librarian, and it's always really a blast to share these resources with the community and with our patrons before we go.

Uh, one other question I had for you, Leanne, is, are there any, any good books that are related to the stuff we've talked about today? 

Leanne: Well, what I did was I actually, instead of books, I put together like a list of other music, documentaries, That are available through our, you know, different platforms, either DVDs and/or hoopla or Kanopy.

So, and once you left the movie, then you'll have so much more music to listen to. So enjoy that. 

Buddy: Okay. We can probably put those together into a list that we can attach to the podcasts for listeners. So thank you for putting that together. That's a great list of references and we'll see if we can attach that as notes.

For anyone that wants to check that stuff out. Okay. That does it prep it sowed five. Thank you so much to our listeners and supporters. And if you haven't had a chance to rate and review the show, we'd really appreciate that and do that in Apple podcasts. And we will see you next time. The Plaza library director is April Roy or manager, his Jerena Boyd Bay.

Our digital branch manager is David LaCrone. Our graphic designer is Levi Hoffmeyer show is edited by myself and David LaCrone and our music was written and performed by my pal Frannie Finster Clark. Thank you for listening. Take care. And we'll see you in the next show. .