Wall Writers (2016)

Here's some screenshots from the great Wall Writers documentary. If you're a fan of real old school graffiti culture then this will be right up your street.
Bear in mind the film's title because we're going back, way back to the early 1970s and even the late 60s to when writers started out of street surfaces. This is to say way before trains and even before the various styles took hold. We're talking rudimentary actions here when all you had was a marker of some sort.

Narrated by John Waters (the legendary transgressive film director) this is an interesting journey back in time.
The writers are now well into their 50s and 60s now and some have wonderful recollections of their teenage years (as well as one writer with a truly harrowing experience) where they fumbled around before hooking up with others who also got down with the ink.

Personally I've always admired TAKI 183 who seemed to just do his thing for a short while then just disappeared back to live the life of an average schnook. He wasn't the first but he certainly influenced many who came after him. He's a very unassuming guy who seems almost bemused by what he helped create and it's nice to see him on screen still plodding away.

In case you can't find a copy of the doc, here's one for you to borrow. But please return it as others will want it after you.
(ABU HOLDS NO RESPONSIBILITY TO THE DAMAGE THAT MAY OCCUR TO YOUR PC IF YOU STEAL SHIT OFF THE INTERNET - PROCEED WITH CAUTION!)
And lastly here's some tasty links to whet your appetite.

Wall Writers " Graffiti In Its Innocence" Q&A - YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mON1lh5XTZ8 

Throwback Thursday: The Aerosol Autographers 1971 - 12ozProphet
http://www.12ozprophet.com/news/throwback1972-the-aerosol-autographers/

Graffiti in Its Own Words:
http://nymag.com/guides/summer/17406/index1.html

Martha Cooper's quintessential photos of NYC:
https://i-d.vice.com/en_us/article/documenting-the-70s-golden-age-of-nyc-graffiti-culture

History:
http://www.at149st.com/hpart1.html

Getting Up: Subway Graffiti in New York by Craig Castleman (1982)
http://bit.ly/2q6sbim
 
Honouring the Bench at 149th St. & Grand Concourse:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/erikburke/sets/72157615891116334/with/3409829358/


(SHOUT TO IRISH CRAIG)

That Wild Style Baby Sample

Being a bit of an audio nerd does tend to get on my nerves sometimes.

You never know when a certain sound is going to spark off a day's worth of investigating the source.
I'll hear a brief sound then wonder where I've heard it before. Or sometimes I'll know immediately as in this particular snippet.



Listen to the first couple of seconds of this advert from Aveeno.
That baby gurgle sound. So far, so normal. For me though, as soon as I heard this on the tv I immediately thought of the movie, Wild Style.
There was a record produced in low quantities especially for the DJs in the film which consisted of specially-made funky instrumentals intended for the MCs to rhyme over.

 

One of these tracks - Baby Beat - begins with a baby expressing the same happy gurgle as the baby in the above ad and then progresses into the breakbeat.

They do sound remarkably similar though, don't you agree?
It makes me wonder where it came from in the first place. The baby noise must've been taken from some sound effects record and played over the track whilst the Wild Style recording sessions were going on back in 1982.

I'd love to know where it began.




Here are both the baby samples side-by-side.
But where does the source come from?
Who knows....