Design Context: OUGD503- R.A.B Publishing Research

I am required to create two images to work along side hip hop quotes so I am going to collect some research on the artist and songs to get some inspiration for the artworks.

The first quote is:

Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five - "The Message"> "Don't push me cause I'm close to the edge/I'm trying not to lose my head/It's like a jungle. Sometimes it makes me wonder/How I keep from goin' under."

Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five fomented the musical revolution known as hip-hop. Theirs was a pioneering union between one DJ and five rapping MCs. Grandmaster Flash (born Joseph Saddler) not only devised various techniques but also designed turntable and mixing equipment. Formed in the South Bronx, Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five were one of the first rap posses, responsible for such masterpieces as “The Message,” “Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel” and “White Lines.” The combination of Grandmaster Flash’s turntable mastery and the Furious Five’s raps, which ranged from socially conscious to frivolously fun, made for a series of 12-inch records that forever altered the musical landscape.

Various combinations of Grandmaster Flash, Melle Mel and the Furious Five placed 10 records in the charts during a three-year span from 1980 to 1983. These included Grandmaster Flash’s dizzying turntable showcase, “Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel,” and the group’s acknowledged masterpiece, “The Message.” The latter offered a series of unflinchingly honest and discomfiting observations about life in the ghetto, with lead rapper Melle Mel returning to the same weary conclusion: “It’s like a jungle sometime, it makes me wonder how I keep from going under.”

As Rolling Stone observed, “’The Message’ was [the first record] to prove that rap could become the inner city’s voice, as well as its choice.” This slice of unvarnished social realism sold half a million copies in a month, topped numerous critics’ and magazines’ lists of best singles for 1982, and cemented Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five’s place in hip-hop’s vanguard. “I ask myself to this day, ‘Why do people want to hear this?’” Grandmaster Flash wondered of “The Message” in 1988. “But it’s the only lyric-pictorial record that could be called ‘How Urban America Lived.’”

The main points that stand out are that the song is about living in the 'ghetto' in the South Bronx in America so I thought it would be a good idea to collect some images of the Bronx that I could possibly use to create a digital collage.

The Bronx

The main characteristics I want to communicate through the artwork are decay, poverty and chaos to reflect the living conditions of the time. I want to manipulate perspective by picking out different parts from the photos above to create a apocalyptic scene.

The second quote I have chosen to is:

Mf doom- 'Accordion'> Living off borrowed time, the clock ticks faster."

MF DOOM is the most inimitable figure in hip-hop. As prolific as he is elusive, London-born and New York-bred Daniel Dumile owned artist anonymity long before SBTRKT donned his feathers and Daft Punk were still wearing bags on their heads. From behind the privacy of a metal mask, DOOM has painstakingly crafted a world of his own that's invited a cult following of fans like no other rap artist. It's a world drenched in sci-fi and comic book references, built through multiple personas, inseparable visuals and, of course, laboriously constructed bodies of music. Whether it be a concept album or left-field collaborations DOOM's world is one of a kind.

The artist is well know for the metal mask he wears which relates to the comic character Dr Doom. I want to incorporate this somehow into my design as its an iconic feature.