Original subtitles

Video Music Box is the place to be.

And you can see they got it going on.

I'm VJ Ralph McDaniels doing my thing.

Recorded live from Miss Jones' birthday party,

Nas and Biggie Smalls getting wrecked.

So what happened was somebody... They was fighting behind me.

- Yeah. - And stuff flew.

And my boy tried to be smooth with it in wiping me off.

They say, "Yo, why is he touching your head like that?"

And me and Big were starting a crew

called The Goodfellas at the time.

That... That's why we said that, Goodfellas.

When I look at clips like that,

I'm, like, it's, like, a miracle that someone knew

that they should be taping that.

Those are lost moments, you know?

They could easily be forgotten moments forever

if nobody had a camera.

But Ralph McDaniels and Video Music Box

were there, capturing it.

I go back in a time where there being a chance

to get seen, get noticed, be heard.

That was big.

This is a story that needs to be told.

A story that I've always wanted to tell.

Hey, you know, everybody is talking

about the good old days, right?

Everybody, the good old days,

the good old days.

Well, let's talk about the good old days.

Come to think of it as bad as we think they are,

these will become the good old days for our children.

Backstage, Spitkicker's tour.

Mos Def, what's up, baby?

What's up, Ralph?

Now what were you saying about Dream?

Shit. I'm on Video Music Box.

Fuck everything.-

This is a magic moment.

Like fireworks and shit

- should be going off. - You just arrived.

Oh, man, I'm here.

- Hey, look, man. - I want give a shoutout.

- Oh, shit! - Yes! Go! Go!

Video Music Box got it going on.

We in here at the Ark.

We got some shoutouts.

- How old are you? - I'm 22.

Just got off the plane from LA.

Praise God I made it without crashing.

It's Greg Nice and Scooter D And we came to rock a spot.

So won't you take our advice.

And turn to the box.

- Go, Biggie. - What?

Yo, what's up? We're Run-D.M.C.

When we ain't chillin' in Jamaica Park,

we chillin' out looking at Video Music Box.

- Word. - Word.

Yeah, to all the killers.

And a hundred dollar billas.

What's up? This is 50 Cent on Video Music Box,

the number one video show.

Bet, take that. What!

I'm just an addict addicted to music.

Maybe as a habit, I gotta use it.

Coming home, racing home,

and getting in there and hearing

that opening theme song...

It's like you look up.

Video Music Box is on.

And then, you know, that's it.

You're shutting down.

Give you a little history

about television in New York.

We didn't always have cable.

There was Channel 2, Channel 4, Channel 5.

7, 9, 11.

13, educational.

And then for some reason, it jumped

from 13 to 31.

Nas, why did you do it?

You know you got the mad fat fluid.

When you rhyme, it's halftime.

And the U Channel, whatever that meant,

you go to the other knob

and find these outer space channels

that don't... just white noise.

- Empty channels. - They were empty channels.

Dance, get up and get with it.

Shante is here to take care of business.

So plug up the mic and stack the dough, yo.

It's almost like cracking a safe.

When you finally get that right

little combination, you be like,

"Don't touch it.

So this way when Video Music Box comes on,

we can see it clear.

I got it made, I got it made, I got it made.

You'd pick up the telephone,

"Yo, Video Music Box.

Channel 31 on the UHF dial.

He's playing music videos right now.

He's playing hip-hop." We were going crazy.

We were losing our minds.

You was fly once.

Now you're losing all your fronts, yeah.

Started off light.

On the tip of woolie blunts.

But now you get a stripe.

Graduated to the pipe.

Took a long pull, hype, yeah.

You started off, R. Kelly produced you.

And you got out there.

And, I mean, he's produced a couple of projects this year

but yours was the most successful outside of his own

that he's done.-

And, of course, you know,

there was some controversies going on,

so I'm gonna cut to the chase and we're gonna get it off.

I know everybody asks it.

What is the situation 'cause we don't know?

Okay. Well, I'll let you know...

To let you know... no.-

But, no, really. I wanna let everybody know

that it's not true.

I'm Aaliyah, not Aaliyah Kelly.

Video Music Box in the '80s was must-see TV.

- You made an appointment. - You watch Video Music Box.

You watch Ralph's interviews.

LL Cool J. Well, LL stands for ladies love,

legend in leather, long and lean,

love of ladies, last of the red hot lovers.

Looking for little, level-headed leader.

And you watch the videos.

And then he gets into parties.

Video Music Box broadcasting live

from the Peppermint Lounge in East Orange, New Jersey.

I'm Wendy Williams.

You can see the parties.

...in full effect.

And you know where you wanna be the next week

if you can gain access.

Mr. Lover lover.

Mr. Lover lover. Oh

Mr. Lover lover. Hmm.

Sexy mothafucka.

She call me Mr. Boombastic.

Tell me fantastic.

We've been in the gutters together.

- Exactly. - It's nice to do all of this.

And now we back up in here.

I did a song called "Big Up".

And that's how I got the whole idea for "Big Up"

by everybody going on the mic saying...

Big up. Big up. Easy.

This just came together like my man, Doug E Fresh.

And all of the beautiful women out here

who came together just to have a good time,

celebrate the overweight lovers' party.

We out.

Actually seeing people

that look like you,

unapologetically hip hop

and, and Black,

it empowered the whole, you know, culture.

We got the Wu right here, my man Raekwon up in this piece.

Peace. Peace. What's poppin'?

- Good to see you, brother. - He had perfect pop.

He's the first uncle.

Everybody thought hip-hop

wasn't really gonna do nothing.

They thought it was just going to be a phase,

like, "Man, it's over with."

No, Ralph carried it on his back like Santa.

Heavy D and The Boyz.

I'm rough and tough and all that stuff

I'll make you dance and prance.

As a rapper, you had to get

your videos on his show.

If you didn't get on there, you didn't matter.

Sucker you missed I put feelings aside.

I know who I am My name is Lyte.

Is your name Sam?

My earliest memories of hip-hop

are frankly from Ralph McDaniels

and Video Music Box.

And he was playing music

that we couldn't get our hands on.

I try to explain this to my kids

that we didn't have everything at our fingertips.

We all knew there was no coverage

of our rap heroes.

And that if they would just give us five seconds

of The Fat Boys on... on national television,

we were waiting, I was waiting.

Somebody had to start it.

It's like Moses and the apostles.

Video Music Box has that impact.

It's that biblical for us, you know?

These legends that gave birth to a whole world.

Summer Jam, really, you need to be like...

To have like the records ready.

It just always kept its credibility.

Welcome to Video Music Box.

Today a special show

recorded at Rahway State Prison.

It was always authentic.

Whatever was happening in the neighborhood

was gonna happen on Video Music Box.

Video Music Box to me is an underrated piece,

not just of the story of hip-hop

but of the story of American culture.

Like that, I gotta like that.

I need it like that, I love it like that.

I made it like that, I know it like that.

I don't feel like that, I hide it like that

I'm rockin' like that, I'm feeling like that

I'll take it like that, yeah.

Yo, you're looking at the best MC in the world.

- You know what I'm saying? - Yo, what's up?

This is Kool Keith from the Ultramagnetic MCs.

And I'm with my main protégé.

- Money D. - You know what I'm saying?

Yo, this is my man Craig G.

And this is DJ Mister Cee.

He DJs for Big Daddy Kane.

- Hello, everybody. - My name is Doug E. Fresh.

- And we are... - The Get Fresh Crew.

Yo, I'm Teddy Ted.

And I'm Special K of the Awesome 2.

And we're chilling with triple number one.

This my man Steady Pace.

And this my man, Masta Ace.

I'm MC Shan, the crowned prince of rap.

And I'm the royal microphone, Lord Big Daddy Kane.

And I'm Cutmaster Cool V and you know I do damage.

And we're rocking with the box.

When we ain't out cooking hibachi...

With Barry Manilow...-

And stealing gummi bears from grocery stores.

You are watching Video Music Box

with Ralph McDaniels and the VidGrownup.

It basically became a religion, all jokes aside.

It was something that we couldn't miss.

You turned Video Music Box on,

you was like, "This happened Saturday.

That happened Friday. This... ".

And then he was there and they was there.

It was revolutionary.

It was revolutionary.

- You know we didn't have WHT... - That's right.

Well, Mecca Home Theater for you... for you guys

- that don't remember that. - That's right.

And HBO. You know we had Ralph McDaniels.

That's the only thing we had.

- You know, Video Music Box. - The VidKid.

I'm VJ Ralph McDaniels.

And I'm the VidKid.

Right here where you keep the music at.

- Video... - Music Box.

Ralph McDaniels and his partner, visionaries.

Man, I guarantee you, they had no idea where this would lead.

There was something divine speaking through them.

Yeah. Video Music Box doing it up,

backstage at the Spitkicker's tour.

It's going down like that. My man Black

- throwing the place. - What's up, baby?

- What's the word? - What's the word, baby?

Video Music Box started with Ralph.

- It was Ralph's idea. - It was Ralph's baby.

Three, two, one.

New York City, in the place to be.

Hi. I'm your VJ, Ralph McDaniels.

Tonight, Video Music Box kicks it live from the South Bronx.

It's the 10th anniversary of the Disco Fever.

So if you're ready, let's get busy.

State your name, gangster.

Ralph McDaniels,

R-A-L-P-H M-C-D-A-N-I-E-L-S.

I was born in Brooklyn, Brooklyn Hospital,

in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn.

My parents are from the...

One is from the Caribbean, Trinidad,

and one is from down south, American Indian.

We live in Brooklyn, baby.

Brooklyn was rough.

A lot of people talk about the '60s

as though it was all hippies and love.

Nah. That never reached to where we were.

There was no hearts and flowers

and girls with long hair singing... no, no.

It was... It was rough.

Totally different from what it is today.

You know, you had a lot of heroin back then.

In the projects, it was pretty intense.

A lot of street life.

My grandmother and grandfather

owned the house that we lived in in Brooklyn.

A brownstone.

Everybody that lived in our house was family.

You know, a cousin lived on the top floor.

My uncle lived on the second floor.

You know, everybody had their own entrance and everything.

But we knew each other.

My mom is born in the United States.

She's the first generation.

Everybody else came from Trinidad.

She's like a hard worker.

Trinidadians have 20 jobs, if you don't know.

- I'm a Trinidadian. - I have that in me too.

I have 20 jobs all the time.

My grandmother's house is also the spot

where if you're coming from the Caribbean,

you can use our address.

So... 'cause you had to, "Where you going?"

You get to the Immigration, "Well, what's the address

- that you're going to? - You need an address."

So all of these people were coming from Trinidad.

One of them is Geoffrey Holder.

Never had it, never will.

- Why? - Why?

Why? Good question.

My cousin Geoffrey came to New York,

- and where was he going to stay? - At Uncle Johnny's.

And that was, you know... he lived with us for quite a while.

He's in the Bond movie.

He's in... He's in, you know,

all of these different things.

And it's like Geoffrey's a big deal, man.

Like he's a painter.

He's a writer, you know?

And he's become this New York socialite.

And that's, you know, my mother's cousin.

And I think that that's where I got

the idea to wanna do TV.

So my dad worked at the shipyard in Brooklyn,

the Brooklyn Navy Yard, and he drew the drafts of them,

the schematics of, you know, of... of the aircraft carriers.

You know, those are pretty decent jobs

for Black folks around that time, you know?

We weren't rich, but we had enough money

to have something in the refrigerator

and I had, you know, some decent sneakers

- at the time, you know? - So we were cool.

The Jackson 5.

So let's have a fine welcome.

As a kid I watched... Of course,

everybody watched Ed Sullivan.

That was where the music was at.

Please, please, please...

I love James Brown.

- I love the soul. - I love the way he danced.

And James Brown was considered like rebellious back then.

- You know, like, "Say it loud. - I'm Black and proud."

People were like, "Oh, oh, oh."

And then Dick Clark,

American Bandstand, I watched that.

People all over the world are just beginning

to talk about The Beatles.

Dick Clark was like amazing.

He knew all this information.

I was like this guy is cool and he's smooth as hell.

We saw The Jeffersons.

We saw Good Times.

But we didn't see too many people that,

that looked like us on television.

Anytime there was a, a Black person on a show,

we'd be like, "Oh, shit. Aretha Franklin

- is gonna be on tonight. - Yay." We'd be happy.

Stand up and take a bow there.

Diana Ross.-

We saw The Supremes, a lot of Motown,

The Temptations,

Ellis Haizlip who had this show called Soul!

Which was amazing to me.

Live and in color from of New York...

But then later on,

I started to get into Soul Train.

Always in parting, we're gonna wish you love,

peace, and soul.

Black people was having a good time on the Soul Train.

I'm like, "What club is... What club do they go to?

They look mad happy."

'Cause you didn't see it too often.

There wasn't too many Black people on TV.

We moved into Queens when I was 11.

We wanted a different environment to raise him

and we felt that moving to Queens

would be a nice surrounding.

The idea of going to Queens

was that Brooklyn was kind of crowded.

Let's go to Queens where we can have

our own home, first of all.

They didn't have their own home.

Better schools in Queens.

The education is gonna be better.

The community is gonna be better.

In the '60s, early '70s, there was a lot of movement

as African Americans made more money

or had better jobs.

They were looking to purchase homes.

When it comes to Queens,

you can literally find someone

from everywhere in the world.

And we've always been very accepting.

- Queens was nice, man. - It was residential.

- It was a neighborhood. - It was a community.

Everybody on the block knew each other type of thing.

When we get to Queens, there's not a lot of people

that I see that look like me.

In fact, we're the third Black family on the block.

In the early 1970s, a few middle-class Black families

with very much the same idea in mind

began to move too.

The Whites saw their coming as a threat.

- All right. No big deal. - I'm gonna get on my bike

and I'm gonna ride around and we're gonna have fun.

So I'm riding and this White kid,

sitting on his stoop,

and it's him sitting there with his mother.

And the kid goes, "Look, Ma. A nigger."

And I looked at him and I...

Now, I've never been called a nigger in my life

up to that point,

and I didn't even know it was bad.

I just knew that it wasn't good.

- We don't want that. - We want to keep

the neighborhood the way it is.

- We love our neighbors. - We're all...

We're very, very close.

So I was like, "Okay." I kept riding.

Came back to the crib, told mom,

"The kid down the block called me a nigger."

We were riding down this block and, and these white people

started saying, "Get out of here, niggers."

And my mother looked at me like,

"We come all the way from Brooklyn

for a better life."

At that time, I was... My concern was

did we make the right move moving here to Queens Village

because now he's exposed to a different environment

than he was exposed to when we lived in Bed-Stuy.

I just wanted a White neighborhood.

No Blacks at all.

- We lived here. - There was a Black family.

My friend Dawn and her family lived over there, and ♪.

Maybe one other Black family down there.

It was all White people.

Within 10 years, it was all Black.

White people probably was like,

"Damn, why did all the White people leave?"

But that was it.

They was outta here.

- White flight. - White flight.

There was some people that you saw

that were blatantly racist.

And then there were other people that were White people

that were like the connection was the music.

Me and Lionel, we used to go buy records together.

That's how we started our relationship as friends.

- He'd buy a certain amount. - I'd buy a certain amount.

We'd be like, "Yo, I need a second copy of that.

You know, you can hold mine."

- I was just buying records. - That's all I was doing.

And I see this guy next to me

when you're going to pay for it

and I have a stack of records literally about this thick.

We've created a DJ group

and it was called The Brothership Connection.

New York late '60s, early '70s

was a hotbed of, of music

like Parliament-Funkadelic

and Sly and the Family Stone, James Brown.

Then, of course, you had the music

out of Philadelphia, The Delfonics.

And then you had the Latin fave man,

Joe Cuba, Joe Bataan,

you know, the Jimmy Castor.

So we were very plugged in

with music across the board.

So my Uncle Michael is my hero.

He's the guy who got me started in this whole music thing.

And he would buy vinyl, 45s, LPs.

So there were all these cool clubs he used to go to.

One summer, he said, "We're going to Riis Beach,"

which is in Brooklyn.

And there was an outside jam

and a basketball tournament going on.

And you got like pro players there like Clyde,

Frazier's there, Earl Monroe is there.

You know, I'm like, "This is amazing."

But more amazing to me than that was

there was a guy playing music and he had crates

of records, speakers, and turntables, and these amps.

I was just like, "What is this?"

I heard records I never heard in my life.

And the crowd is going crazy.

Especially if you play Love Is the Message.

Love Is the Message by MFSB is like the song

that will never go away.

And back then, you know, party's poppin'

and then, boom, comes Love Is the Message.

And the place goes nuts.

And I'm like, "That's what I wanna do.

I like that."

I want to make the people go nuts.

There was a club in Queens called the Blue Ice

where Ralph started.

And all I could tell you, like, it was amazing.

It was a little bar, a corner bar.

It was always crowded, and, uh, and we were playing,

like, disco, R&B.

Ralph was playing the R&B,

some of the dance records that were happening,

coming out of the '70s.

And in the '80s, we had the Furious Five,

Spoonie Gee, and Donna Summer records.

Whatever was hot, he was playing it.

As a matter of fact, a lot of the rhymes

that people were doing in the streets

were off the beats of these big street bands.

Ralph shined like nobody else.

I mean, I've just never seen a guy command a room

the way Ralph commanded a room.

People always talk about Studio 54

in that particular time and I'm like,

"Oh, they were Black discos." Like there were like...

There was a whole Black disco scene where like...

Like if you like Chic, Chic came out of that scene.

And those people weren't going...

They weren't even allowed to go into Studio 54.

Like, if we went to Studio 54, we weren't getting in.

Steve Rubell was not checking us right now.

He was like, "You all definitely at the wrong club."

And then slowly but surely rap started

to come into the picture.

Every disco that died turned into a hip-hop club.

- Hip-hop here. No, no! - Don't Close the venue.

- We'll take that over. - Set the DJ up.

Russell Simmons and I became friends

because I was into the music, playing music.

He was into giving parties.

And Russell had already went up to The Bronx.

He saw what hip-hop was all about.

I remember he gave me a record with somebody rapping on it.

"Yo, Ralphie, play this." And I was like,

"So why would people buy this record?"

He said, "What do you mean?" I said,

"We, we rap in the park for free every day.

Like why are people gonna buy these?

They can just come and hang out with us."

He stood there for a minute, he looked at me,

and he was like,

"Everybody is not coming to the park."

And I said, "Oh."

You mean that this is happening in other parts of the world

or could, could potentially be happening

in other parts of the world?

I didn't even imagine that that could happen.

Flash and, and Bambaataa, and, and Herc...

- Gotta talk about Herc. - Can't leave him out.

- Herc's the godfather. - But everybody

had their own little crews.

So the MC was on the mic.

The MC was really the one who got the party hyped.

Everybody starts going to, to this dance

called the freestyle.

In The Bronx, they called it breakdancing.

In Brooklyn, they called it freestyling.

So that became the new thing.

Then everybody started wanting turntables

at that point, but everybody couldn't

afford turntables until we had the '77 blackout.

Once the blackout happened,

my brothers came home with turntables,

speakers, you name it,

and we had our DJ equipment.

The b-boy was the kid who may not have had shoestrings.

They may have had some fly slip-on sneakers.

Some may have gloves on for like a spin and...

It's like a crew,

Rock Steady and all these guys.

Back then, like I said, it was territorial.

The streets was buzzing.

The home of hip-hop was in The Bronx.

And, um, and then it moved around

to, you know, other parts of the city,

Queens, Long Island.

And then it branched on.

Listen, if you're... If you're a hip-hop guy,

the majority of the guys that engaged in this music

at that time are criminals, of the criminal nature.

It's just the tough era.

You know, we were sort of like influencers of that era.

When rap really started to become popular,

we were kind of, like, the supporters and sponsors.

Back then, you know, we was rich, you know?

Why were you guys rich?

From that street entrepreneurship, you know?

And so one thing about us, we're not braggadocious.

We don't kind of glorify our past history,

but, you know, for folks that's viewing,

I would say just Google us.

A big misconception is that hip-hop

was always nice guy music.

You know, every block party I went to

ended up with violence.

Somebody got robbed, they turned off the music,

or some shots in the air.

The Feurtados, they weren't flashy at all.

They weren't... you know, there was some people that,

you know, they had all the flash, fly gear.

They was regular dudes, but they were everywhere.

- Serious business. - Serious business.

By the time I got to my first year of college,

they had this internship program.

One was communications.

- I said, "I'll take that. - What does that mean?"

"Oh, you might get a job at a... a TV station."

- "- Oh, sounds exciting. - Yeah, I'm down for that."

And so my first internship was at this company

called Manhattan Cable TV.

It was on 23rd Street and I would go there

two or three times a week.

And there was all these little monitors.

And my job was every hour,

there's a microphone there and you say,

"Hi. You're watching Manhattan Cable

and it's 6:00 PM,"

or, "You're watching Manhattan Cable

and it's 2:30 AM."

And I was like, "I talk?

Ooh. Nice.

Nice. I get to talk on a mic."

And there were shows like The Robin Byrd Show.

If Santa can't come down your chimney,

you just may be able to see me.

It was like porn.

And I was like,

"Yo, this is dope."

And what you do is, you light up your hash pipe

and get it going.

Al Goldstein.

Fuck you, Carlyle Hotel.

- Oh, man. This is crazy. - We don't have this

on my regular TV.

It was enlightening because I realized

there were other things going on outside of Queens,

'cause I was in Manhattan every day.

- I'm in 23rd Street. - I'm getting

on a train, getting off.

I'm looking at different people.

People come from different places.

They look different.

They... They act different.

You know, and I'm at the age where I'm...

I'm... I'm... I'm able to get it.

Channel 31 was my third internship.

A bunch of Black folks are now starting to get hired

at networks, ABC, NBC, CBS.

Oh, I met Ralph,

back in the early '80s.

We was just two young brothers

trying to figure out how...

After graduating from college,

how we was gonna get a job in this TV industry.

One day, these tapes came in from a...

And it said Sony or something on it.

I said, "Yo, Ed, let's put this in.

Let's see what we got here."

- Ed puts in it. - And it's all of these groups

performing in a sound stage.

Now, I'm starting to see MTV.

But I realize that they don't play any Black music

other than Michael Jackson.

I was like, "Why don't we just play this on TV?"

Ralph would sit down and write a little script

of what he was gonna be saying.

And basically it started out where we had the videos...

And we put it together, and like,

like we were making a mixtape, really.

That's what we thought we was doing. But it was for video.

So it was really a, a video mixtape in the beginning.

I was like, "Boom box,

music, video.

We're gonna call it Video Music Box ."

And everybody looked at me like, "You sure?"

I'm like...

"Sure it's not Music Video Box?"

- "- Nah, son. - It's Video Music Box ."

- And that's it. - It's a big boom box

and it shows videos." And that's what we're gonna do.

And that's when Video Music Box was born.

Hello, Video Music Box.

We keep it on the block, the house, yo.

Yo, kid, it's about that time.

- Whose time? - Box time.

Lionel didn't wanna do the video thing either.

Half of Video Music Box.

He didn't want to be on screen or nothing like that.

He brought me in to, uh, kind of check out what was going on.

When I went to the station WNYC,

it was on Channel 31,

that was the first time that I ever was in a TV studio.

I saw the monitors, the waveform monitors,

- cameras, and I was hooked. - I was like, "Wow."

Lionel was getting ready to go to the service.

He didn't figure... He was trying to figure out

- what to do with his life. - And I'm like,

"Yo, you might wanna mess around with this TV thing.

It's kind of like deejaying, but it's video."

Everything was like deejaying to me.

It's crazy where hip-hop,

you can say it started with a DJ.

- Yeah. - And video shows

for hip-hop started with a DJ too.

- So it's, it's attached. - Yeah.

And the way the show ran

- was like records. - Right.

You know, Video Music Box

brings you the best and the latest first.

Here's Talking Heads, "Once in a Lifetime."

And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack.

Basically, he was playing music videos

and he was doing a voiceover.

I never wanted to be on camera.

I didn't wanna be a celebrity.

I didn't wanna do none of that.

I just want it to be my voice.

It's gonna be, like, a video radio show.

- What's up, man? - Nice to meet you.

Hi, Video Music Box.

How you doing, Music Box? I'm with Salt-N-Peppa.

This is Salt and this is Peppa.

You got Sandy D right here.

We used to hold the mic like this.

So we hold the mic out and... To the artists we would talk to.

So you never saw the person.

You just saw the microphone

and the artist, like, saying whatever.

Yo, The Afros are gonna tell us what the next video

is gonna be on Video Music Box, show what they wanna see.

Believe that, baby.

I was like, "Well, why don't we get in the shot

with them and hold the mic and stuff like that."

And the camera person was like,

"One, two, three." And Ralph said...

Video Music Box in full effect.

I'm VJ Ralph McDaniels...

And I was like, "Uh." I just, like, froze.

I had no idea what to say.

I pulled out the sunglasses, put them on my face.

- I said, "All right. - Let's do it again."

He goes, "I'm VJ Ralph McDaniels."

And I said, "And I'm the VidKid."

- And I went like this. - And I said, "Word."

That's right. Keep on rocking with the Box with yours truly,

VJ Ralph McDaniels.

- And, of course... - The VidKid.

And that caught on.

And that's how VJ Ralph McDaniels

and the VidKid was born.

Ralph on camera comes across like your brother

or your uncle, Uncle Ralph.

He didn't come across like a, uh, a media personality.

The term uncle mean another level

where you're elder to them,

but they look at you as you're cool,

you're hip, you impact it with them.

But you have a respect.

And I start calling Ralph that

because I saw how people was taking to Ralph.

Ralph was the one who took uncle and made it mean something.

Ralph became Uncle Ralph for real.

And he deserved that because that was a title

of endearment, for sure, and respect.

I like to say what's up and peace to Uncle Ralph first.

- Video Music Box. - Uncle Ralph.

- Uncle Ralph... - everybody love y'all.

From our reggae spectacular,

he is Moja Nya with Rise Up.

There were certain videos that we played

that you didn't see anywhere else.

We were exposed to other cultures.

Ralph used to play the Caribbean stuff,

the... the... the reggae stuff before we even knew Jamaicans.

I would see Jimi Hendrix,

- Madonna, Run-DMC. - We saw Whodini.

Of course, we know what they look like

but we never seen them like in,

in... in physical form performing and stuff like that.

You gots Tha Chill, Big Daddy Kane, and Rob Base.

It takes two to make a thing go right.

I remember just being in my room,

going back and forth,

trying to learn the choreography.

The first artist I saw on the Box

was probably the Force MDs, Force MCs,

Roxanne Shante, UTFO...

Gizmo's scratching Milk Dee's rhyming.

Milk is chillin', Giz is chillin'

Milk and Giz all day, MC Lyte.

It was just amazing to watch all these new artists.

There wasn't enough hip-hop videos,

so I had to fill up the time.

I was on six days a week.

- Say... - Tell me what you want...

We would say, "Okay, let's play Hall & Oates

because that's some funky soul, White boy shit,

but we love it," you know?

We... We... We loved that right there.

"Or let's play Bernard Wright, Who Do You Love."

Who do you love?

Girl I'm in love with you.

Are you for sure?

Sure as the sky is blue.

So all of these things was coming into my head

as I was putting the show together.

And I think we gathered that from being DJs.

Are you ready to go 'cause...

The streets dictated to what we were doing.

The streets would tell you if you're playing something wack

on the radio or on the television,

"Yo, that shit is wack, son.

What you doing?"

So one day, I'm on the train

and these dudes are, like, grilling me on the train.

Like, like, you could easily get jumped

on a train like quick.

So I'm like, this is going to be a problem, you know?

And as I'm about to get off the train,

the dude goes,

"You're the dude on that show that played the videos?"

And I'm like, "Yeah."

"Yo, we like that shit."

And I'm like, "Damn, man.

We sat here for 10 stops.

Like, I thought it was about to go down...

Why you ain't say that 10 stops ago?"

And so that's when I knew that the streets

was checking for me.

Big gettin' wide Gettin' money up in honies.

Not funny, you're my sonny Or your honey.

- We're getting large. - On Video Music Box.

- With Ralph McDaniels. - And the VidKid.

Ralph stayed steadfast his commitment

that this is what he is going to do.

Because once you are visionary,

you can see things that you really don't realize

that's in your psyche until it manifests.

That this is gonna be something that's gonna not only set

the world on fire but it's gonna get people

who look like me a fair opportunity

to get into the world and make some money.

Video Music Box doing it right.

Got my man Funkmaster Flex in the house.

I remember when everybody was dying

to get on Video... Video Music Box.

Like if you heard it was gonna be filming

somewhere at a club, everybody went to go.

They'd look for that bright light

and wanna get right over there.

Why? Because you knew

everybody's gonna know you was at the party.

Now, the same effects happen to people who don't want

people to know that they was in the motherfucking party.

That's what he brought to

even the darkest times of hip-hop.

He brought that bright light.

And now you see me jiggy, you puzzled.

He ain't sellin' no records, is he?

That nigga gotta hustle.

It's super important, you know, for us to be seen in,

in a light by someone who truly understands us,

you know, 'cause once we're in the room,

then we... you know, we're gonna... we're gonna...

We're gonna navigate that and do what we have to do.

- Hey, man. - This is Ralph McDaniels.

And everybody's on pins and needles

for what you're about to introduce next.

And this is... And we didn't know,

we just have to sit here and wait,

and then you would introduce us to new videos.

...with Kool G Rap & DJ Polo

and the all-stars from Cold Chillin'.

And then you would do all the shoutouts which...

You brought... You brought the radio to TV.

- Yeah. - You start to get...

I don't think anybody else did shoutouts.

No. No.

I wanna give a shoutout to all my family

- and all my true friends. - Love you, Janet.

I'd like to give a shoutout to my daughter, Ratisha.

Big shoutout to my moms, my girl, my son,

- my nephew, my brother... - Yeah!

Everything originates from the hood.

The shoutout, it's all of that.

- Happy birthday, Jennifer. - I love you.

- Yo! - Shoutout to every nigga

that came from the projects that's behind the wall

in Rikers, we love you.

Whatever that is, that resonates and moves through the city.

And it touches down and lands.

I wanna give a shoutout to the Bronzeville

south side posse.

Yo, I'd like to give a shoutout to everybody's girl.

It's priceless.

...working out of Rikers Island.

- Yo, my name Monique. - I'm from AC.

I'd like to give a shoutout to everybody at Rutgers

and New Brunswick!

Yo, I wanna give a shoutout to lockdown brothers, word up.

Sea-cacus, Yards-ville.

- Motherfuckin' Northern State. - All that good stuff.

That's our world.

Sometime when you get a shoutout from my...

My husband in C76 or whatever it may be,

or he might be upstate, somebody in Green Haven,

Comstock, that makes them feel good,

makes them feel like someone's thinking about them,

especially if they're... They doing time.

Say peace to my cousin, Jazzy, back in A Town. PA.

I'd like to give a shoutout to my daughter, Janika,

my moms, my pops, and the 40 Crew.

Everybody in Flatbush, yo. In the house.

Video Music Box shoutout is your moment,

is your moment in the sun.

...Akeem, Ameen, my boyfriend, Hale.

Growing up and being able to see images of myself,

especially on Video Music Box was a blessing,

'cause you didn't see too many kids

who looked like me.

I'm, like, really not too much of a partier anyway,

so, you know, it was the Box was perfect for me

so I could just watch it, you know, say,

from the comfort of the home and just be like,

"Okay, yeah." Feel like I'm there.

I'm in the middle of thousands of people sometimes

with the camera.

They grabbing at the camera.

They... everybody was just trying to get on film and...

- Lot of classy people in here. - I'm feeling it.

- All right. I'm feeling it. - I'm feeling...

I'm feeling you out, for truth.

So you're just standing here, making a fashion statement,

interrupting the flow of the party.

It was just an exciting part of what we did,

which is the core of Video Music Box.

"Let's go to France, Egypt where we came from!"

Crazy Sam was doing this thing called the Uptown Comedy Club.

Went up there, I ain't hear no comedy.

And then finally, Crazy Sam came out and he just talked.

And people would laugh.

I wanna give a shout out to my man,

you know who you are.

I like when y'all say that shit,

"And you know who you are, nigga.

All six of y'all."

And he did these characters, Billy Strong Boy,

and this lady, the Spanish lady on the bench

who talks about everybody.

He was a character.

Best way I can describe him is like,

what Flava Flav is to Chuck D and Public Enemy, you know?

And... And that was something interesting too,

for the fans, you know, they liked it.

He became his own personality

and he developed on that show.

I come from a family of religious gangsters.

I mean, I buy crabs for, like, a whole city block.

You got crabs, you got lobster, you got everything out there.

Welcome to Nervous Thursdays.

Where everything is nervous.

Started out as alternative videos,

and he was so hot that he was like,

"Why are you giving me the wack videos?"

He was like,

"Ralph, I need the good videos."

Welcome. I am here with my home boys.

And we're all chilling.

We would send him out with a... with a camera,

and he'd just come back with the craziest shit ever.

Oh, I don't like the wind.

It's strong, it's going...

He was a nutcase.

- This lady right here. - She's so short.

Don't get me upset or nervous.

Uh-huh. Uh-huh.

- Tim Dog. - Tim Dog's in the house.

Hello.

We're Five Star and you can see our video.

"All Falls Down" on Video Music Box.

Video Music Box continues with a hot one

from Billy Ocean "Mystery Lady".

Na, na, na, na, na, na.

I actually met Ralph on a blind date.

I don't think he'll remember this,

but he came, like, with a teddy bear.

And we met,

and then my cousin left,

and he left... They left us by ourselves.

And then the rest is history,

Thirty-five years here together.

Three, two, one.

No, this is not... ugh.

Three.

- Rolling. - Three, two, one.

No, this is not MTV, it's Video Music Box.

A great program with positive informa... sorry.

No, I'm gonna do something else here, hold up.

I'll tell you when to start then I'm just gonna turn to you so.

Go.

We take the beat to the street with the top 40 sounds

of Madonna, New Kids on the Block,

and Bruce Springsteen.

Let's do another one.

It was just in the midst of the beginning

of Video Music Box, so he prepared me for it.

Red, how'd you like the party?

Yeeeeeaa, what's up?

- You know what? - This is a spectacular party.

I enjoyed it very much,

and, you know, I hope things keep on going strong.

And you guys, y'all are the best.

Video Music Box continues

with Boogie Down Productions featuring KRS-One.

To let us into your skin.

Why?

'Cause then you'll begin...

- Yeah. - ...To master.

Rhymin', rhymin', rhymin'

Criminal minded, you've been blinded.

Lookin', for a style like mine.

You can't find it.

They are the audience, I am the lyricist.

Sometimes the suckers on the side gotta hear this.

Page, a rage and I'm not in a cage.

Free as a bird to fly up out on stage...

- Oh, man. - The live performances

on Video Music Box were like a treat.

Yo. The Jazzy Jeff

and Fresh Prince early joint at

uh, Union Square.

Music, and make parents and children.

All sit down and they both be willing to...

These are memorable moments

for like New York hip-hop dudes.

- Yo! What's up? - I'm The Fresh Prince.

And this is a brand new group coming out of Philly

called 2 Too Many.

And here's their video.

- Where's the party? - Y'all took too long.

All right. Go ahead, do it again. Take seven.

- Yo! What's up? - I'm The Fresh Prince.

And there's a brand new group coming out of Philly called...

...2 Too Many.

I don't like that.

I don't like that.

We didn't make no money off of the TV show

because we was non-commercial. It was a non-commercial station.

If it became money, it would turn into something else

that I wouldn't have control over.

And I liked the idea that I could play

what I wanted to play and not have to worry about it.

I said, "We'll, make money somewhere else."

The only way we made money was doing the parties.

I love New York. This is the...

I mean, no place parties like New York, baby.

I'm ripped for real.

These promoters was out here.

And we're seeing... We were doing the math like,

you know, "Wait a minute, they charged $20.

It was a thousand people in that was $20,000.

Oh, let's do that, we could do that."

And so we started doing the parties.

All right, y'all ready for Tribe Called Quest,

- New York City? - Put your hands together.

I did go to the parties that Ralph promoted

and they'd always be packed.

Right now is about New York.

And that's what we... you know, we all about New York right now.

You could see the Wu Tang Clan over there.

Tribe Called Quest over there...

Well, can I get a level on the bass and on the treble.

Footin up and down like a UNLV Rebel.

The answer be amongst us cause we rarely dig acoustics.

Can't be too much flackin', not too much packin'

You must container that at least to dip your hand in rap.

Foxy Brown getting ready to warm up over there.

And a few White people were in there,

like, you could feel them

trying to steal our flavor again.

You could feel it.

Black comedy is blowing up.

- You know, what I'm saying it's blowing up, word up. - Def Jam.

We got the power, we got Uptown Comedy.

You know what I'm saying?

And there was a lot of Black comics out there

that's just as good as me, man.

We need places to work out.

Please look out for us, man.

Check us out and support Black comedy.

And I got Beast over here hiding.

Beast found this man for me

'cause it was hectic to get to them.

Beast was, uh, the head of our security.

And, um, we had a team called the Gorilla Force.

And it was a no nonsense crew.

So artists would come,

we were able to get A-list artists

to come even to Brooklyn.

Ooh, la, la, la.

It's the natural law that the refugees bring.

Ooh, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la la, la, lah.

- Sweet thing. - Yeah, yeah.

- Yeah, yeah. - Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, in saloons we drink Boone's.

And battle goons till high noon.

So when you see like the Fugees and Lauryn Hill

and Wyclef perform,

again, it's breathtaking because, remember,

you were in a neighborhood that people don't expect

nothing to come out of a neighborhood like this.

We never had any casualties.

People had a great time and a great experience.

Oh, yeah, Video Music...

This is the guy on TV.

Like, how many times do you see the guy from TV,

let alone the number one show?

Video Music Box, Pete Rock, CL Smooth.

And he's in your neighborhood hosting the party.

- We're in the inner city. - We're poor as hell.

- We're watching TV. - This is the guy.

Guess what, he's in the spot down the block.

We going.

You know there's some old people sitting out there

watching going, "How can that young man now

wear that thing around his neck like that?"

- He's just fulfilling his dreams. - That's all, you know.

Video Music Box definitely was very,

very influential in terms of fashion as well.

You'll see a certain artist,

you'd be like "Yo, what's that hat right there?

Oh, I wanna get that hat.

You know, I wanna get that jacket."

We saw everything from the jewelry

to, you know, Ghostface in his robes

to, you know, Mary with her hair pulled out

- of the top of her hat. - And we were all doing that.

Well, hip-hop started on independent labels,

you had all these local hits.

It went from that to more serious deals

with better labels,

it became more normal

to see the artists that you were buying,

put out videos with those albums.

Now, we know there's no reason

these records can't reach the masses anymore.

Up the block from me were these guys

named Full Force.

And Full Force was a group that came out early days.

And they knew where I lived so,

they would come and knock on my door in my house,

I'm like, "How did you guys even get in the building?"

- And I'm like, "All right. - What's about to happen?"

And so, "Did you get our video, Ralph?"

And I'm like, "No, your record company

is not giving it to me because they want me

to pay for it." "We'll fix that".

The next week, the woman from the record company

calls me, "Hi, Ralph, I'm gonna send you

all the videos that we have out."

And that's how my relationship got better

with the labels and as well with the artists,

because now, we were working hand in hand with each other.

Ah, yeah.

When I say "Can I kick it?"

I want everybody to say "Yes, you can!"

One, two, three, go.

- It's like that, y'all. - What!

It's like that, y'all.

It's like that, y'all.

It's like that, y'all.

It's like that, y'all.

It's like that, y'all.

Come on, come on.

- Can I kick it? - Yes, you can!

- Can I kick it? - Yes, you can!

- Can I kick it? - Yes, you can!

- Can I kick it? - Yes, you can!

Can I kick it?

This is the Video Music Box collection,

You know, this is where we keep everything.

This is what we used at TV stations back in the days.

And this is how I did Video Music Box

most in the '80s, that's...

classic Ralph with the... with the high...

With the high-top

talking to the legendary Dizzy Gillespie.

What influence did Charlie Parker have on you?

The greatest influence.

The biggest influence on my playing.

And how do you feel about the music business now,

in general right now?

In comparison to before when you first started?

Well, there's much more respect.

They respect it as an art form now.

How, what were the feelings back then

when you first started?

Nigger music.

It's not hot tracks or U68.

It's a video show that we think is great.

- Fresh... - Fresh out of the pack...

- From eight to nine... - Video Music Box.

It will blow your mind.

Good evening and welcome to Video Music Box.

Tonight, Fresh Fest 85.

Taped live at the Nassau Coliseum.

It was the Fresh Fest tour

that put us in the big coliseums

and once again,

Ralph was the only camera in the room.

Him filming

the Fresh Fest in Nassau Coliseum.

Run-DMC,

18,000 people.

It was crazy.

Everybody in the world was there.

I think that's the first press conference.

- I ever went to in my life. - Run-DMC, you guys

got anything to say to the...?

And we get there and we see

all the different cameramen.

I mean, like, national networks.

And we just set our cameras down right there.

We just fit in, like that's the thing

that Russell and Run-DMC did, they brought every new first,

a press conference you know,

a press pass to be backstage,

The Fresh Fest was amazing.

- Come on, clap your hands. - Come on, clap.

Kurtis Blow, Fat Boys,

Whodini,

they had these break dancers.

Chad and Jermaine Dupri were breakdancers.

This is my brother Dynasty...

We had a good time.

They was like, probably 10, 11 back then.

But that tour went shit, like, 40 some cities.

Grandmaster Flash is on the turntables.

This is actually the first time I seen him.

Like I see him on the album covers

but I never seen him DJ.

And he had a dude next to him, he was going like this.

While Flash was cutting and scratching.

That was epic to me.

From Hollis Queens,

Jam Master Jay

and Run-DMC!

After I saw the Fresh Fest. I was like,

"Oh, White people are into this hip-hop thing heavy."

Because I went to Fresh Fest in Long Island.

And it was mixed.

And everybody knows the lyrics the same way.

- "- Oh, this is crossover. - This... This... This has...

No, there's no color on this anymore.

- This is just rap. - This is just hip-hop."

So, went to MTV.

I said, "I got to get Video Music Box on,

it's time for a hip-hop show."

"You don't understand, Ralph.

Middle America's not ready for no hip-hop."

And I said, "What are you talking about?

I just came from...

Let me show you the footage of Fresh Fest.

Let me show you this."

White kids are singing, Asian,

- Latino, Black. - We all together.

And they said "Nah, you don't understand.

- That's in New York. - That's not how

the rest of the country works."

- I don't know about that. - These dudes is on tour, bro.

They're going on... Ain't just in New York,

they're doing these shows, they're touring."

- "- Nah. Not ready. - I don't want to scare nobody."

And I was like, "I think you're wrong."

- Yo! - A year later,

they came out with Yo! MTV Raps.

Their blueprint was Video Music Box.

Video Music Box was the essential show

for hip-hop on television.

A lot people want artists to live up

to a certain standard, you know, like,

be role models and all that kind of stuff.

I'm sure, that's put on you all the time.

Yeah. But it's kinda hard, I mean...

It was... It was never a competition

with MTV with Video Music Box

because Video Music Box was its own thing.

You know, just the love of the art,

and it was still important and needed,

the job wasn't done,

You want to know the star status.

When I walk in the studio.

Mic's there, tracks spare, and I'm ready to do me some.

You know, new artists needed to be put on,

people that don't get the chance

- even before YouTube. - You know what I'm saying?

To really get a light shined on them.

We're getting ready to steam roller,

so here we go with Ice-T

and High Rollers on Yo! MTV.

The difference is Video Music Box

was us showing us,

and MTV was them showing us.

That's the bottom line difference.

That's a different vibe sitting there watching it.

So I'm not worried about it, you know.

I'm like, "Nah, we good."

So finally, now, they're getting speed.

I can see they getting comfortable

with they doing what they do, they getting better

- at Yo! MTV Raps. - So I'm watching it, and I said,

"Okay, we got to go deep, deep,

deep to the underground."

And we start pulling out all these underground artists,

guys that nobody's heard of, Jay-Z.

When I first got my little interview,

- I was happy as hell. - It was like a,

you know, a badge to get that Ralph interview.

I know you got new thing going on with a new label.

- Yeah. - Production's growing, huh?

Yeah, yeah. We doing the same thing as these cats.

That's why I came down, you know, I mean, represent them.

They did a priority thing,

we doing that too Roc-A-Fella Records

on their priority also, you know?

G Rap.

To be a billionaire takes hard work for years.

Some nights I shed a tear while I said my prayers.

The most incredible hip-hop artist to me ever.

You know, we're looking for that dope shit

that's in the clubs, that's in the street

- that we hear in the cars. - Luke...

Doo Doo Brown Doo Doo Brown.

Doo Doo Brown Doo Doo Brown.

Doo Doo Brown Doo Doo Brown.

Doo Doo Brown Doo Doo Brown.

You know Miami bass music.

Nobody's playing Miami bass in New York.

Nobody was playing our videos.

Oh, it's too much ass.

Oh, too many crotch shots.

Well, Ralph was not playing the same videos

that MTV was playing.

Straight outta Compton!

Crazy motherfucker named Ice Cube.

From the gang called Niggaz With Attitudes.

Like, by '88, we're playing N.W.A.

Nobody... Who the hell is N.W.A.

and why are you playing that in New York?

So we're... we're going after hardcore music

that's for the ghetto.

All night-a.

All right-a.

All night-a

Ay, sing with it. Ay!

Oh! Give it up.

What people don't realize

is because it's a show,

they really made me...

It really made New York

my number one selling market.

I don't really play no keyboards and instruments.

My man, I'll hum him song things.

He'll come with ideas, we work together,

we make hits together, we make money together.

The first video that I begged Ralph to play

from Bad Boy was Craig Mack "Flava In Ya Ear".

Just like Uniblab, robotic kicking flab.

My flavor bidder badder chitter-chatter.

Madder than the Mad Hatter.

You know, on that day, it broke the video.

And that video and that piece of art

was so impactful

that it launched Bad Boy.

Have you forgotten

that once we were brought here,

we were robbed of our name?

Why did you care so much about community?

Because, you know, it was violence

going on in our community.

Here it is. Bam!

In your face goddamn.

This is the dope jam.

Crack tore the neighborhood to shreds.

- A lot of gun violence. - You know, it was...

It was tough times and times, You know I mean.

Some of us, we sold the drug

and some of us was victim to the drug.

But the drug made you do things for $5

that you wouldn't do for 500.

So because Ralph had complete editorial control,

in between the videos, he could drop some knowledge.

You know we're here to talk about... we're gonna have,

you know, like a conversation, on what I think

is probably one of the major problems

is young Black men killing themselves off.

And, uh, I wanna first talk to you Guru

about the, uh, the video that you have out,

it's called "Just to Get A Rep".

And this is how the story goes.

Brothers are amused by others brother's reps.

But the thing they know best is where the gun is kept.

Young brothers are just, like,

everybody's frontin' on each other. Everybody...

Like, it's a lack of self-esteem.

And to gain esteem,

they want to take something from the next man.

Bring him down so,

to gain more respect, to gain a rep.

I believe it was Ralph that came up

- with Word. - Word.

That's what they were saying on the street.

That's what we was saying, "Word?"

Behind that slang,

came information.

If I'm real sad, I just cry about it.

Just get it all out, you know, my system.

I think crying is a good way to get a lot of things out.

So we... we... we would drop

in stopping teen pregnancy.

It was important for me to get information across

in the show like edutainment.

You know, it was like, we can educate you

at the same time as entertain you.

He also was the voice of kind of reason

and bringing to you social issues,

very... not as speaking down to you,

speaking with you and just kind of sharing

with you what's going on.

And I think he's probably the only person

we trusted about what's going on.

- It's Uncle Ralph. - He was Uncle Ralph,

he was bringing it to you.

I would say that 10% for me

of Video Music Box at the time was artists.

The other 90%,

we were in the community or doing an event.

I live in Brooklyn, people from outside Brooklyn say,

- "- Our Brooklyn niggas is wild. - Them niggas is just crazy."

- Now, we ain't wild. - Why is that?

Because every time something bad happened,

- they put it on the news. - But when something happens in

other places, they don't bring it out like that.

Video Music Box is based on family.

It might've really come from my parents.

You know, they were really active

in community-based issues.

Families is... is bigger...

Is a bigger word than business to him.

Well, I think, um, the security is good.

I think everybody feel more safe

and they need to just leave those guns home

and, you know, just chill.

Get their education so they can get there

and make something out of their self.

Via survival, you have become a victim.

A war victim.

They're not even being respected

under the guidelines of wartime.

So we would go to Rikers Island all the time.

You know, we had relationships with corrections,

and they would let us come in

because the inmates watched Video Music Box all the time.

They would... uh, the correction officers

that I knew would be like, "Yo,

when Video Music Box comes on,

- no stabbings, no nothing. - Nothing's going on."

Soon as it's over, it's back to business.

Everything's crazy again.

Prosecutors say they were part of a gang

of about 30 youths, so we're on a wilding attack

in Central Park last April.

Korey Wise, when this thing comes out

about these guys the Central Park Five,

you got some five Black kids

and you got one White woman

and it's just... You can't win.

These Black kids are gonna lose,

it's not gonna... it's not gonna work out for them.

Later on in life, I'm watching this tape

of Korey Wise talk

and he's in... he says "I was in, um Rikers Island

and watched Video Music Box."

So I'm like, "What did he just say?"

After I found myself, uh, becoming incarcerated,

that's when I found myself embracing...

Embrace the Video Music Box.

Video Music Box, it just... It just...

It spoke to my soul.

I guess it helped raised me.

"Video Music Box would like to thank the staff

at Rahway State Prison for allowing us

to come in and do this story."

Rahway prison used to write me.

The guys used to write me all the time.

And then they got a record deal.

And... And traditionally, over the years,

people have come out of Rahway with record deals.

With a charge and our system locked.

When you don't wanna live.

And they had a record deal when I was a kid.

I used to listen to their records.

It would say "Recorded in Rahway State Prison."

We call this the house of pain.

Because prison is about suffering,

it's about living in pain 24 hours a day.

And it was the real deal. These was lifers.

Like, these was cats that they wasn't getting out

no time soon.

Yeah, the Rahway presentation

was particularly searing,

because it was sort of an indication

without being lectured to,

you probably wanna avoid going down this path.

Because this is a circumstance

that you may find yourself in,

if things go the wrong direction.

I'm trying to make babies, I'm trying to raise babies

with a strong mother and a strong father figure,

and I can't do that when you're behind bars.

- Go ahead. - So respect.

But I need you here, too.

So, maybe you recognize the fact that I need you,

- if you know what I'm saying? - To build our young

and create that army.

If we don't make it this generation

but the next generation will.

We tried to find a balance

in presenting Video Music Box over the years.

You know, we can get as hood as you wanna get,

we can give you some knowledge

in between there, you know,

- and we can have some fun. - However, you wanna mix it up.

I mean, Ralph, we come from an era

where it was really a dream to get on at this time.

- Yeah. - You know?

You know, to become and maybe get some love

from Rey, get some love from you, you know.

That was a part of the dream, right?

- That's right. - Just to make it that far

and just have a record in the neighborhood,

who would've thought it'd be a major

business conglomerate like it is today.

- Rap has arrived! - The music and the culture

has been absorbed into many parts

of mainstream America.

Rap music and hip-hop culture

have gone from being an inner city

homeboy lifestyle to a popular music.

Craved even by suburbia.

At this school, the kids learn the four Rs,

reading, writing, 'rithmetic, and rap.

Most of the expressions here make quite a bit of sense.

Fat cables for example means big gold chains.

Full moon, that's a large back side.

I think the corporations started

to see the change, the prospect of making

a lot more money and being in more control.

You saw the money grabbing

and... and the opportunity for individuals

like myself, uh, coming from these areas.

Uh, the... the lane started to kinda get

a little bit more narrow.

Everything in the world

has some hip-hop tied to it,

and corporations are making

an absolute killing off of it.

Once the inner city got you,

then the outer city wanna get involved,

the Whites, whatever, the other people that's living outside.

They say, "What the hell are all those niggas doing?"

- It's gotta be something. - Let's get involved.

That's the money we can make out of this.

All these black motherfuckers jumping around and shit.

How can we make some money out of that?

And I am Cash Money, the number-one stunna.

- I'm the Birdman Jr. - Weezy, baby.

I mean, hip hop in the '90s,

we got rich.

We started to know our worth.

You know what I'm saying?

So, you know, you... You started to have people

that actually, you know, became millionaires.

I'm a capitalist

and I'm about making money,

but definitely, uh, when a corporation comes in,

that's when the manipulation comes in.

And I'm happy for everybody getting money,

but it corrupts the system.

You know, my era came in with a sense of-of,

"We're not going to work for you.

We're going to own our own shit,".

And we had to figure it out because there was a lot

of trickery in these contracts

and a lot of shit like that.

Yo, show time, let's go!

What?

When you first start, you know

you're doing it because you love it.

- It's something new. - You're trying something,

and then it became something epic.

Ralph McDaniels went from becoming,

you know, somebody that was doing this shit.

It was a great idea.

And then, now he's an activist for the culture.

Everybody deserves a shot.

- He gave people that chance. - He gave people that shot.

That was part of the building blocks

to get us to where we needed to go.

Video Music Box, all right.

We're here, I'm in 125th Street.

Broad Money about to drop this Tuesday.

I'm taking it's kinda like... You know,

to the subways today, that's kinda crazy right now.

Oh, yeah. You know what I'm saying,

ain't no artist get on the train

since MC Lyte, you know what I mean?

- So... - MOP up in the place!

It's going down like that.

I can't find someone else

outside of our immediate family

that's in the business that supported MOP

as much as Ralph McDaniels and Video Music Box.

- How about some hardcore? - Yeah, we like it raw!

- How about some hardcore? - Yeah, we like it raw!

- How about some hardcore? - Yeah, we like it raw!

You never would think that your video

is coming up next,

and he's gonna actually say your name,

and he's gonna be excited about your song.

- He didn't care. - He's just doing a video.

The whole neighborhood is hyped.

So we basically did

the video for the neighborhood.

The reason why we started making videos

is because I said sometimes,

"I don't like the videos that we get that we play

on Video Music Box."

Sometimes it just doesn't work.

I always want the video to take it to the next level.

So, your movement can only be, like, right here,

you come back this block.

Me and Lionel was sitting down one day

and we came up with an idea of a name

of a company called Classic Concept.

Then, we started, like, really producing

and shooting our own stuff.

Well, my name is Roxanne, and don't ya know.

- Roxanne's Revenge. - Roxanne's Revenge.

Right. That's the first hip hop video we ever made.

We shot it in Queens, Queens and Brooklyn. Yeah.

And I remember Ralph, you know, doing his directing,

and Lionel Martin, and he was like "Yeah."

And I was like, "Oh, these are professionals

- with three cameras. - This is great."

We weren't really in it for the money.

Ralph's perspective is like,

- let me get to know you. - What do you like,

let me hang around your neighborhood.

Let me see how you eat, how you move,

- how you walk. - Ralph did everything.

MC Ren, we had MC Rail, Steady B.

We shot music videos for all these artists

and we made them matter.

I grew up on the crime side.

The New York Times side.

You know RZA was like, "Yo,

I got a song that's called C.R.E.A.M.

I want you to do it." And I said, okay

and I... I listened to it, I was like wooh.

Cash rules everything around me

C.R.E.A.M., get the money.

Dollar dollar bill, y'all

I'm telling him things, like, yo,

- catch the trees. - Catch the rocks.

- Yeah. - He was just like, "Say less,

- I got it under control." - He did what he had to do.

He made that shit match the song.

- Yeah. - When I was starting,

you gave me my visuals

to show me to the world.

Sparkle like a diamond, sneak a Uzi on the island.

In my army jacket linin'

Hit the Earth like a comet, invasion!

Nas is like the Afrocentric Asian:

Half-man, half-amazin'...

I saw us as a renaissance

of young Black filmmakers.

The buddha monk's in your trunk.

Turn the bass up not stories by Aesop.

Place your loot up, parties I shoot up.

Man, Ralph played a... a big part

in Nas' rise because he did

the press kit for Illuminati.

The 20 year old Nas is a product

of one of the largest and toughest

housing projects in New York City.

Queensbridge Houses, AKA The Bridge.

It's full of crime, full of all this crack, drugs,

- all of that. - Just like every other ghetto.

You know what's funny? Is, like, when we did your EPK,

- I don't know if you realize... - That was huge for me.

Right. Right.

I don't know if I ever saw one of those done...

- Right. Did not. Not on TV. - ...for anybody else. Nah.

Because nobody played them on TV.

They just used to give him to the...

you know, TV stations.

- "Oh, this is Nas... - Yeah.

...the new artist." They'd look at it,

"Oh, this is cool," but they never put it on TV.

- Right. - I was like,

"I'm gonna play it on the TV."

Before even Sony even said it.

You know, we was in... We was like this,

it was like, "Oh, shit, bro.

We're, uh...

We're about to be... Yo, we made it."

He has a lot of style, you know what I'm saying?

He... not only lyric-wise, you know like, his person.

I don't even know if you remember,

when they got me on the phone with you, and I was like,

"Well, what's your idea? What do you want it to look like?"

And you said, "Just like Video Music Box,

like what you normally do." So, I said, "Oh, okay.

We could do that." And that was all I needed to know.

So, I said, "We gon' do that, we might as well play it."

I'm a product of hip hop, you know what I'm saying?

I'm a product from... Of the old school

and the newest of the new.

Ralph had his eyes on everything that was moving,

so he knew who I was

even though I wasn't anybody at that time.

But it's Ralph, so he knows what's going on.

Thank God.

It was simple back then right?

Some of the things that you see here,

I guess, are some of your items.

I don't know if you have everything here today

but just give us the idea or the audience an idea

of some of the other items you might have

or the items in general.

Well, for... as for right now,

we, uh... we're testing the New York market...

I tracked Ralph down all the way into Virginia.

I saw him and I gave him a couple of shirts.

Then, he did this interview with us,

and he was the one who, kind of, anointed us

right there and said, "Check them out.

Good clothes.

And, you know, you need to know who they are."

The phone the next day was ringing off the hook.

Ralph started to put out something called Fat Fashions.

- A fashion show. - I didn't have any money.

He said, "No problem.

- You can just show in the show." - Please give it up

for Team FUBU.

So, when I approached NLL

or I approached anybody else,

Ralph had already basically

whispered in their ear due to me airing.

He opened the door for those artists

to believe in me, and I don't care

what artists they are today,

they owe a large part of their career to Ralph.

In 1998, or before 1998,

Giuliani decides that he was gonna get rid

of some of the assets the city had.

And one of them became the city TV station, NYCTV.

Video Music Box. Ruff Ryders, this is how it's going down.

My man, DMX, in the place,

it's a beautiful thing man to see you, man.

- Once again, congratulations. - Yeah.

Thank you very much to all.

And I don't think they really understand

- how beautiful it is. - You know what I'm saying?

'Cause for me, being a dawg, lock down,

- you know what I'm saying? - Watching you on the Box,

- you know what I'm saying? - And now,

- being a part of this? - I knew...

I just did what I had to do. You know what I mean?

And, and I'm glad to be here, man.

- I am the streets. - I will be the force

of the streets till I die.

You have a fan out here.

- Thank you very much. - For real.

- Video Music Box. - You know what I'm saying?

You know I'm with it, the branch, whatever...

Channel 31 was the biggest outlet we had.

Everyone got to see Video Music Box on channel 31.

So when they decided to sell it,

it was a big loss for us...

I gotta stand right here, man.

Sixteen years, I had been doing Video Music Box.

Can you get this in the background?

So, when that day ended,

and we got all our tapes, and we went,

put them in storage, did whatever we did.

Video Music Box doing it behind the scenes and...

And I went home and I had nothing to do.

Oh, this is real, like it's really not happening

no more, like.

And, you know, we were still doing music videos

but Video Music Box was me.

I remember Ralph was very upset

because it was like, now it's...

- I got to start from scratch. - All the relationships.

I developed, all of this stuff

and everything like that.

And now you got to start all over again,

on a political side as far as getting himself in.

It was like an empty hole.

- I was like, "Okay. - What can I do?

Should I go to MTV again?"

I go to BET.

Maybe there's another channel that's out here

that would take our show.

You know how like you right here,

you was... you was hot.

It wasn't like we did anything wrong, like we fell off.

We was hot when we fell off that channel.

Come on, man.-

And I was like, "Damn, dudes is going

to be playing me when I come up

and start trying to get a job over here.

They're gonna handle me."

My pride got in the way.

Like, no, I ain't asking nobody for that.

- We're gonna wait it out. - And I just waited it out,

and waited it out, and waited it out.

It wasn't Ralph's fault that the channel

was closing down. He had nothing to do with that.

So, he was like, "Okay, it's happening".

This is Ralph, Ralph was like, "All right, no problem.

We're gonna figure it out."

And I remember crazy Sam calling me.

What you think the next move is?

I said, what the fuck you mean what the next move is?

Hey, Ralph, you want me to go in the streets

and promote this shit everywhere,

every record label, every fuckin' place

that moves, barbershops?

He said, "Nah, I'm gonna lay back,".

I said, "What are you gonna lay back for?"

I wasn't even going out.

I didn't even want to talk to nobody.

I was like, no, I gotta figure this out,

- I gotta figure it out. - Don't talk to me.

And crazy Sam's, "Yo, come on, nigga,

come outside. Come outside."

And I was like, "Fuck it."

So, let's see what's going on.

And we're gonna proceed on, all right?

But it didn't keep Ralph from not taking

his show elsewhere.

It took a lot to search, but he never gave up,

and he made sure that he found an outlet

for Video Music Box.

And it was this other station,

- which was like channel 31. - It was channel 25...

He went down for a little while.

But then when he popped back up again,

it was just like he never left.

I'm that same brother, you know,

Untouchables, hunny-sixth.

I'm with Uncle Ralph on Video Music Box.

You know who this lady is?

She goes by name of Keyshia Cole.

You know, I prepare for the worst and wish

for the best, you know?

Can you introduce yourselves, real quick?

- I'm Beyonce. - I'm Kelly.

- Hello, I'm Michelle. - And we're Destiny's Child.

It's getting hard for me.

And I don't wanna leave.

I said you're the only guy

that I haven't seen before live.

And when, when you got on stage I said,

"This is incredible, man."

That'll be the same day I give the game back.

You know the next question dog "Yo, where Dame at?"

This track the Indian dance to bring our reign back.

Yo, go to the studio right now.

I got the legendary cats out of Houston, Texas.

They go by the name of the Geto Boyz. Check it out.

When these people's mind stop playing tricks on them.

You got that right.-

Every time you're think you notice something, you know

no matter what your endeavor, it is that you do.

- I hated going on radio. - I hated the radio.

We played the same music over, and over, and over again.

We're doing the... the radio show right now

for my people out there that's listening.

But at the same time, I got my video cameras

in here for my video show.

Yeah, coast-to-coast hip hop countdown.

Your uncle Ralph... DJ Ralph McDaniels.

Westside connection in the building.

You needed rotation.

And people only listen for a certain amount of time.

They wanna hear hit records, and that whole concept.

I understood what they were saying,

but I felt like people still wanted more variety.

And we could throw in and make the playlist

a little bit bigger, and they go, "Nope.

It's only these songs and that's it."

And I just felt

like I was trapped in that space.

That's when the... the whole hip hop world shifted.

Pioneering music retailer, Tower Records,

one of several chains closing its doors nationwide.

The internet destroyed, the computer destroyed

the music business to me, I think...

The main culprit in the decline of the brick

and mortar record store, online music.

I watched how it destroyed first of all the recording studios,

a lot of them all went out of business,

ain't too many left.

The quality of music got horrible,

you know what I mean?

The record stores dwindled, and the people that I knew

that was getting those six figure jobs lost their jobs.

There's a new artist every time you turn on

your phone and you really can't get into anyone.

Okay. So, we'll put up some information,

uh, as well as online information, so people...

'Cause everybody is online right now. The game...

The game changed a little bit, right?

Yeah, yeah, for sure. A lot.

Well, it... it changed because now,

we are part of the entertainment

exploitive monster.

In my day, I had to give out flyers that said,

"Hey, I'm Fat Joe," at the train station.

I'm on the thug, but never the drugs though.

When all the kids said that they hated me, Fat Joe.

At night, we would put up paste posters, glue.

I would go to the clubs and give the DJ the vinyl.

It was just a real process to really promote yourself

and get out there.

Now, you just press send and it's in the air,

and whoever likes it likes it.

In one way, the internet is a fantasy for a lot of us

because we get worldwide recognition in minutes.

So, yes, there's some bad that came out

of the internet into hip hop, but there's some damn good

that came out of it and went into hip hop.

Man, The Boogie Down Bronx is in the house.

Brooklyn's in the house, Queens is in the house.

We got it going on.

It gave Video Music Box a different life because.

Video Music Box has what, 30,000 hours of footage.

Video Music Box, I won't say it lost

- its audience. - Its audience shifted...

- Yup, come on. - It's Video Music Box.

We out here at Webster Hall right now, for the launch party.

It's really, really, really packed, turned up here...

- We're in punk Brooklyn! - Brooklyn!

We're from the Bronx.

- Cali! - Commack, Long Island.

Victor from Jersey!

Ralph was dedicated

and focused on his goals and his main objectives.

That's where the love of what I'm doing,

not knowing where it's gonna go played a major role.

Yeah, Video Music Box backstage, Summer Jam '06.

I mean, this is real exclusive.

And I mean, for, like, six weeks we've been talking

about how this guy was coming to New York,

and then he did it tonight.

- Jamie Foxx, come on, man. - Oh, man, I had a blast.

You know, ultimately, it's a family business

and we just like love to contribute to it

and see it grow and prosper.

And I think, when we talk about family,

we're talking about the fans as well,

because they've been on this ride with us the whole time.

Check it out.

ATL make some motherfucking noise

B-I-G-G-I-E

AKA B-I-G

Get it, Biggie.

It's the 20th anniversary

of Christopher Wallace's passing,

and I said I'm going to the floor of the house

and I'm going to give a tribute to Biggie Smalls.

It was all a dream.

- I used to read Word Up! - Magazine.

Salt-N-Pepa and Heavy D up in the limousine.

I think in many ways, you know, hip hop's journey

has been the journey of the African American community

over the last 50 years.

And as a result, I think, you know,

the journey of this country, because the African-American

community is so intimately connected.

And President Obama's rise and his election,

his cultural fluency, his engagement with artists,

it was just an indication for me as to how deeply

his election had penetrated into the streets.

Because of what it represented, not just in the suites.

But who would've ever thought,

whereas Christopher Wallace said,

"You never thought that hip hop would take it this far."

Now I'm in the limelight 'cause I rhyme tight.

Time to get paid.

Blow up like the World Trade.

I like to give a shoutout to my fellow nominees.

Shoutout to a very special visitor.

Shoutout to team USA...

And again, it's how hip hop brings

to you parts of, you know, civic life

in ways that you may not have even had any understanding.

With that, I just have two more words to say...

"Obama out."

I think that for the first time,

kids of all colors revolted within the system.

I think because they understood that this was a true

president of the people, this was a hip hop president.

It's undeniable that hip hop culture changed the lens

for a lot of people in this country of who we look at,

who we see, who we listen to,

and to understand the cultures,

to understand the challenges,

to understand the triumphs, and the heartbreak.

And to me Video Music Box and Ralph McDaniels

were pioneers in, sort of,

planting this seed of hip hop culture

that is so ubiquitous now.

We're back in Coney Island.

This is Brooklyn right here.

Boss shit, your Lordship.

Niggas talkin' yachts since I'm on shit.

I used to run the block, now I'm corporate.

Hoppin' out, you know it's Son when the doors lift.

Whole squad hide the burners.

Mets hats in the sky like...

Put your face on the TV screen.

- Put your ear on the speaker. - He gonna tell you what it is.

I love my brother right here, yo.

Peace and love.

If you love hip hop music, if you love R&B music,

make some noise up in the piece right now.

I grew up in, uh, projects

in Brooklyn and we didn't have outlets

where we really got to see

our own community perform

or have videos.

And Ralph McDaniels Video Music Box provided that for us

and let us know that we have the opportunity

to go out there and do these same things.

He made us take a look at our superheroes.

- Yeah. - And really understand

who they are,

and what they bring to us, and with what they was bringing

to us was knowledge, wisdom, you know what I mean?

Understanding, everything, just...

- The culture. - It's an honor.

This is Killah Chuck, right here.

I think Chuck got a couple of bars, too.

He might have some bars for us.

Ralph knows this, the history of hip hop

started in the Bronx,

now it's all over the whole world!

He's got the Mary J Blige

when she started.

Heavy D when he started.

LL Cool J when he started.

The number one rap song, Video Music Box.

He was there when they were nobodies.

So, he... So, he ate, drank

and slept it, still to this day.

I started working at the library maybe

like five years ago, as a Hip Hop Coordinator

and I wanted to see, like, hip hop in institutions.

In Queens, there's 65 different libraries.

- Right. - And I was like,

if we can get in these communities

and do something, and put hip hop in there

just like they have other cultures,

that would be kinda dope.

We have events in the libraries

where we actually bring in some of the people

that were involved in hip hop,

and not just musically, people that are writing books,

documentaries, and we show that to the kids there.

So, in the last five years, I've done over three hundred programs

with all types of different people here.

We still keep our core of what we've been doing,

because it's been working since 1983.

We also have evolved with things.

We're on social media.

New York's number one video show, Video Music Box.

I'm DJ Ralph McDaniels.

Yeah. I gonna have Money Love.

She's gonna check in with us.

My girl from across the river.

First of all, thank you for taking the time.

I know you was on the radio today.

Oh, please, that's nothing, man.

Like, you're just... Who can say no to you?

The hardest working man in hip hop.

- Like, who can say no? - Like...

We're in the Smithsonian.

In Washington, DC, where our mic is in the museum.

So, it's like an artifact.

I think that young people need to see

this is all part of us and this is where we came from.

That's amazing, man.

I love what you're doing, Ralph, like,

this is what it's all about.

The next generation, them having a better chance.

We have Video Music Box Collection,

which is the digitizing of videos of artists

from when they first began that have been

in our basement for so many years.

- Man, Brooklyn. - Oh, yeah. Sup?

Okay.

Coming in our woods Say rhymes that I invent

I'm about to recollect, and inject.

And knock you out your socks.

This is full classic concept.

Video Music Box.

We're trying to put them in schools and colleges.

They can see, "Okay,

this was what was happening in the '80s."

Or "This was happening in the '90s."

Man, I would love to see a Video Music Box

educational curriculum that's been placed

in different junior colleges,

colleges, or high schools.

When I started Revolt, I had called,

you know, Ralph to tell him, you know,

thank you for just being such an inspiration.

I wanted to be Video Music Box.

I want to be unapologetically Black, do whatever we wanna do,

say whatever we wanna say, be whoever we wanna be.

Oh, yeah. Yeah.

But it started with Video Music Box.

The Ave has always been important, you know,

because that's where we got our gear.

You know, Shirt Kings was down there.

Yes.

The Shirt Kings, the mighty Shirt Kings.

Um, Eddie Gold Caps.

- Yes. - Barbershop.

- Uh, Benny the Jeweler. - Yup.

You know what the beauty of Ralph is,

Ralph doesn't demand respect.

He commands respect.

And that's truly respect.

Love, man.

Everybody grew up on you, Ralph.

I know.

One of the things that brought us together,

honestly, was hip hop.

We're right here at the Coliseum.

Jamaica Coliseum.

You know, hip hop was the culture

that allowed us a space to communicate with each other

without being extremely judgmental.

- What store is it? - Which one?

- I'll be back. - We'll come back.

- We'll come back. - Yeah.

- This is a vibe, though. - Right.

- I'm Mike Tyson. - I'm kicking everybody's ass.

I'm the world's greatest.

But I wouldn't be who I am now.

It will be a little different without hip hop.

- Different cultures. - This is what...

- What's up, Nas? - Hey.

Everything is all about.

And I love the fact that we are able to reach these heights.

Now, we're looking beyond that.

You know, how you feel about the effects

of these systems that kept us from the money.

And create systems that's gonna bring us to the money

because we're gonna need that money

to build our communities.

- Yes, sir. - Peace to The God.

- Peace, peace. - I love you...

And I think hip hop culture has been incredible

in contributing to the Black community.

Ralph McDaniels, Video Music Box,

this is what it's all about.

We're with the people right here on Jamaica Avenue,

- Queens, New York. - You dig me?

Turn around and see the people, man.

- All right. - Oh, wait, wait,

Oh, yeah.

- Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. - Like, like Uncle Ralph's joint.

- Shout out... - You wanna give some shout outs?

I give a shout out to my mom.

I wanna give a shout out little thing.

Shout out to...

Yo, shout out my first wife, shout out my second wife.

I wanna shout out...

All you beautiful people out there.

Oh, shout out everybody from hip hop in Queens.

- I wanna give a shout out... - Well, let me give a shout out.

Fredro used to cut my hair.

And the pioneers of hip hop

that made this possible.

Shout out to Kool Herc.

- Yeah, yeah. - I wanna give

a shout out to Lauryn Hill.

I'm in the gym.

- I wanna give a shout out... - Shout out.

I give a shout out to my family that have been supportive of me

since day one.

I'm the nut that'd be standing on the side of the stage...

- Lauryn, I love you. - I'm sorry.

Did I make a confession?

- Um, okay. Yes, I did. - All to Brooklyn.

My partners in FUBU.

Big shout out to my moms.

- LL. - Buy my first turned tables.

- The Rock. - -And for keeping me off the street.

- Onyx and Mr. Cheeks... - Alala.

Alala. What's up, Alala?

Shout out to Ralph McDaniels.

Word, and the Vid Kid.

- And the whole squad. Crazy Sam. - My man Tuffy.

All... All the whole crew that helped Video Music Box.

And us down all these years, man.

All right. I'm sorry about the baby shower.

For what's-her-name, 'cause I didn't give her the 10,000.

'Cause I don't think no baby should get $10,000

for baby shower.

Unless he's my own baby.

- To my husband. - To my mom.

To the fans that have devoted themselves

to Video Music Box.

I wanna give a shout out to my dad.

You are awesome.

I love you and I'm forever proud of you.

I wanna give a shout out to you, Ralph.

- Love. - A shout out to Ralph.

Thank you for pushing the culture forward

and preserving the culture, man.

To my husband Ralph McDaniels.

You have done an amazing, amazing job.

I'm going to spiritually say it, it's for me,

and I want to give a shout out to Biz Markie.

We love you, Biz.

Forever.

Alicia Keys.

Um, God, I'm so proud of you.

Shout out to Alicia Keys.

Okay. Shout out to her crazy husband

for giving us DMX and all the other shit that he did.

And the new thing that they doing

with the DJ thing and all that shit is awesome.

And Marky D, of course, and Spider D, and all the D's.

- Big shout out to my wife. - You know, she holds me down.

You know, this is not easy, this is a family business.

This is what we do.

- Video Music Box for Life. - Thank you, honey.

Mwah. Love you.

I wanna give out a shout out to Ralph.

Thank you for everything you've done for me.

And for the hip hop community,

for the culture.

For New York City, for the world.

Um, thank you, man.