Kurtis Blow — Rappin’ Blow

Let’s face it: I didn’t buy this for whatever music is on it. Nothing against Kurtis Blow, but it’s not my style, and that’s fine. I bought it because of the sleeve – in the days of disco, there were some ubiquitous generic sleeve styles used to sell 12″ singles, and those have largely gone away. That in this case it used sexy disco queens in glittery (and presumably very itchy) bodysuits is no surprise, but very often the generic sleeves just had the label’s logo or some other message along the lines of “Disco Single.”

I gave this a listen yesterday, and ya know, it’s fine early rap/hip-hop from 1979. The first side, “Rappin’ Blow, Pt. 2” was featured on his 1980 album “Kurtis Blow.” It’s marked as “previously released as ‘Christmas Rappin'”; I’m not sure if any edits were made. For a rap record this early, it really has all the elements. The second side is just the backing track, so aspiring rappers could do their own thing to it.

Got this last fall from the $1 bin at Forever Changes, 100% for the amazing sleeve.