![]() ![]() In Los Angeles in the 1980s, we had our most famous tagger, a young man who signed his tags “ CHAKA”, which is street slang for drug dealer. TDK could mean Total Dance Kings, The Def Kings, Total Destruction Krew or just Those Dam Kids. SLIME had back up names like SKUM and PUKE. ![]() Many crews that formed were difficult to track because they would change their tag or crew names. Freeway signs, water towers, walls, and empty buildings began to be covered up by competing taggers and their “crews.” The “pieces” they painted became more and more elaborate, and as the open spaces were filled the cleverest styles stood out from the “surfus statik” of the less talented taggers. and into Canada and Mexico.Īcross the Americas, hip-hop kids began to compete for the tagger fame by “Getting up” in the most inaccessible places or the most times. This moving canvas spread the new “tough urban kid opposed to gang banging” life style across the U.S. Tagging busses, subway trains, and railroad cars got the tagging exposed all over the city, and hopefully across the country. So early on, “going to the heavens” or tagging on high rise structures became important. This tagging and “bombing” was most prized when it was the most visible to the most people. These original dancing graffiti artists and street poets were strongly opposed to gang violence. These murals colorfully depicted a New York, or at least an urban skyline. When hip-hop music became popular in New York, kids stood on corners with boom boxes and did pop lock and break dancing moves in front of murals on brick walls or old cardboard boxes. Does this story sound familiar? That’s because it was depicted in a movie called " TURK #182." So the story has a happy ending because the city did finally grant the firefighter his retirement. ![]()
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