On August 11th, Hip-Hop celebrated its birthday. 53 years ago, the genre was credited with being born at an after-school party in New York City.
Like all musical genres, Hip-Hop evolved over the years and has been shaped by many different figures and musicians. Still, it's nice to give it a time and place, in this instance, at a historic party DJ'd by Clive Campbell, also known as DJ Kool Herc, one of the founding fathers of the genre.
© Pluto TVTo celebrate, Pluto TV is streaming a curated list of classic hip-hop films. The best part? It's free for anyone who downloads the app.
The streamer now features 16 movies that explore all sides of hip-hop culture and the way it's shifted over the years, including titles like "8 Mile," known for Eminem's surprising turn as a lead actor, and "Honey," Jessica Alba's dance classic.
The movies can be watched by downloading the Pluto TV app, which requires no subscription or sign-up, making it one of the most convenient and useful apps to have on your TV, laptop, or phone.
© Pluto TVCheck out the full lineup below:
- Culture-Defining Hits: 8 Mile, ATL, Roll Bounce, Set It Off, and Pootie Tang
- Gritty Dramas & Docs: Get Rich or Die Tryin', Filly Brown, Rhyme & Reason, and Butter
- Dance & Romance Classics: Honey, Save the Last Dance, and Save the Last Dance 2
- Old-School Essentials: Beat Street and Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo
- New Era & Cult Comedies: On the Come Up and I Got the Hook Up
© Pluto TVMore about that historic party
DJ Kool Herc was a pioneer of hip-hop music, spinning records at all sorts of parties. On August 11, 1973, he was working with his largest crowd yet, with his most powerful sound system. Over the years, he'd developed an innovative set-up: two turntables, switching back and forth between two copies of the same record to extend the drum break, the song's most exciting part, allowing the crowds to dance. Nowadays, this trick is called the "break beat."
"I was noticing people used to wait for particular parts of the record to dance, maybe [to] do their specialty move," he said, as reported by History.com. Six years later, the term hip-hop entered the mainstream vocabulary.
© Pluto TV
