[ad_1]
DJ Screw is an engraved name in Houston hip-hop folklore, but he was known by many names to many people during his short life. To some he was The Originator, to others he was Screw, and to his family he was simply Robert Earl Davis Jr. In addition to his many aliases, DJ Screw had a prolific career filled with music, love, laughter and no small amount of struggle.
While many never had the opportunity to experience DJ Screw’s music when he was alive (he died of a codeine overdose in 2000 at the age of 29), Lance Scott Walker’s new book, DJ Screw: Life in a Slow Revolution enables readers to explore the life and work of the Houston music legend in rich detail.
“The idea [to write a book on DJ Screw] came around 2006 when I was working on houston rap tapes,Walker said. “So my study of DJ Screw was concurrent with everything else I was working on.”
DJ Screw was revered for his innovative “cut and screw” DJ style, a new kind of approach to remixing music that slowed down the tempo of a song and then used techniques such as skipping beats, scratching records and stopping time to create ” chopped up” version of the song. And while Screw was a groundbreaking hip-hop artist, he was also a skilled pianist who could play Chopin by ear.
Life in a slow revolution is an amalgam of first-hand accounts from those closest to DJ Screw, from family and close friends to members of Screwed Up Click (the popular hip-hop collective he founded).
Sixteen years in the making, Life in a slow revolution is Walker’s life’s work. At 49, Walker has spent more time building the story of DJ Screw than anything else he’s ever worked on. Partly because, Walker says, he often encountered resistance from family and friends still reeling from Screw’s death in November 2000.
“Some people didn’t want to talk or had reservations, all of which I completely understood,” Walker explains. “This is a very personal story for many people who knew Screw and loved him dearly. Some found it difficult to open up; others were simply never asked. These were the people I wanted to interview the most.
Although the book’s narrative ultimately ends in tragedy, readers are also exposed to the beauty, brotherhood, generosity, and passion for music that dominate DJ Screw’s life.
But perhaps what sets Srau most apart, according to Walker, is his sense of duty and responsibility to care for those around him.
“I wanted to highlight how special he was to people because that’s what made me want to write the book,” Walker said. “What really attracted me to the DJ Screw story is that you have someone who is incredibly good at what he does, and everyone who’s been around him reinforces that idea. But really for me it was about the kind of person he was and how people still talk about how he made them feel all these years later. That’s a really rare quality.”
Despite such an early death, his legacy remains intact. Told in detailed and intimate language, each person Walker interviews helps embody the kind of person and artist DJ Screw was, no matter what name you knew him by.
[ad_2]
Source link