What is the real history of the Mix Tape?

Mix Tape: It can be said the mix tape game started when Caz and the Cold Crush were giving the tapes to O.J. cab companies to sell out of their cab. As well it is stated Star Ski is the first to do mix tapes, but how? Doug E. Fresh and D.J. Chill Will use to make tapes for the neighborhood before the Get Fresh Crew days. I also remember when Flash use to make special tapes for paying customers in the very early 80’s and he would say your name on it and anything else you wanted. I have a 1981 tape of D.J. Whiz Kid doing strictly break beats. But the real kicker is Coke La Rock said he use to make special 8 track tapes for paying drug dealers, $50 a whop and of course he would shout their name out. While D.J. Hollywood goes back as far as 1971 making mix tapes for the hustlers before
even Coke La Rock's 8 track tapes.

It is also said that Star Child, not Kool Kyle, but D.J. Star Child out of The Disco Fever started the mix tape game where he would do it from the club and give shout outs to people inside and around the 5 boroughs with a beginning and an end. (From time to time they would even say turn the tape over.) I don’t know when and where Love Bug’s first tapes started but I would have to say that a mix tape is something started with an introduction by the D.J. in the very beginning of the tape and he states were he is playing at and has numerous current records being played on it. So that would knock the CC4 out because they were actual just selling their
shows that they did the night before which can start any where as well as have other crews on there with them.

Brucie Bee said he learned from Star Child who he use to watch when they were in The Disco Fever together. So Star Child goes before Brucie Bee but Brucie Bee and Kid Capri put it on the map. Yes Kid Capri is next, he too played a little something out of The Roof Top with Brucie Bee but
Brucie was the major player out of The Roof Top. Kid Capri played out of The Castle, a club in the Bronx just over the water from Harlem. Of the 3 Brucie Bee and Kid Capri were neck and neck as far as greatness when it came to these mix tapes. Star Child was cool with his selection but Brucie
Bee and Kid Capri were dynamic with there selections of records as well as their voices and what they spoke about. Brucie Bee broke In the Air Tonight by Phil Collins and the whole Harlem was playing this record out of their cars and box radio’s and everybody dug it. And Kid
Capri use to kill with the Jackson 5 records. Both these guys had an arsenal of records that they played. Star Child and Love Bug also played at a club in Harlem known as The Love Nest a
small club where the patrons drank, smoked and sniffed at there leisure while a top less girl danced on a small cubical. Well that’s where Star Ski’s tapes became popular.

For a long time all three of these guys Brucie Bee, Kid Capri and Star Child were coming with a tape each week. They would write the date next to their name (ex. 5/16.) The first time I officially knew I could get my hands on any of these tapes was one night my man Fat Bub told me Kid Capri was down the block between st. Nicholas and 8^th avenue on 125^th street selling his tapes for $10 each. Well soon my man Duke started selling both Kid Capri and Brucie Bee tapes out of his mother’s store. Cats in the projects that had equipment made tapes for us but nothing was official like a Brucie Be and Kid Capri tape, and I guess it wasn’t just the voice but their record selection was really skilled.

Next up was Ron Gee he came a few years later and his claim to fame was he mixed two different records together. (Brucie Bee stated in his interview with me he had done that long ago but he didn’t do it for a whole tape just one or 2 records.) Well Ron Gee blew up and then the rest of the world followed and it got so popular that it stepped over to CD’s and d.j.getting exclusives from other m.c.s to rhyme on their tape. Then came Funk Master Flex who made a grip selling his 3 CD’s. But it got to a point everybody and his mother and grand mother made mix tapes and the market was flooded and I mean that in a negative way. The game is still going on but I have not touched a tape or mix CD in years.