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All Rise for the National Anthem of Hip-Hop
October 29, 2006 1:21 AM

The Incredible Bongo Band made a record back in 1972 entitled, "Bongo Rock," which features "sometimes thrilling, sometimes cheesy instrumentals built on tight brass charts, psychedelic guitar riffs, funky keyboard vamps and heavy percussion." It's basically a percussion-filled LP performed by Los Angeles studio musicians who never toured and who later found their fame elsewhere. In fact, the LP, and the follow-up "Return of The Incredible Bongo Band," hardly sold at all. Yet, incredibly, that 1972 release would germinate many Hip-Hop hits to this day!

The New York Times tracks the origin of the biggest Hip-Hop hit from that LP, "Apache." It's a fascinating story, starting in England in 1960 and continuing on today.

Band members of The Incredible Bongo Band had established reputations as studio musicians, and after...

...some success, the group reconvened to make a full-length LP. And befitting its name, the core of the band was two powerhouse percussionists. One, the bongo and conga player King Errisson, was a revered session man from the Bahamas who played limbo shows in a Miami strip joint before jumping into New York’s early-60’s jazz scene, where he befriended musicians like Miles Davis and Cannonball Adderley. Mr. Errisson eventually found his groove in California, where, among other gigs, he was Motown’s go-to guy for percussion in the late 60’s and early 70’s, after the label relocated from Detroit to Los Angeles. He played on sessions by the Temptations, the Four Tops, the Jackson Five and the Supremes.

The drummer was Jim Gordon, a handsome California boy probably best remembered as part of the group Derek and the Dominoes. During that stint he came up with the famous piano coda for the hit “Layla,” written with his bandmate Eric Clapton. His fat, precise beats also turn up on recordings by John Lennon (the “Imagine” album), George Harrison, Traffic, Frank Zappa, Steely Dan, Merle Haggard and the Monkees.

Mr. Gordon, for his part, had dived headlong into the rock scene. After years of living the high life and maintaining his reputation as a consummately reliable player, he became a famous drug casualty. He stopped playing altogether and later claimed he was haunted by imaginary voices. After a series of violent episodes and self-elected stays in psychiatric hospitals, he murdered his mother — whom he identified as one of the voices in his head — with a knife in 1983.

Meanwhile, back in late 1972 in the Bronx, a young Jamaican immigrant who worked as a D.J at parties under the name Kool Herc discovered the “Bongo Rock” LP through his colleague, DJ Timmy Tim. He had heard the “Bongo Rock” single, which he thought was O.K. But “Apache” was something else. Beginning with the tandem drumming of Mr. Errisson and Mr. Gordon, the song peaks like a fireworks display, with bursts of organ, horns and surf guitar exploding amid a rain of bongo and kit-drum beats. It drove dancers crazy at the Hevalo, on Jerome Avenue between Tremont and Burnside, where Herc had a steady gig and where he first played the record for a crowd.

"Apache" has become the National Anthem of Hip-Hop, and now you can trace its path at Oliver Wang's website, "Soul Sides." There you can download versions of "Apache" stretching from 1960-2003.

Long live Hip-Hop and "Apache!"

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