Pazz The Jazz The 1992-1993 Demos EP

Rotterdam was, is and probably will be known in years to come as the Hip Hop capital of The Netherlands. In the early ‘80’s this city proved to have very fertile grounds which germinated the "Hip Hop seeds" blowing over from the USA to Europe. The diverse cultural background of the city’s inhabitants played a large role. Cultural key elements being the no-nonsense attitude of working class ‘Docks city’ kids and the many sons of immigrants from countries like Surinam and Cabo Verde who were searching for the right sub cultural movement to make their own.

Rotterdam in 1981 spawned some of the first legendary B-Boys of Europe: the likes of Paulo Nunes, Carlos Rocha and Edzon Themen. Rap music followed close after with the first DJ’s and rappers popping up around 1983. DJ Save, DJ Alien, DJ DCS, Jazz DMX, Def Rhymz and other local pioneers laid the first bricks that would eventually become the fortress of Rotterdam Hip Hop Culture in the late ‘80’s.

From 1987 on, Rotterdam’s Hip Hop movement was huge and dominated Holland’s entire party scene. Numerous groups arose and performed all over the country, the most notable being Supersonic Cru, D.C.O., Moonrunners, Dope Syndicate, Interface Sources, Time Drillers and Space Connection. Many of these groups were allied to the large and infamous Bad Boys Posse.

The sad fact is, except for some noisy demo tapes, almost nothing got "properly" recorded in those days. Although the underground Hip Hop scene was booming, the record companies were totally ignorant towards this ‘new’ kind of music. It proved to be nearly impossible to get the tracks out on vinyl and so a lot of music got lost. It took until 1995 (when rapping in the native language exploded on the scene) before Dutch rap artists got signed on a larger scale.

One of the groups from Rotterdam’s golden era of rap was Pazz The Jazz. This large crew consisting out of rappers Earnasty, Dimension, B-Rough and DJ/producer Chris H., had one of the best stage shows of the early ‘90’s. They recorded some great demos in 1993 but like other groups they couldn’t capitalize on their underground success due to unwilling record labels. Luckily, in contrast to many of their peers, they preserved the demo recordings making it possible for Chopped Herring to do what others have failed to do two decades eariler ...