Everything is so accessible now, but when you stared, hip-hop culture was never the dominant culture.

We were fighting, Julianne. There was a time when rock ruled and hip-hop was the underdog and nobody believed in it and nobody thought it was real. And every article that came out in the paper or Time or Newsweek or whatever was “It’s negative” or “They’re killing people” or “It’s a fad, it’s not real, it’s not worthy of real criticism or love” or anything like that. One of my first big stories at the San Francisco Weekly —I thought I was so investigative and so deep—was about how club bookers told me off the record that there was a de facto ban against booking hip-hop in clubs in San Francisco. We were fighting all the time. To me, it was a fight for our humanity, for our place in culture. We had to constantly say, “We’re here, we’re rap, we’re an art form, we’re graffiti, we’re dance, we’re breakdancing, we’re rapping, we’re creating music. If you won’t book us in your stadiums or nightclubs, we’ll have parties in parks.” It was the greatest time ever, frankly. It’s so amazing to be part of a movement. As a journalist, it’s a complicated relationship because you don’t want to be totally fanned-out, but I was straddling the line, because I believed so hard that hip-hop was real and I felt that people were not giving it a fair shake. I felt committed to making people understand that it’s a thing, and it’s our thing, and it’s going to be even bigger than this. It’s going to take over.

It was an amazing feeling, like you were always working for the culture. If you are 16 or 14 right now, if there’s something that you believe in, don’t hang back! Put on your stomping boots, put on your sassiest dress and be at the center of that shit. It’s just the best to be part of something as it’s happening. Then on those faraway days when you’re like, “Oh my god, I’m thirty-threeee!” (it happens, young Rookies, it happens), you can look back and say, “I was major, and I’m going to be even more major in my 40s. I have experience in how to change the world.” If you don’t do that, you’re going to be mad. “I was doing what ? Homework?!” “What? I was high? Too high to enjoy it?” No—put on your cutest shit and go to the fucking party and run it. Not to get too preachy or anything, but don’t always be going to the party, give the fucking party, you know what I’m saying? Curate it and make that shit as fresh as possible. It’s all good to be invited, but it’s a lot better to be the inviter. It’s all good to be the reader, but it’s way better to be the creator, the editor. It’s just fresher, I’m sorry. And no shade to the community of people that are on the side of reading and just coming to the party, because maybe you’re curing cancer, maybe you’re raising amazing kids, maybe you’re just going to work every day stunting off fools as the dopest receptionist ever at the dentist’s office, because that’s fresh too! But if you’re really into culture, own that shit. There’s nothing like starting your own shit. There’s nothing like moving on up, being like, “I was writing, now I’m editing.” “I was editing, now I’m editing a whole section.”