532 Hello Run- D.M.C. - My Adidas / Peter Piper

Chart  entered : 19  July  1986

Chart  peak : 62

Number  of  hits  : 10

These  guys  did  more  than  most  to  move  hip  hop  into  the  mainstream  of  popular  music.

The  three  guys  who  made  up  Run DMC  came  from  the  suburb  of  Hollis  in  Queen's, New  York.  Joseph  Simmons  was  born  in  1964  and  through  his  elder  brother   Russell , started  working  as  a  DJ  for  pioneering  rapper  Kurtis  Blow. He  gave  himself  the  stage  name  DJ  Run. He  met  another  DJ  Darryl  McDaniels   ( born  1964  ) and  persuaded  him  to  have  a  shot  at  rapping  under  the  name  of  Easy  D.  They  went  to  a  local  park  to  find  a  DJ  and  befriended  Jason  Mizell   ( born  1965  ) who  used  the  stage  name  Jam  Master  Jay.

Russell  Simmons   had  become  something  of  a  player  on  the  scene  and  agreed  to  record  them  if  they  made  one  or  two  changes. Darryl  was  obliged  to  change  his  handle  to  D.M.C.  and  the  name  of  the  trio  was  to  be  Run-D.M.C. He  kept  his  part  of  the  bargain  and  got  them  a  deal  with  Profile  Records.

In  1983  they  released  their  first  single  "It's  Like  That"  under  the  guidance  of  Russell's  producer  friend  Larry  Smith. Smith  wanted  to  break  with  hip  hop's  reliance  on  funk  and  disco  grooves  and  reproduce  the  minimalist  sound  he  was  hearing  in  the  parks  so  there  were  no  session  musicians  in  the  studio. Smith  just  used  drum  machines  and  the  occasional  keyboard  part  for  emphasis  to  produce  the  stark  backing  track  for  which  he  got  a  co-composer  credit. The  street  life  lyrics  are  influenced  by  The  Message  although  the  latter  verses  see  them  groping  for  a  more  positive  stance. Joseph  and  Darryl  alternate  with  each  line  which  seems  a  bit  unnecessary  on  a  non-adversarial  track  and  contributes  to  the  single  sounding  a  bit  stiff  and  lumpy  now. It  was  well  received  and  eventually  became  their  biggest  hit  after  a  re-tweaking  many  years  down  the  line.

They  then  set  about  recording  their  eponymous  debut  album  with  Russell  and  Smith. As  I've  said  earlier,  hip  hop  really  isn't  my  thing  and  it's  a  tough  listen  due  to  what  Robert  Christgau  ( who  loved  it  ) described  as  "heavy  staccato  and  proud  disdain  for  melody ". I  found  it  hard  to  notice  many  of  the  transitions  from  one  track  to  the  next. "Rock  Box"  is  more  palatable  for  the  guitar  contributions  of  Eddie  Martinez, the  first  attempt  to  integrate  white  rock  tropes  into  their  music  and  "30  Days"  has  some  melodic  keyboard  parts. The  lyrics  veer  between  social  comment  and  self-promotion. Whatever  my  response  to  it , the  album   is  regarded  as  a  seminal  work  in  the  development  of  hip  hop  music. Despite  none  of  its  many  singles  ( "Hard Times", "Rock Box", "30  Days","Hollis  Crew" )  charting,  it  made  a  respectable  53  in  the  U S  charts.

In  January  1985  they  released  a  new  single  "King  of  Rock "  which  continued  their  mission  to  encroach  into  white  rock  territory. "Niggas  play  rock'n'roll  too"  was  Smith's  attitude.  Accordingly  Martinez  was  recruited  to  add  some  muscular  riffage  and  give  the  track  a  rock  dynamic  although  the  lyric  is  the  usual  b-boy  boasting  including  the  amusing  "There's  three  of  us  but  we're  not  the  Beatles". The  single  "bubbled  under"  both  here  and  in  the  US.

It  became  the  title  track  to  the  new  album  released  three  weeks  later. "King  of  Rock "  is  a  bit  more  listenable  for  the  unconverted  with  Martinez  and  Rick  Rubin  adding  guitar  to  further  tracks  and  more  keyboard  work  throughout,  making  the  sound  less  brutalist. The  boys  also  engage  Yellowman  to  guest  on  the  self-explanatory  "Roots , Rap, Reggae"  . There  were  two  subsequent  singles  from  it ,  "You  Talk  Too  Much "  ( straight  hip  hop  but  with  a  bass  line  on  the  chorus  and  electro-funk  keyboard  decoration  )  and  "Can  You  Rock  It  Like  This  ?"  (  a  rather  premature  reflection  on  superstar  lifestyle  with  both  rock  guitar  and  some  doomy  synth  chords ).  The  album  improved  on  its  predecessor's  chart  performance  by  all  of  one  place.

"My  Adidas / Peter  Piper"  was  the  first  release  from  their  third  album, "Raising  Hell"  which  went  triple  platinum  after  the  success  of  the  next  single.  Rick  Rubin  had  taken  over  from  Larry  Smith  as  co-producer  with  Russell  Simmons  and  is  credited  as  a  co-composer  of  "My  Adidas ". It's   pretty  unusual  to  dedicate  a  song  to  your  footwear  and  it  could  be  viewed  as  the  start  of  the  genre's  unfortunate  obsession  with  "bling". Musically   it  goes  right  back  to  the  primitivism  of  the  first  album  with  no  melodic  content  at  all  , just  voice  and  rhythm  box  with  the  occasional  Art  of  Noise  crash  for  punctuation. You  wonder  exactly  which  bit  of  it  Rubin  contributed.

"Peter  Piper "  is  slightly  less  abrasive  with  the  band  referencing  nursery  rhymes  and  fairy  tales  in  order  to  tell  you  how  great  they  are. A  brief  sample  of  Bob  James'  Take  Me  To  The  Mardi  Gras  early  on  notwithstanding  , it's  equally  tuneless  just  a  bit  less  strident.

With  blatant  advertising  on  one  side  and  a  reference  to  "Jay's  dick"  on  the  other  this  was  never  going  to  make  Radio  One's  recently  re-introduced  playlist  ( an  awful  misjudgement  on  their  part  but  that's  another  story )  but  it  made  the  charts  anyway, another  indication  that  the  old  certainties  were  crumbling  away.