Sir Coxsone Dodd was the Granddaddy of all dancehall. Studio numero uno. Self-annointed and then annointed by so many. He, for all intensive purposes, made the sound system massive and collectively set the standard for all who followed. Duke Reid and King Tubby were bigger and more aggressive, but Dodd won out with style and the very best record collection on the Island. Quality over quantity.

Cy Twombly was a deep, weird dude, but his work set forth a kind of raw, energetic scrawling that was a pre-cursor to the scratching of graf and the work of so many eighties Downtown artists. If your kid really “could have done that”, than make sure he or she keeps doing it. I would have loved to see him do do an acid scrawl outside a Foot Locker on Broadway. Straight dope.

Better known as Kareem Abdul Jabbar. Not only did he hang with Magic, Worthy, Cooper, Wilkes, and Rambis, but he also took on race, religion, and of course Bruce Lee.

When I was listening to Bad Brains and DC hardcore, I stumbled across a record called Yo! Bum Rush The Show and my life was changed forever. Sure I had some Run DMC and Kool Moe Dee records, but this shit changed my life and opened the doors for it all to come crashing through….

Jackie Robinson busted down doors but this guy got overlooked. He lead the Hispanic influx and let’s face it without Latin players MLB baseball would just be NBA basketball. This guy played the game with tremendous grace and speed and professionalism. His career made him a Hall of Famer, his human outreach, raw charity, and untimely death made him a legend.

Dischord is the very legacy of independent Hardcore of the eighties. I literally have been straight edge my whole life but Ian made it cool in 1982. Not overly aggressive but overtly mind-fucking. Minor threat is one of the greatest hardcore bands of all-time, 13 Songs is still one of my favorite albums of all-time, and Waiting Room is perhaps the best song of that era.

My favorite music in the world was the melodic, spiritual free-jazz of the mid to late sixties right up until the early eighties. This guy sat squarely in the center of this. Sun Ra and Coltrane will come later, but few came any harder than Pharoah.

The Stilt. Enough said.

Not the original talk over dj, but certainly was the toughest and had the most style. So much so that he was in fact the original Rocker.

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The legendary artist/illustrator who along with William Steig dominated The New Yorker for over 50 plus years. This guy is still being knocked by all of us and as a result, one would have to say that he might have been the original Beautiful Loser. There is a lot to be said for just a pen and a paper.