Jam Master Jay
1964-2002
by James Norton

Jason Mizell — better known as Jam Master Jay — is dead today. The cause of death is a gunshot wound. The motivation is unclear. But his legacy is large and undeniable.

Jam Master Jay was the DJ for rap pioneers Run-DMC, and his impact is still felt everywhere you hear a fat beat, a killer sample or the chaotic scratching of a turntable. Contemporary DJs like Cut Chemist, RJD2, Coldcut, and Mixmaster Mike have taken the standard of founding father DJs like Jay and run with it; meanwhile, Run-DMC hasn't been a serious musical force for years. But today's hip-hop greats are kicking around in an arena that was built in part by Mizell and his collaborators: Run (Joseph Simmons) and DMC (Darryl McDaniels).

Jay and his cohorts blew the lid off of rap's simmering potential. Countless hordes of suburban white kids — and the record companies that cater to their every whim — would follow Run-DMC's lead down into the underworld of commercially lucrative gangsta rap, leaving financial empires, a generation of rap superstars and bitter cross-coast rivalries in their wake. Product shout-outs ("My Adidas"), black power rhymes ("Proud to Be Black") and rock-rap crossover ("Walk This Way") were all in full effect in their pioneering album, Raising Hell. The record was released in 1986. That's 16 years ago.

On a more personal level, the guy rewired my brain.

I wasn't born to love hip-hop. I grew up in Wisconsin, a scattering of corn, dairy farms and white people drowning in watered-down Country Western and oldies. But when Run-DMC crossed the rock/rap divide — and it felt like the Grand Canyon to those of us little kids who were trying to figure out what music was all about — it rocked MTV and rewired our brains. Aerosmith grabbed our hands and pulled us in. Run-DMC met us on the other side.

My friend Tim and I would blast their music on a boombox and shout out standards like "It's Tricky" and "You Be Illin'" as his parents drove us up north to his family's small cabin on Parker Lake. Once we arrived, we would run through the woods, shoot at porch lights with pellet guns, and have bottle rocket wars. To this day, it's hard to hear tracks from Raising Hell without feeling a wave of Klinkenborgian rural nostalgia.

Across America, hundreds of thousands of other little kids were rockin' through the same kind of experience. Run-DMC hit the airwaves hard, and, propelled by Jay's beats and some lyrically deft rhymes, they changed minds.

Jay's beats were bold, basic and hard. With Run-DMC, he helped precipitate a musical revolution. Words don't do his musical legacy much justice; music comes a little closer.

He's the greatest of the great, get it straight he's great/ Playing fame 'cause his name is known in every state/ His name is Jay to see him play will make you say:/ "Goddamn, that DJ made my day!"

E-mail James Norton at jrnorton@flakmag.com.