Back in the early to mid 70's just after the civil rights era, most inner-city youths were still listening to R & B, and post doo-wop music.  If you would have listened to the radio air waves you would have heard the funky R & B grooves of great artist like; the Jackson 5, Millie Jackson, Lou Rawls, The Commodores, Lynn Collins, post P-Funk, Rick James, Stephanie Mills, Gladys Knight and the Pips, The Average White Band, Cheryl Lynn, Tom Browne, Frankie Beverly & Maze, Al Green, Cameo, Kool & the Gang, George Benson, The Great Stevie Wonder, 'The GodFather of Soul' James Brown, Barry White, Rufus & Chaka Khan, Carl Carlton, Roy Ayers, The Brother Johnson, Patrice Rushen, Earth, Wind, and Fire, The Isley Brothers and many more great groups that deserve honoring.

Also during this time R & B aritist were starting to make alot more money.  Some of the R & B groups began to loose touch with young listeners.  In an attempt to appeal to a wider audience, their music lost it's edginess. Soon these youths became very bored and disallusioned with radio programming.  It was a very inconsistent time for youth listenership in regards to radio programming.

To appease the young inner-city demographics big city radio stations started developing contest and giveaways targeting young listeners.  It was this aspect of live radio that gave hip-hop djs the opportunity to be heard. The stations figured if they don't like the music we offer, then let's have them entertain themselves. This was originally done with call ins and live over the phone rap contest.

At this very exact time street dj's, mostly performing at block parties or basement parties, came on the party seen.  In the beginning, the only real skill a street dj needed was a decent turntable and a milkcrate of jams(records & tapes).  Very little music manipulation was being utilized. They just slammed in one song after another.

The God given talents of DJ Hollywood shaped the true nature of the street dj. More than likely, it was Hollywood who innovated the entire hip-hop form. If he was the innovator then guys like Afrika Bambaataa, Grand Master Flash, and Kool Herc would definitely be directly or indirectly influenced by his emergent abilities.