BY JAKE PAINE • JUNE 10, 2018

Big Daddy Kane and DJ Mister Cee have been performing and recording together for more than 30 years. The two Brooklyn, New York natives appear together on Funkmaster Flex’s I Got A Story To Tell series. For more than an hour, one of the greatest MCs of all time revisits moments from his career between 1985 and 1993. In doing so, he reveals some information that Hip-Hop Heads will appreciate. Cee provides some interesting insights to his onetime HOT 97 colleague about the early days of Biggie Smalls, imperfect scratches on hit records, and more.

Kane discusses some lesser-known things including his run as Roxanne Shanté’s DJ (including the scratches on single, “Go On Girl”), “The Symphony” being born out of his and Kool G Rap’s WBLS radio promo drop for Mr. Magic and Marley Marl, and 45 King’s un-credited “Set It Off” production being first intended for Biz Markie and a (slightly altered) Public Enemy remix before he took it.

Perhaps the most interesting part of the interview comes around 46:00, where Big Daddy Kane goes into his history with JAY-Z. While King Asiatic supplied JAY-Z with his first televised guest appearance on a 1990 Rap City episode and later put a pre-Roc-A-Fella Records MC on 1994’s “Show & Prove” (alongside Ol’ Dirty Bastard, Shyheim Da Rugged Child, and Sauce Money), it is not their first collaboration. Notably, this year marks the 30th anniversary of the two Brooklyn lyricists sharing the mic on wax—or in their case, cassette tape.

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