August 12, 2009

CIUT 89.5fm as we knew it...


Gentrification and hip hop are close cousins, some might even say the parents of hip hop culture.  Ever since the monstrosity of a highway carved up the South Bronx and Brooklyn, you can be sure where ever people need to be uprooted for increased profit...hip hop culture will be affected.  The latest in Toronto-- University of Toronto community radio CIUT 89.5 fm must vacate the building for the expansion of the Rotman business school.  It was a fight in the U of T community but of course, community always looses to profit...CIUT has been significant in nourishing Toronto's hip hop community from the Masterplan show that started in 1989 to the overnight (literally) success of Project Bounce (R.I.P.).  I have literally walked into this building to find  Doug E. Fresh hanging out, Crazy Legs just chillin' or OHNO promoting his show on three separate occasions when I would just be hanging around on a saturday night.

Other shows still, like Oral Ammunition which eventually became Stylistic Endeavours, have been around for more than a decade providing this city with quality hip hop unheard on commercial radio....