Everybody’s Fly: A Life of Art, Music, and Changing the Culture

Street artist and hip-hop producer Freddy “Fab 5 Freddy” Brathwaite debuts with a rollicking memoir of the downtown art and music scenes of 1970s and ’80s New York City. Growing up in Brooklyn’s Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood in the 1970s, Brathwaite was inspired by a high school trip to the MoMA to steal spray paint cans from shop class and tag subway trains. “The graffiti gave me visibility, and the visibility gave me status,” he writes, detailing how he teamed up with Lee Quiñones and other members of the legendary Fabulous 5 graffiti crew. At the same time, he connected with MC Melle Mel and Grandmaster Flash, “tapping into the scene” of the emerging music style known as rap. Much of the memoir reads like a downtown picaresque: as a public access TV cameraman, Brathwaite met Debbie Harry, Robert Mapplethorpe, and David Byrne; when he met Jean-Michel Basquiat, the two “vibed instantly,” as both were Brooklyn-raised with Caribbean roots. In the book’s final third, the party slows down to make room for somber reflections on AIDS and the racial politics of MTV, with Brathwaite’s forceful points weakened somewhat by the tonal whiplash. Still, for readers interested in the birth of hip-hop, this is a must. Agent: Luke Janklow, Janklow & Nesbit Assoc. (Mar.)