Miss Manners once passed along an MP3 file to fellow KOOP 91.7FM host Ryan Blake, offering a rare recording of undigitized Eighties/Nineties Austin girl group Cooly Girls. Alongside taking over Manners' longtime Hip Hop Hooray broadcast this year, Blake works as an archivist at the Austin History Center. His curiosity aligned with the center's plans to keep this year's globally feted 50th anniversary of hip-hop rolling. On Sept. 17 at the Central Library, the Austin Hip Hop Honors Awards will salute the rappers and industry innovators who planted the world-conquering genre's local roots.
At the ceremony, Austin Film Society-produced short interviews with each of the nine VIPs will screen, alongside a posthumous tribute to MC Overlord and a nod to KAZI 88.7FM's ongoing impact. Looping in the next wave: Anastasia Hera hosts, Kydd Jones doles out awards, Pat G & the Justice League perform, and TJ the DJ spins. Behind the scenes, Blake and division manager Danielle' McGhee logged over 20 hours of oral histories, alongside posters, merch, and other retro media, to kick-start the History Center's growing hip-hop archives. As online RSVPs to the awards show have sold out and decades of culture-crafting pack a behemoth script, the Chronicle Music team interviewed the honorees, too.
As artists, entrepreneurs, mentors, collaborators, Texans, and transplants, their stories make a nice introductory mixtape. – Music Editor Rachel Rascoe