Digging is a competitive, archival practice through which hip-hop DJs and producers discover source material for making music. They search basements, flea markets, record stores, and other locations for vinyl records they can play or sample to make hip-hop music. This practice extends back to Jamaican soundclash traditions where rarity, scarcity, and secrecy translate to cultural capital. It encapsulates a crucial ethos of hip-hop culture: search and discovery.

Our class practiced this longstanding hip-hop tradition by going digging one day in a local record store. We sought to hone the skills that make up this larger practice: listening with the eyes, inferring about sounds from artwork, examining the grooves of the record for possible drum breaks, tuning into the names of musicians on the back covers, and listening not only for what the break is but what the break can be. And don’t forget the dollar bin! 

Digging can also be deeply personal. You come up on a record your grandmother used to play when you were young, a record your father had, or an image on a cover that reminds you of home. Vanessa bought a record because of the futuristic looking image on the label. Stephany bought a record because it had a song referenced in a book we read. Rowan bought a record because it reminded them of their mother’s marching band. 

I used the records students got while digging as source material for this piece. As such, the piece explores the sensibilities, memories, desires, and aural inclinations that guided us through the archive -- chopped, screwed, sampled, pitched up/down -- what we found and what found us.

Class Diggs (an experiment)

Veteran DJ & crate digger. 
Maker of beats with kids. 
Music miseducator.

Class Diggs (an experiment)

Em.