To Live and Defy in LA

Rich with drama and details, To Live and Defy in LA tells the story of Los Angeles hip-hop during the eighties, a much-mythologized but often misunderstood period. -- Hua Hsu, author of <i>A Floating Chinaman: Fantasy and Failure across the Pacific</i> This book was really fun to read...[Viator] gives a comprehensive, interesting view of how this genre came to change our culture. * Los Angeles Review of Books Radio Hour * Rattling hatchback trunks and terrifying suburban parents, gangsta rap went harder and further than everything that preceded it. Suddenly, everyone was listening and the media wagons began to circle...Viator excavates this music's unique political, social, and mercantile origins. -- Raymond Cummings * The Wire * Zero[es] in on how economic devastation and militarized policing bred a subgenre whose extreme lyrics were fueled by indigence...A fast-paced and engaging read for music fans, history buffs and anyone with an interest in social justice...Eye-opening. * KQED * Much more than the story of the creation of gangsta rap, the rise of NWA, or the history of early West coast rap in general. It's a cultural history. What one is left with at the book's end is the powerful idea of how art can be formed out of pain and suffering, and how injustice can be the crushing weight that can incite change. * Under the Radar * [Viator's] understanding of the hip-hop music and the musicians that first emerged from the streets of L.A. in the '80s is deep and profound. * LA Weekly *