"The first hip-hop record I owned was The Message by Grandmaster Flash and The Furious Five," recalls DJ Rob Viktum. "My father bought it for me."
When that record first dropped, back when Viktum was but a wee lad, it was mostly the inner-city kids who were having The Message handed down to them. It may have received some significant airplay on more "urban" radio markets, but probably not so much around Amarillo in the early 1980s.
Synthesizing the classical training provided by his mother with the love for rap and soul music that had been implanted in him by his father, Viktum started making beats when he was 12 years old, eking out whatever hip-hop flavor he could find within the Texas Panhandle town. Looks like it worked for him, since the DJ's eclectic spinning sensibility is now a hot commodity at the Slip Inn every Wednesday night in Dallas.
