San Francisco and New York helped to create Krip-Hop Nation. In 2001 after closing my non-profit, getting deeper to poetry and lyric writing once again I was interested with the concept of Hip-Hop and disability but this time I held on to it that birth the want to start a collective of disabled Hip-Hop artists when I traveled from San Francisco to New York.
In the year of 2023 marks twenty-two years ago when I, Leroy Moore, created the term and collective named Krip-Hop Nation on Poor Magazine in San Francisco and with Lawrence Carter Long and Preechman both in New York of 2001 the term and collective, Krip-Hop Nation was born. After that mind-exploding meeting with a friend and disability media expert, Lawrence Carter Long, in Manhattan at a café where we came up with the name Krip-Hop, Lawrence reminded me of a Hip-Hop artist from Yonkers who has polio and walks on crutches aka Preech Man. Preech Man and I met online and he was one of the first supporters and workers of the new concept called Krip-Hop. I made my way to Yonkers to meet and talk to Preech Man in 2001 right after talking to Lawrence Carter Long.
I went back home to San Francisco and at this time in 2001-2002 it was early internet and the early social network yes talking about MySpace that is when I met a lot of Hip-Hop artists with disabilities like Rob DA Noize Temple who I’d meet face to early 2002 when I went to his Brooklyn home music studio where we laid down the first Krip-Hop song entitled Krip-Hop. In Rob’s studio in 2002 I made Rob the first Co-Founder of Krip-Hop Nation. At the same time on MySpace also met Keith Jones. In 2004 I was a delegate of the California’s Disability Democratic Club at the Democratic National Convention in Boston, MA and that’s when I meet face to face with Keith Jones and decided to make him another Co-Founder during the making of his second CD. In April 2006 Leroy with KPFA Radio collective, Pushing Limits did a three part sires on Hip-Hop artists who were Deaf and disabled that lead to Krip-Hop Mixtape series and the first public event at UC Berkeley entitled Diversifying Hip-Hop: Homo-Hop & Krip-Hop in 2009.
Now in 2023 Preechman dropped off early in Krip-Hop history, Rob DA Noize Temple passed away in 2020 and a recent break up with Keith Jones leaves I, Leroy Moore once again the sole founder of Krip-Hop Nation as I continue with Krip-Hop Nation here at UCLA writing my Masters thesis on Krip-Hop pedagogy and then opening what will be called the Krip-Hop Institute by 2027. These twenty-two years from today in 2023 have been incredible and I’m excited to see what the future brings to Krip-Hop Nation.