So many people had such an indelible impact on me. I think meeting Benjamin Melendez and Carlos Suarez from the Ghetto Brothers brought a lot of things together. The 1971 gang peace treaty organized in the Bronx still affects us today—in many ways, it made hip-hop possible. It's the ultimate example of a butterfly effect; something that happened amongst a small number of forgotten youths in an abandoned borough of the big city still touches us more than three decades later all around the world. Yet you can't read about it in most "official" histories of New York City, let alone hip-hop. The thing that sticks to me about all of these Bronx pioneers—from Benjy and Carlos through DJ Kool Herc, Afrika Bambaataa, Grandmaster Flash, and others—is that they felt they *had* to do what they did. They weren't getting paid at first; they did it out of love and passion and a desire to live. DJ Kool Herc says in the introduction, "it was something we did for fun." That's the beauty and power of hip-hop right there in seven words.

How do you follow up a project like this? What's next for Jeff Chang? How/where can people learn more about what you're up to?

I'm working on an anthology on the aesthetics of hip-hop, a book that will be artist-centered, and move beyond just rap music to look at how hip-hop has moved into performance arts, visual arts, literature, and all kinds of other forms. The next book is top secret but I'm beginning to think about it a little bit right now. I'm taking most of the summer off—though I'm still doing some appearances, and there's always hip-hop activist work to do—and then I'll be back out on the road a little bit in the fall. People can always catch up with me at my website, cantstopwontstop.com, and check out my blog to see what i'm obsessing about at any given moment. i don't know if that's healthy, but that's what's up!