‘Walk This Way” brings Rap and Rock Together, Many Walls Gloriously Kicked Down

Until the late nineties and Nu Rock and Limp Bizkit put their baseball caps on backwards and ruined the party, the worlds of guitar banging and mic slinging were famously and quite popularly mashed together by a band from Boston and three guys from Hollis, Queens. For a moment there, 28 years ago, it was perfect. Read on!

Some songs are just chart climbers, up to the top and back down, a future recurrent on your radio and nothing much else. Other songs are freaking atomic bombs, dropping into the popular landscape, devastating everything, changing lives forever. And that was the meeting of Aerosmith and Run DMC. Through the producing aegis of music guru Rick Rubin, the old elder Aerosmith seventies high school sex romp was repuposed with the perfect 808 generated beat and some uber wanky chanky Joe  Perry guitar and Steven Tyler wailing, and absolutely slayed seven ways to Thursday by Run DMC, who rap like they on fire being chased by the cops.

It can be understated, walls were torn down mightily by this song. For the first time, an honest to goodness rap song sat atop the charts. Sure, it eventually led the way to Vanilla Ice and other very white rappers coming out of the suburbs with their eyes on a music career, and, sure, it led to a second wind of a career for Aerosmith, and, sure, the pop charts wouldn't ever let Run DMC get that high again, but, for the moment, it was amazing. (Interestingly, prior to cutting the song, Run DMC didn't much about Aerosmith,  D.M.C. called it "a beautiful thing."

Check it out. Peaking at number four in 1986, oddly four spots higher than it did on the R & B charts, this is your K-101.7 SONG OF THE DAY!

And while you are down here, how about you check out this thing we did here at The K-101.7 Production Studios, just for you: