By Ta-Nehisi Coates | Book Excerpt
I was a chubby kid in West Baltimore. Crack addled the streets; De La refused to scowl. How the summer of ‘88 became my generation’s greatest.
My older brother, Big Bill was a disciple of the Golden Years—a kid who knew the difference between Jock Box and the original DMX, a kid who could speak on the wonder of Jazzy Jeff pulling transformers and bird-songs from black vinyl. In those days, to be a black boy was to beg your parents for a set of Technic 1200s turntables and an MPC sampler. Failing that, it meant banging on lunch tables and beat-boxing until you could rock the Sanford & Son theme song and play.
Deep in the basement of West Baltimore, Bill stood in his homeboy Marlon’s basement holding the mic like a lover. They 
called themselves the West Side Kings, which meant Marlon cutting breakbeats and Bill reciting battle rhymes he’d scrawled in a yellow notepad. He would come home with demos, play them for hours, and rap along with himself. This went on for two years before I saw the West Side Kings in action. By then the game had changed, and brothers had gotten righteous. That was the summer of 1988—the greatest season of my generation.
I was so much softer then, all chubby and smiling. My skin was clear and brown. My eyes were wide like my name. My style-less haircut was the handiwork of my father, my widow’s peak crawled out like a spy. Amidst the tangle and chaos of West Baltimore, I was a blue-jay. Rapacious jaguars clocked my every move. I spent my first year of middle school catching beatdowns and shrinking under the patent leather Jordans of live niggers out to make their manhood manifest. It was not my time. I was all X-Men, polyhedral dice, and Greek myths. Bill was of a different piece. He was tall and smooth as Kane touching “All Night Long.” He pulled shorties with all the effort of a long yawn, and, like so many, believed that he would make a living off his jumper. He spent loose-time out on the block laced in puff-leather, Diadora and Lottoes, packing a tool and clutching his nuts. When bored, he gathered his crew and brought the ruckus, snatching bus tickets, and issuing beatdowns at random. They gave no reason. They published no manifestos. This was how they got down. This was the ritual.
