New York City is the Mecca of hip hop. And no trip to NYC is complete without paying homage to the birthplace of the genre. If you’re a hip hop head, you need to add these 6 NYC Hip Hop Landmarks to your bucket list!
As self-professed musicphiles, we seek out opportunities to visit music landmarks when we travel. We fulfilled a lifelong dream when we embarked on the Fab 4 Taxi Tour in 2010, which swept us through the hometown of our four favorite Lads from Liverpool. In Nine Mile and Vienna, we toured the respective homes of Bob Marley and Mozart.
But NYC is a big place, and scores of hip hop legends call the city home. Naturally, we had to narrow the scope of sites we aimed to see. We’ll walk you through 6 hip hop landmarks you can visit in the Queens and Brooklyn boroughs. Check out the Instagram reel we put together on the sites, but make sure to read our post for details on each location!
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QUEENS
๐ A Tribe Called Quest Mural
- Location: Nu Clear Dry Cleaner, Linden Boulevard & 192nd Street in St. Albans
- Artist: Vincent Ballentine
Dedicated to the legacy of one of the most influential hip hop acts of all time, the mural was commissioned after the untimely passing of founding member Malik “Phife Dawg” Taylor in 2016, following complications of diabetes. Artist Vincent Ballentine painted the mural on the side of the Nu Clear Dry Cleaner Building, the building on whose roof the “Check the Rhime” video was filmed in 1991.
You can find the mural on Linden Boulevard & 192nd Street, a corner now named after Phife. As every ATCQ fan knows, Linden Boulevard is of particular significance in the group’s history; the street was referenced numerous times by the Native Tongues alum. Phife notably name-checked it on “Check the Rhime”, the first single from ATCQโs seminal second album The Low End Theory, rapping: โBack in days on the boulevard of Linden / We used to kick routines and the presence was fittinโ, mirroring Q-Tipโs opening verse.
QUEENS
๐ Jam Master Jay Mural
- Address: 205th Street & Hollis Avenue in Hollis
- Artist: Art-1
This Hollis, Queens mural was installed in 2003 to honor the life of Jason โJayโ Mizell, known professionally as Jam Master Jay, the DJ for hip hop pioneers Run-DMC. Jay was mysteriously gunned down in a recording studio in 2002. His murder tragically went unsolved, but in 2020, NYC prosecutors charged a suspect in the killing. Interestingly, the accused reportedly filmed an amateur music video in front of the mural in 2015. The video, which boasted about drug dealing and guns, was cited by prosecutors in a motion to deny bail as evidence demonstrating the suspect’s danger to the community.
Find the mural around the corner from the South Hollis Library, on 205th Street and Hollis Avenue. The corner was rechristened Run-DMC JMJ Way in 2009. Run-DMC originated in Hollis, Queens, which is flanked by Hollis Avenue. You probably live under a rock if you haven’t heard the group’s 1987 “Christmas in Hollis”, a single that appeared on two Christmas compilation albums that year!
BROOKLYN
๐ “King of New York Mural” (Notorious B.I.G. Mural)
- Location: Bedford Avenue & Quincy Street in BedfordโStuyvesant
- Artists: Scoot โZimerโ Zimmerman and Maoufal โRockoโ Alaoui
This 38-foot high, two-story mural is a 2015 tribute to the late Christopher Wallace, also known as The Notorious B.I.G., who is widely regarded to be one of the greatest rappers of all time. The mural is located just minutes from Biggie’s childhood home in Brooklyn, and the corner on which it’s located holds a special place in the rapper’s lore.
Biggie famously went bar-for-bar with MC Supreme, who was the best rapper in the neighborhood at the time, at a block party on that corner in 1991. The 17-year-old Big won the cypher and lyrically took out every rapper he battledโa street cred-solidifying day that helped launch his career.
A quarter century after Biggie’s murder at the age of 24, the man and his mural still loom large over NYC and hip hop history. The impressive commemoration was almost taken down in 2017 due to the building owner’s desire to renovate the property. However, the artwork was ultimately saved thanks to a petition signed by thousands of loyal Biggie Smalls enthusiasts.
“Live from Bedford-Stuyvesant, the livest one / Representing BK to the fullest.”
(“Unbelievable”, The Notorious B.I.G.).
BROOKLYN
๐ ODB Mural
- Location: Corner of Franklin & Putnam Avenues in BedfordโStuyvesant
- Artist: Vic Goldfield
Plastered on the side of a bodega, this Bed-Stuy mural memorializes the late Russell “Ol’ Dirty Bastard” Jones, founding member of The Wu-Tang Clan, who called the neighborhood home. The mural features the cover of ODB’s debut solo album, Return to the 36 Chambers: The Dirty Version, which was an image of his infamous welfare card.
Although Wu-Tang is considered Staten Island’s (*ahem* Shaolin’s) greatest cultural export, with two-thirds of the group hailing from the borough, Brooklyn will remember ODB as a native son. Indeed, “Brooklyn Zoo”, the premier single off Dirty’s debut album, is one of the borough’s most memorable anthems. Method Man said it best on a 36 Chamber’s intermission: Jones was the Ol’ Dirty Bastard because, “There was no father to his style.”
BROOKLYN
๐ Adam Yauch Park
- Location: 27 State Street #5512 in Brooklyn Heights
A small Brooklyn Heights Park called Palmetto Playground was once the literal stomping ground of the late Adam “MCA” Yauch, one-third of the trailblazing rap-rock group Beastie Boys. MCA’s father taught him how to ride a bike at the park, located blocks from MCA’s childhood home.
On the one-year anniversary of MCA’s sudden passing in 2012 due to lymphoma, the park was renamed “Adam Yauch Park” in his honor. Bandmate Adam “Ad-Rock” Horovitz said at the dedication, ” It’s fitting that we’re here today to dedicate a playground to Adam Yauch, because like the Wu-Tang Clan, Beastie Boys is for the children.”
โBorn and bred in Brooklyn, the USA / They call me Adam Yauch, but Iโm MCA.โ
(โNo Sleep ‘Til Brooklynโ, Beastie Boys)
BROOKLYN
๐ George Westinghouse Career and Technical Education High School (high school attended by Jay-Z, Busta Rhymes and Biggie)
- Location: 105 Tech Place in downtown Brooklyn
Sean “Jay-Z” Carter, Trevor “Busta Rhymes” Smith Jr, and Biggie were classmates at George Westinghouse Career and Technical Education High School in downtown Brooklyn. In fact, Jay-Z and Busta had a rap battle in the lunch room one day. Speed rapping was the name of the game at the time, Jay-Z won, and Busta did not take the L kindly. However, the loss inspired in the Leaders of the New School alum a need for speedโan art we’re pretty sure he’s since mastered.
๐ Other NYC Hip Hop Sites
As we mentioned above, this list only scratches the surface of NYC hip hop landmarks. There are countless others you could add to your list if you have have time!
- Hush Tours is the original hip hop tour service. They currently offer walking tours, but previously did bus tours in pre-Covid times.
- Fuse’s Hip Hop map of Brooklyn lists other sites you can visit in the borough.
- Wu-Tang Clan District in Staten Island
- 11 Notorious B.I.G. Landmarks
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