The Young Adult Edition / All-Ages Audiobook
“Required history for young hip-hop heads—and everyone else.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred)
“This engrossing, engaging account bills itself as a history of hip-hop, but it’s so much more.”
—Booklist (starred)
From award-winning author Jeff Chang and legendary hip-hop journalist Dave “Davey D” Cook, Can’t Stop Won’t Stop: Young Adult Edition is the story of hip-hop, a movement and music that transformed America and the world forever. In this new special edition for young adults and all-ages audiobook voiced by the authors, they chronicle hip-hop from its beginnings through the Black Lives Matter era.
Based on original interviews with rappers, DJs, b-boys, graffiti writers, activists, and gang members, with unforgettable portraits of many of hip hop’s forebears, founders, mavericks, and current icons—and featuring a focus on the women of hip-hop and the movement’s global impact—this wholly updated book chronicles the epic personalities, events, ideas, and the music that have shaped generations.
The Original Edition, 2005
Named one of “the best nonfiction books of the past 25 years”, Jeff Chang’s Can’t Stop Won’t Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation is the “one of the most urgent and passionate histories of popular music ever written.”
Forged in the fires of the Bronx and Kingston, Jamaica, hip-hop has been a generation-defining global movement. In a post-civil rights era rapidly transformed by deindustrialization and globalization, hip-hop gave Black youths a chance to address these seismic changes. It became a job-making engine and the Esperanto of youth rebellion. Hip-hop crystallized a mutiracial generation’s worldview, and forever transformed politics and culture. But the epic story of how that happened has never been fully told… until now.
The Blog
From 2002 to 2014, the Can’t Stop Won’t Stop blog and website was a place for commentary on hip-hop, politics, and culture. Its very first post announced the idea: “Inaugurating a cultural autonomous zone from which to wage low-intensity peace.” Don’t laugh too hard. It was the time of the Matrix trilogy and the beginning of the Wars on Afghanistan and Iraq.
We’ve kept the site up here—as was, tantalizing dead links and all—partly because we’re not the type to throw things away—sorry, Marie—but also just to document the time and vibe that the original book came from. Enjoy!
