Rocky Bucano, President and Co-Founder of The Hip Hop Museum has been working for over fourteen years to create a new home for Hip Hop where the culture’s past, present, and future can be celebrated. That dream will become reality when The Hip Hop Museum opens in 2025. We caught up with Rocky to talk about his early days as Kool DJ Rock, the inception of the idea for the Museum, and what the Museum’s opening night will mean to him…and Hip Hop culture as a whole.

The Hip Hop Museum: To start, can you talk about your early days in the music industry?

Rocky Bucano: I started as a DJ in the mid-70s. My cousin Pete DJ Jones was the top DJ in New York City. I grew up in a middle-class neigborhood in the northeast section of the Bronx called The Valley. I was actually born in Harlem but never spent a second in Harlem because my family had already purchased a two-bedroom home in The Valley.

The northeast section of the Bronx doesn’t get much credit for its contribution to Hip Hop. But myself, DJ Breakout, and DJ Baron were from the northeast section. A lot of Hip Hop was happening in the northeast section of the Bronx. My family used to have these Summer barbeques. You have a backyard, you invite people over. And one day my sister Dorena told me that we had a friend, who’s actually a cousin, coming to play music in the backyard. And when this guy showed up, it was Pete DJ Jones. He pulled up in a white Volkswagen with his name on the side.

And I knew his name from listening to the radio so I was like oh my God, this guy is going to be playing in my backyard.

HHM: Wow, what was that event like.

RB: Well after that night, everyone knew that Pete DJ Jones was in my backyard. Immediately after that event, I told my sister I knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to be a DJ like Pete. She said “that’s cool” – kind of like get out of here. I told my mother, who was now in contact with Pete, next time you talk to him see if I can come to one of his parties. She said she would speak to him. Pete tells my mom that I could come to an Easter Sunday party at a nightclub in the City but I had to get there early before the club opens and I could carry his records. I did that for like the next year. That’s how I learned to DJ. I used to sit and watch him all night.

I got my formal break into the music industry at a club in the Bronx called the Stardust Ballroom when Pete was supposed to DJ one night but he came up to me and said he wasn’t feeling good. He said he didn’t have his backup DJ and he needed me to DJ. I DJ’ed all night and the crowd didn’t have any idea that I was learning on the job that night.

HHM: What was your DJ name?

RB: Kool DJ Rock. So the owner of the nightclub, an Italian guy, came up to Pete and asked who was that DJ’ing tonight and Pete said that’s my cousin Rocky. The guy asked me if I wanted to be the DJ for the club. I was like that’s cool but I don’t have any equipment and he said, well, we’ve got our sound system. The sound system was terrible. But he said, you need your own records and I didn’t have any records.

I told Pete that I didn’t have any records and he said I’m going to call the record pool I’m affiliated with called the New York record pool. He told me it was at 99 Prince St in the Village and next Saturday is when the DJs pick up their records and he told me to go get mine. I got there on the Saturday and this white guy a long beard opens the door. It’s David Mancuso, one of the top DJs in New York City who ran the biggest nightclub called The Loft. I had no idea the record pool was in his apartment, which was also the club called The Loft. When I walk in, there are people laying on the floor from the party which doesn’t end until nine, ten o clock in the morning. He gives me like 200 records.

HHM: Do you remember what record out of the batch you were most excited about or got the most spins in those early days?

RB: It was a lot of Disco records. Donna Summer, The Tramps, The Bee Gees. Kool & The Gang. I became a pretty well-known DJ and then I started to add my own MCs and we called ourselves The Come Off Crew. I DJ’ed professionally from 1976 to 1979. I worked in television. I was Technical Director at Channel 9. And I started my own record label called Strong City Records with Jazzy Jay.

HHM: Fast forward a bit, what was the inception of the idea for The Hip Hop Museum?

RB: I was the executive vice president, general manager of the New York Gauchos and AAU Boys and Girls After School Basketball Program, the top AAU Boys and Girls basketball club in America. I got approached by a couple of real estate developers to see if the Gauchos wanted to expand our presence in the Bronx to another part of the Bronx, because the city had issued an RFP to develop an armory.

Long story short, the developer that wanted to help us expand was part of an RFP, but they got eliminated because they couldn’t show proof of funds that they would have the money to finance their vision to reimagine the Kingbridge Armory.

But the city of New York was intrigued that the Gauchos were interested in expanding our program. So they kept us in the loop and they teamed us up with another real estate developer that was trying to also take over the Kingbridge Armory. His name was Young Woo, a Korean real estate developer, very successful. So Young Woo and I met. He got to know about the Gauchos program and I got to know about what his vision was for the Kingbridge Armory. He said, I’m looking for something entertainment that the community would like, and something that would not be too heavy of a lift to actually do. So I told him, I said, you know, Young, if you’re going to add anything entertainment for, for the Kingsbridge Armory in the Bronx, you should think about adding a Hip Hop Museum. He asked what I knew about Hip Hop and then I had to tell him my whole background in music. So he was excited about that.

Over the years, I kept the project alive with my own money. I saw that people were excited to have a Hip Hop Museum. The community really wanted a Hip Hop Museum. So I was like, you know, look, I’m going to continue working on this project as like my side hustle kind of thing.

HHM: Looking what has now come together for The Hip Hop Museum, is it what you envisioned?

RB: It’s more than what I envisioned. The funny thing is, at the Kingbridge Armory when Young Woo was leading the project he asked me how much space I needed for the Museum. I pulled a number out of the air and said 60,000 square feet. I had no idea how big a Museum was. And then when I did my research, I’m like shit, Museum’s are like 200 and 300 thousand square feet. I should have asked for more.

HHM: Jumping ahead to the opening night of The Museum, what will that mean to you personally? And what do you think it means for Hip Hop culture?

RB: For me, this is a dream come true. I’ve been working on it for 14 years. What it means for Hip Hop is Hip Hop now has its own home where it can be assured that the history, culture, and legacy of so many people who made this culture a global phenomenon will live on forever. The grand opening is going to be one of the greatest nights in Hip Hop history. I can’t tell you how excited I am. We have a great team and this project is going to be one of the world’s best Museum’s when it opens.

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