Originally Published:Monday, January 31st 2011, 11:41 AM
Updated: Monday, January 31st 2011, 5:37 PM
Scratch that.
Contrary to reports that DJ Kool Herc is gravely ill, the hip-hop pioneer’s family said Monday that he has “serious kidney stones” that require a surgery he can’t afford.
“He’s been in terrible pain for months,” said Herc’s sister Cindy Campbell. “The doctors say they’ve got to come out, but we just don’t have the money.”
Fans of the legendary turntablist grew deeply concerned when reports that he was “very sick” with an undisclosed illness emerged over the weekend.
“\[He\] who we call the father of hip-hop, Kool Herc, is not doing well,” DJ Premier announced on his Sirius XM radio program on Friday.
“Since he’s very sick and has no insurance … \[He\] needs to pay his bills so he can get out of the hospital.”
That set off a flurry of Twitter messages and an on-line fund-raising campaign to help the pace-setting Bronx DJ out.
So far, the 55-year-old DJ has piled up more than $ 10,000 in hospital bills and the much-needed surgery will only add to that, his sister said.
Herc, born Clive Campbell, is widely credited with creating the break beat in the early 1970s – a key DJing technique that is the underpinning of hip-hop.
While greatly influencing generations of performers in the decades that followed, Herc never had any major hits of his own and has struggled financially. He has also battled drug problems in the past.
Doctors at St. Barnabas Hospital in the Bronx discovered large stones in one of Campbell’s kidneys several months ago and inserted a stent to try to alleviate his discomfort, his sister said.
“But it’s starting to affect his health and he’s on pain killers, which is no good,” she said. “This needs to be dealt with soon.”
She said the hip-hop community owes it to those who came before them to help out.
“People need to come together on this. The trailblazers are getting older and they have no real support network,” she said.
DJ Premier echoed that sentiment on his radio show.
“He needs some help to pay his bills for the hospital because he can’t hold it down,” he said. “Being that he is the man who set this whole culture off, ya’ll should be wanting to do it any type of way that you can.”
lalpert@nydailynews.com
