Over time, it became common for the MCs (or rappers, as they soon became known) to talk and rhyme over and in sync with the music. Initially dismissed as a fad, rap music proved its commercial viability in 1979 with the release of The Sugarhill Gang's "Rapper's Delight," and then again in 1980 with Kurtis Blow's "The Breaks," a Top 5 hit that eventually went gold.-->
DJ Kool Herc is widely credited with kicking off the genre. His back-to-school parties in the 1970s were the incubator of his burgeoning idea, where he used his two record turntables to create loops, playing the same beat over again, and extending the instrumental portion of a song.
As rapping as an art form and a technique continued to develop, so too did the DJing. DJ Grand Wizard Theodore is said to have accidentally invented the method of "scratching," wherein the DJ pushes the record back and forth as it's played to produce a scratching noise as it brushes against the needle. The scratching technique proved to be enormously influential, as it was quickly picked up by legends like Grandmaster Flash. Theodore is also responsible for pioneering the use of the needle drop, where instead of silently cueing up the next record to be played, the DJ drops the needle onto the exact beginning of the song.