22 Sep 2018

The Realness: how a blood disease shaped hip hop history

From The Podcast Hour, 12:55 pm on 22 September 2018
The Realness logo (Supplied)

The Realness logo (Supplied) Photo: Supplied

The rapper Prodigy and his collaborator Havoc came to fame in the 1990s as the influential US rap duo Mobb Deep with songs like "Shook Ones (Part II)", and their classic 1995 album 'The Infamous'.

But Prodigy also suffered from sickle cell anaemia, an inherited blood disorder that affects more than 4 million people worldwide. Prodigy died from complications related to the disease in June 2017 and in 'The Realness' from WNYC, hosts and health reporters Mary Harris and Christopher Johnson look at the impact of sickle cell on Prodigy's life, and on Mobb Deep's music.

We play an excerpt from Episode 1 of The Realness called "This Sunny Day Right Here", presented by Mary Harris and Christopher M. Johnson for WNYC Studios.