* En anglais uniquement
Known as the Drama King,
DJ Kayslay (alternately
DJ Kay Slay) was a New York mixtape and radio DJ who helped contribute to the success of countless hip-hop artists. He rose to the top of his field by refereeing some of the most talked-about MC battles of the early 2000s, most notably
Jay-Z versus
Nas and
50 Cent versus
Ja Rule, on his
Streetsweeper mixtape series and later on his Hot 97 radio show, The Drama Hour. Following the mainstream success of two major-label
Streetsweeper releases, he continued issuing albums and mixtapes into the 2020s featuring guest appearances by
Lil Wayne,
Busta Rhymes,
Kendrick Lamar, and hundreds of others.
Born
Keith Grayson, the gully loudmouth grew up with his grandparents in Harlem's East River Houses. He initially drifted toward good old-fashioned hip-hop culture, particularly DJing and graffiti writing. As Dezzy Dez, his tag name at the time,
Kayslay made a name for himself throughout New York during the late '70s and early '80s -- he even made an appearance in the 1983 hip-hop documentary Style Wars. Drug dependency later took a toll, however; he met his fate early the following decade, when he was indicted for felony possession of narcotics.
Upon his return to the streets,
Kayslay began living a new, drug-free life that was a real hustle. For years he worked at random jobs, trying to make enough money to fund his own studio in Harlem so that he could fulfill his dreams of being a big-time DJ. He slowly realized his dreams, and by the early 2000s, he was indeed one of New York's biggest DJs, churning out mixtapes that featured many of the city's top rappers. His big break came during the advent of high-stakes beefing sparked by the unprecedented furor surrounding
Jay-Z's ongoing bout with
Nas. It was
Kayslay who first spun "Ether," and from that point on, he became the DJ whom rappers approached with their latest battle raps, another huge debut of his being the
Ja Rule-bashing
Eminem,
50 Cent, and
Busta Rhymes remake of "Hail Mary."
Kayslay's
Streetsweeper mixtapes, trademarked by his signature loudmouth voice-overs, were consequently hot commodities during this era, and
Columbia took the initiative to sign him and finance a major-label version of the
Streetsweeper series. Both
The Streetsweeper, Vol. 1 (2003) and
The Streetsweeper, Vol. 2 (2004) -- loaded with appearances from
Mobb Deep,
Fat Joe,
Ghostface Killah, and
Scarface -- were Top Ten hits on Billboard's Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart. Meanwhile,
Kayslay hosted a popular radio show on Hot 97, The Drama Hour, where he would regularly debut the latest battle rap exclusives.
Well into the latter half of the following decade,
Kayslay continued to release mixtapes at a rate of at least two each year, while the widely distributed
More Than Just a DJ (2010) and
The Big Brother (2017) were billed as proper albums, involving input from the likes of
the Alchemist,
Zaytoven,
Kendrick Lamar, and
E-40. The full-length
Hip Hop Frontline arrived in 2019, including appearances from
Kevin Gates,
Moneybagg Yo, and
Lil Wayne. The much shorter
Living Legend was released in 2020; guests included
A$AP Ferg,
Queen Latifah, and
Big K.R.I.T. Kayslay died at the age of 55 on April 17, 2022. ~ Jason Birchmeier