 He moved with his family to New York City at a young age and took up the drums, his first instrument.He began his career in hip hop in the 1970s in The Bronx, New York, the epicenter of hip hop culture during the first decade of its development, at the age of 13.An early member of Afrika Bambaataa's Universal Zulu Nation, he was a protégé of Bambaataa as well as his older cousin, Kool DJ Red Alert.