This is the history of the infamous Vibes and Vapors Show…. or at least a place to reminisce and remember that which was 1992 to 1997 on WPRB on a Wednesday/Thursday night. Just a bunch of (actual) college kids trying to forget about studying for a few hours and put on a good show. Post thoughts, memories, and if you’ve got tapes (especially on mp3)…let us know! The cassette recorder at the station was never in the best shape, nor was a lot of the other equipment for that matter. We used to call that “flavor”. Enjoy.
Currently there are about 30 shows posted so please dig through previous months in the archive links over on the right side.
Vibes and Vapors 
Yo D what’s up man. I was talking to DJ Yaseen this past weekend and he said he had a bunch of PRB shows on CD. I’ll see if i can get those for you to post.
My high school years overlapped with the Vibes and Vapors Show. I grew up in Camden, NJ
and was just on the edge of the PRB radio signal. I tuned in every Thursday night and
without fail was educated every week.
Good memories… and the education in music, taste, and selection has stayed with me.
Thanks Khary. Welcome and stop back for more archives as we dig them up.
Wow…this is too damned much! Have too many tapes, D. TOO MANY!! We’ll have to link up some night and I’ll give ’em to you (the playable ones, anyway…). Some great memories. Before V & V, what was it- G and Jay doing “Nightshift”, or something like that?
Man, some of my favorite shows: the night you decided to try recording people doing live shouts. WHO WAS THE FIRST? (Oh, I THINK that would be ME!) Symphony thinking he was Funk Flex (psssssht!). The night Sel referred to “Sun Born” as “Sunburn”! “Shields Up!” And who was the dude who used to answer the phones who I always talked to? Man, I can remember it all like it was yesterday…and I know it wasn’t, because my daughter was BORN in ’92, and she’s 17 now! We’re gettin’ old, D!!
There’s only about 14 tapes posted so far and I know I listened to your “live shout out” on one of them. I think the second reading of Shields Up (w/ D. Crum) is posted too. I don’t think I have the original. That’s where you come in!
Prior to V&V was the Raw Deal, Club Krush, 2 Smooth, Big Bob’s show (might also been Club Krush but that was prior to Marc). I haven’t written the proper history post yet.
I remember all that, but I’m telling you- before you started doing Vibes, Jay and G did a 2 hr. show, and it was called “Nightshift”, which was also the theme/intro to the show. I think it was on Wednesday nights. That was how I started talking to Jay. Check with Carlton…er, um, Jay. Also remember when I found out Jay’s name was John- when Bobbito slipped and Jay got mad!
I don’t remember Nightshift, but I DEFINITELY remember The Raw Deal. That’s when I first started listening to PRB. I still have one of my favorite radio tapes somewhere from a Raw Deal show that introduced me to so many classics–the Boogie Down Productions “We In There” ATCQ remix, the EPMD “Crossover” trunk mix, the Organized Konfusion “Who Stole My Last Peice of Chicken,” K-Solo “Letterman,” way too many to mention all of them. PLUS it had all those old commercials like the Cypress Hill commercial for St. Idez where they performed that song “How I could Just Kill A Can.” CLASSIC. I also remember the guys reading a commercial for a skateboard shop and a really old commercial for 555-Soul, which, back then, was called “Five Five Five Soul,” and not “Triple Five Soul,” as it came to be called by the late 90s. Peace.
Oh, and I still remember The Raw Deal theme song. That ish was dope.
Yo I still have some old V&V tapes and I want to send the digital copies to you guys so you can post them. Please tell me how.
Thanks, Ryan. I figure there were some 200+ shows and I might have 30-40 tapes so anything and everything is appreciated. Check your email for the instructions…
I dont think yall have any idea how many people this show reached and inspired. I’d like to thank “That nigga J, That Nigga D, and That nigga Sefu!” for all dope music yall gave to the tri state. Philly was definitly tuned in. Did yall post the show with Tony D spinning breaks?
We thought we knew but that was probably more ego than anything. It’s feedback like this that makes my (our) day. Thanks. Oh and if you have tapes…please send ’em in! I’ll encode them and send them back. We have to preserve the history.
Damn, what a pleasant surprise finding this site. Was trawling YouTube for ’94-’95 instrumentals to post on a music weblog, and it occurred to me to search for my favorite hip-hop show of all time. Sure enough, there you were.
I listened from 9th grade through graduation when I moved out of the area, taping almost every week. I ended up taping new shows over old ones that I wasn’t feeling so much, but somewhere in my parent’s attic there are probably three dozen or so semi-labeled/unlabeled 90- to 120-minute cassettes. A lot of them may overlap existing uploads, so I’m not sure how useful they would be to you, but the next time I’m out east to visit my folks, I’d be happy to send ’em your way.
Thanks, gents, for years of great music and a few laughs, too. The rest of the world missed out.
Best Regards,
N
PS-
Anyone interested in a fan page on Facebook?
thanx for the piece on the these cats. I was a huge fan back in the day, still am atulalcy. “It Gets No Deeper” and “I Got A Good Thing” were big inspirations for me as an MC. They had so much style. “girls come one at a time, because when it comes to crowds…I kick rhymes”
i can’t believe i stumbled across this site. i was such a big fan. i was coming out of middle school/going into high school in burlington city when i discovered the raw deal show, & i LOVED vibes&vapors more than anything on the radio when i was a teenager. i taped every show almost w/o fail,& would listen to the tapes on my walkman on my way 2/from school, under my hoodie in detention, etc. 🙂 but over the years, ALL of my prized tapes were lost, stolen, or broken 😦 i miss the old days & those tapes so bad. hopefully now that i found this site i can relive some of that! there’s this one song that i been thinking of for a long time now, & i don’t remember the name of the song or the singer unfortunately. it was actually an r&b song that they played sometimes on vibes&vapors (93,94 or 95 timeframe i think)sung by a girl & it had the dopest bassline. i think the name of the song might have been “pressure” because she sang about pressure over & over again in the song. i also think the singer used just a first name for herself. i don’t think this artist was ever actually “released” either. if anyone could help me find this song, i would appreciate it so much. & big ups 2 jerzey always 🙂
idk what made me even think about the ol WPRB days. i used to catch the bus from willingboro (shout out) to camden or philly 1nce a week. so i would pop my tape of vibes & vapors in the sony sportsman & get it in. i remember they used to knock that OC “constables” song like it was going out of style. good times! is there a way we can download?
BRING HIP HOP BACK!!!!!
yo, i would love to get hooked up with some of these tapes. good times man.
Wassup V&V fam! Man, this show brings back memories. I’m actually in the process of converting about 3 Timberland boot shoeboxes full of Maxell XL IIS 100 minute tapes of Vibes and Vapors shows, to MP3 format while typing this. The show with Punk Barbarians in the studio is playing now: we got the industry on lockdown, #1 top hits!! Renegade, 12-guage… I decided to Google “WPRB Vibes & Vapors” and came across this site. I listened to the show during my high school years and then some; 92-97. I was definitely tuned into the show Wednesdays and Thursdays. I think I recorded nearly every show. You guys had the best hiphop show in the area, during this era. I used to listen to Drexel University’s hiphop show which came on Sunday afternoons (i think). One of the Dj’s name was AJ Shine. V&V was better though. Tuning in from Philly, I got a fairly good signal depending on the weather…
Reminiscing on the times I spent in my parents’ basement, tuned in listening to the show, boosting blank tapes from k-mart, sears, where ever… haha! I was wylin’ out.. It got to the point where I made a make-shift antenna and stuck it out the window to get a better signal. too bad I jacked up my pop’s radio for doing that ish! but it was worth it to hear the latest, dopest hiphop songs that haven’t gone mainstream yet. I was the kid in school listening to recorded shows, with the latest songs from artists my classmates never heard of.. sh*t, i even played the tapes at basement parties!
Yo, big up to D-Groovy, Sefu, guest artists that appeared on the show, and whoever else put it on at WPRB for the Vibes & Vapors Show.
Let me know what I need to do to get these MP3 filez to y’all!
-Peace
The homemade antenna?…bonkers. I love that you could use the tapes for basement parties as that was the WHOLE idea. We formatted the show to be a dope tape and I’m glad it worked for somebody. I’ll hit you on the side with regard to getting those mp3 posted. It continues to fascinate me as people stumble on this site. It’s a fam thing. If you weren’t there, either as a listener or at the station, you won’t understand. More things to come…
Just upload a show from the summer of 1992, ENJOI!!!
http://suspectblog215.blogspot.com/2011/02/vibes-and-vapors-throwback-wprb-1992.html
rSINx86 – I’ve been truly sleeping recently. Sorry for just getting to this post now. If you see this, please repost that page or send me the mp3 and I’ll put the show up on this site. This is still an ongoing project and I’m still interested in all the recording I can find. Thanks for lookin’ out. – D
SMFH yo im from willingboro i started listening to vibes & vapors back in 91 when i was in 8th all the way til about 97 man the feeling i have at this moment,man crazy,i had mad tapes but moving and all that i lost them all words cant express how thankful i am you guys have this site. Lets continue to preserve the culture SALUTE
Thanks. If I can get my tape deck working there will be at least a few more.
I totally went nuts when i found this site……i was the biggest WPRB head i knew. I turned every one of my friends on to it and it became church to us week in and week out. My question is how do i get A hold of the maker of this site because i have about 30 weeks worth of recordings that I’m in the process of converting and id love to contribute to the site so the masses can see/hear what they missed during the best time by far for hip hop. things have changed so much for the worse these days and its scary to realize that it will never be the same. Don’t get me wrong there is plenty of talent out there but what happened to the love for just the pure Hip Hop lifestyle. There is o more crews like DITC, The Flava Unit, to just name a couple…..i could go on for ever. But this stuff needs to be heard, all the OG hip hop heads should make it there job to make the young bucks out there listen to some of this raw uncut hip hop so they can have a appreciation for where it all came from. There was o better time for hip hop than from 1990 to about 1997 and WPRB was the epitome of Real Hip Hop
Justin –
I’ll hit you on the side to get those files/tapes. I appreciate the offer… that’s the exact spirit I was hoping for with this site. Thanks man. – D. Groovy
WHAT HAPPENED TO ALL OF GreaonGrea’s tapes that he had?
I still have them! Trying to figure out how to upload them to the net!
Yo I grew up listening to this show every night it came on, I was living in North East Philly at the time, and when this show came up the lights were off I was in another zone and stared at my radio. This show got me into hip hop at an early age, and man there was so many joints on the show I never heard before, I remember when Canibus was there freestyling on of the show, and man I remember this one track I think it was mobb deep “we taking you to your funeral…Im in the cut with not one but two gats”, This show introduced me to MOP, Bahamadia, Sadat-X, and so many more. I am also looking for the show where it was nothing but wu tang and killarmy, I had recorded in on cassette lent it to someone never got it back, it had some killarmy tracks till this day I can’t find but would love to own. So many memories though and thanks to everyone involved for doing this show, and shaped me as a person gave me my intellect.
I have about 30+ 90min cassette tapes of the Vibes and Vapors show recorded between ‘95-2003. I converted them to mp3 format and wanted to know how can I upload the files to your website to share with the world?
I am going to dig up a few shows I have recorded.