Through the late '90s and early 2000s, no music fan's pilgrimage to The Village was complete without sighting a familiar figure on the Northeast corner of Sixth Avenue and 10th Street. Decked out in and a trademark durag (sometimes red, sometimes black, but usually canary yellow), the legendary rhyme inspector, MC Percee P, kept watch from morning until long past sundown, chatting and rapping and hyping his mixtape to each and every person who passed by.

For an entire generation of rap heads, this was hallowed ground. On the left, LifeThyme, the health food spot where you might run into Common and Erykah Badu getting custom-blended juices from Melvin (the neighborhood's resident wizard of blended beverages). On the right, Bagel Buffet and Gray's Papaya offered cheap and hearty sustenance. And in between, a narrow stairwell led up to a retail wonderland of rhyme and rhythm: Fat Beats, the city's foremost outlet for all that was new and exciting in the world of underground and "true school" Hip-Hop.

Percee himself was – and is – a revered lyricist and MC who won over fans with his unmatched lyrical dexterity, but never quite got the same respect from record labels. His debut 12" release on Big Beat Records in 1992 (with DJ/producer Ekim) received good reviews and word-of-mouth but failed to spawn a follow-up full-length, and in the decades since, he has become known as a "rapper's rapper": releasing projects on Stones Throw and other indie labels; appearing on records by Lord Finesse, Jaylib, Jurassic 5, and Aesop Rock; recognized by his peers as one of the finest wordsmiths of his generation.

And it was in staking out this spot on Sixth that he truly cemented his status as a local legend... When the industry failed to recognize him, he simply created his own lane, establishing a presence that nobody could ignore, setting up shop in the public eye, making his chosen square of pavement into prime rap real estate. For more than a decade, he was the hardest-working man in Hip-Hop, keeping long hours with his discman and self-pressed discs, offering his headphones for passersby to hear his greatest hits, dropping impromptu verses when the mood struck, making the sidewalk his stage.

No rapper, producer, or fan who took those hallowed stairs up to Fat Beats could miss Percee, and through sheer will and dedication, he became as much of a neighborhood landmark as any piece of brick-and-mortar. Even today, years after the flagship Fat Beats location closed its doors, Hip-Hop heads speak in hushed tones of the records they found there and the community that the storefront spawned – and Percee was the mascot and face of that community, known to all for his hustle, skill, and dedication.

With 2023 being celebrated throughout NYC (and the world) as the 50th Anniversary of Hip-Hop Culture, we believe the time has come to show proper appreciation for one of the city's most notable native sons, celebrate his perseverance and dedication, and recognize his status as an indelible icon of grassroots New York Hip-Hop – by renaming the corner of Sixth and 8th "Percee P Place".