A Time Before Crack

Once upon a time before crack, inner city communities were blighted by poverty, but not by the drug wars that destroyed lives. Once upon a time before crack, Jamel Shabazz was on the scene, working the streets of New York City, capturing the faces and places of an era that have long since disappeared. Best known as Hip Hop's finest fashion photographer, Shabazz unearthed an extraordinary collection of never-before-published documentary photographs collected for his third powerHouse Books release, a visual diary of the streets of NYC from the mid-'70s to the mid-'80s.