Heavy D & The Boyz — Money Earnin' Mt. Vernon

JUL 01 1988 · 12:00

Heavy D & The Boyz — Money Earnin' Mt. Vernon (1988) Director: Lionel C. Martin Era: Golden Age of Hip-Hop (1986–1992) - Early East Coast rap expansion from New York City boroughs into suburban communities, marked by community-pride lyricism and street-level documentary aesthetics A high-value archival document capturing both the visual grammar of late-1980s hip-hop community culture and the early directorial voice of Lionel C. Martin, a foundational but often overlooked figure in music video history. The video's unmediated location shooting in Mount Vernon, NY preserves streetscape, fashion, and social choreography from 1988 with documentary fidelity rarely achieved in the era's more stage-bound productions. Essential for any survey of East Coast hip-hop's geographic expansion and visual self-representation. Context: Released in 1988 as a single from Heavy D & The Boyz's debut album Living Large, 'Money Earnin' Mt. Vernon' functions as a geographic identity anthem rooted in Mount Vernon, New York — a city directly adjacent to the Bronx and long associated with hip-hop culture. Heavy D (Dwight Myers), born in Jamaica and raised in Mount Vernon, used the track and video to place his hometown on the hip-hop map at a moment when the genre was rapidly expanding beyond its South Bronx and Harlem origins. The video embodies the community-pride ethos of late-1980s rap, presenting the neighborhood not as a backdrop but as the subject itself, a documentary impulse consistent with director Lionel C. Martin's broader mission to inject authentic urban and suburban narratives into Black music visuals at a time when such representation was scarce on mainstream television. Director notes: Directed in 1988 as a music video for the single 'Moneyearnin' Mount Vernon' from Heavy D & The Boyz's debut album Living Large. Per IMDB, the video features the group paying homage to their home city by performing at their favorite hangout spots in Mount Vernon, New York. The production reflects Martin's signature approach of grounding hip-hop visuals in authentic urban and suburban locations rather than relying on studio sets, consistent with the resource-driven naturalism he developed at his production company Filmmakers With Attitude.