When bigger was better, the suitcase-size boom box was a necessity for big-city teenagers. In the 1980s, sales nationwide topped $20 million a year. In Spike Lee’s “Do the Right Thing,” Radio Raheem carried his everywhere, playing Public Enemy’s “Fight the Power.” By the ’90s, the battery-powered bass-heavy boxes equipped with radios and cassette players were supplanted by Walkmans and smaller devices, even as hip-hop and rap — born in New York City — came to dominate musical culture worldwide.
A History of New York in 50 Objects | NYT
