The DJs at the time were picking up the arm and dropping it down exactly on the break of the song. But I was dancing, and I noticed everybody's head was bobbing at the same time, and then suddenly everyone's heads would go into disarray, and then come back together again. I found this to be very strange. From that moment, I decided to come up with a science that would allow me to have full control to manually edit the beat. I came up with the science called the Quick Mix theory. It consisted of me having to do something that DJs at the time never did: placing my fingertips on the vinyl. I was ridiculed for a long time. I was told that I ruined needles, ruined styluses, ruined records, and also that placing my fingers on the vinyl was something DJs never did because I'd make the record filthy. But I knew that I had to do it to have full control over the vinyl.

— Grandmaster Flash