The Message

Recorded in 1982 for Sugar Hill Records by Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, with Melle Mel taking the lead vocal and Ed “Duke Bootee” Fletcher and Sylvia Robinson overseeing the production. It was cut as a stark, street-level rap single rather than a party record. The track turned mainstream attention toward socially conscious hip hop and proved that rap could carry a serious urban narrative. It became one of the defining records of early 1980s rap and a landmark release for Sugar Hill. It remained a template for politically and socially pointed rap, with its imagery and urgency echoed by later generations of artists. The song has been widely sampled, covered, and cited as one of hip hop’s foundational classics.