The Message (Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five song)

"The Message" is a song by Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five. It was released as a single by Sugar Hill Records on July 1, 1982 and was later featured on the group's first studio album, The Message. "The Message" was the first prominent hip hop song to provide a lyrical social commentary. It took rap music from the house parties to the social platforms later developed by groups like Public Enemy, N.W.A., and Rage Against The Machine.Melle Mel said in an interview with NPR: “Our group, like Flash and the Furious Five, we didn’t actually want to do the message because we was used to doing party raps and boasting how good we are and all that.”[2]

The song was written and performed by Sugar Hill session musician Ed "Duke Bootee" Fletcher and Furious Five MC Melle Mel.[3] [unreliable source?]



Contents
[hide]  *1 Uses in popular culture  ==Uses in popular culture[ edit] == The chorus verse was sampled in Sinbad's "Brain Damaged" for his 1990 comedy album of the same name.
 * 2 Reception
 * 2.1 Retrospective
 * 2.2 Music and structure
 * 2.3 Critical reception
 * 3 Chart positions
 * 4 Remixes
 * 5 References
 * 5.1 Further reading
 * 6 External links

"The Message" was included as in-game radio music for the 2002 video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, and the 2006 video game Scarface: The World Is Yours, an adaption of the 1983 film. The signature synthesizer melody was also sampled and featured in multiple episodes of Star Wars: The Clone Wars. For the MTV-produced compilation album Lit Riffs: The Soundtrack in 2004, the band Katsu supplied a stripped-down cover version of "The Message". The second and last verses of the song are sung by Mushroomhead in the song "Born of Desire" off their XX album. American singer-songwriter Willy Mason also covered this song for BBC Radio 1's Live Lounge on February 25, 2005.

Genesis drummer and lead singer Phil Collins along with Grammy Award winning producer Hugh Padgham described in the 2001 release, The Genesis Songbook, how "The Message" helped shape the hook of the band's 1983 hit single Mama. Padgham said that "At the time "The Message" was one of my favorite records". Collins thought "The laugh thing" was "Fantastic...what a great sound" and he experimented with it and incorporated it into the song. During live shows, his version, usually using their signature Vari-Lite technology, became a highlight of the performance. Collins quipped that "Rap has influenced Genesis".

In the 2006 computer animated film Happy Feet, Seymour raps the chorus line from this song to impress Miss Viola and other penguin students.

In 2007, the 25th anniversary of "The Message", Melle Mel changed the spelling of his first name to Mele Mel and released "M3 - The New Message" as the first single to his first ever solo album,Muscles. 2007 is also the year that Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five became the first hip-hop act ever to be inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.[4]

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:20.3636360168457px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13.63636302948px;">In 2010, Melle Mel and Scorpio appeared in an Australian commercial for the Kia Sportage in which they perform "The Message".

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:20.3636360168457px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13.63636302948px;">On November 30, 2011, Melle Mel, Scorpio, and Grandmaster Flash joined Common, Lupe Fiasco, and LL Cool J as they performed a tribute of this song at the 54th Grammy nominations.

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:20.3636360168457px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13.63636302948px;">A Swedish translation/adaption of the song, "Budskapet", was released by Timbuktu in May 2013, following the riots in Husby and other suburbs of Stockholm.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-5" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[5] <sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-6" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[6] <sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-7" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[7] ==Reception<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-family:sans-serif;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">] == ===Retrospective<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">] === <p style="margin-top:0.5em;line-height:20.3636360168457px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13.63636302948px;">Rolling Stone ranked "The Message" #51 in its List of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Songs of All Time (the highest placing for any song released in the 1980s, and highest ranking hip-hop song on the list). It was later named the greatest hip-hop song of all time in 2012.

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:20.3636360168457px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13.63636302948px;">It was voted #3 on About.com's Top 100 Rap Songs, after Common's "I Used to Love H.E.R." and The Sugarhill Gang's "Rapper's Delight".<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-8" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[8]

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:20.3636360168457px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13.63636302948px;">In 2002, its first year of archival, it was one of 50 recordings chosen by the Library of Congress to be added to the National Recording Registry,<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-9" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[9]  the first hip hop recording ever to receive this honor.

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:20.3636360168457px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13.63636302948px;">It was used in a British Government commissioned public information film on road safety.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-10" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[10]

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:20.3636360168457px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13.63636302948px;">"The Message" was number 5 on VH1's 100 Greatest Songs of Hip Hop.

<p style="margin-top:0.5em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:20.3636360168457px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13.63636302948px;">WatchMojo.com ranked "The Message" #1 on Top 10 Decade Defining Rap Songs of the 1980s,<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-11" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[11] <sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-12" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[12]  and #1 on Top 10 Ultimate Decade Defining Rap Songs.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-13" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[13] <sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-14" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[14] ===Music and structure<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">] === <p style="margin-top:0.5em;line-height:20.3636360168457px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13.63636302948px;">"The Message” has been reused and re-sampled in so many different ways that it would be easy to reduce its legacy to cliché. Music critic Dan Carins described it in a 2008 edition of The Sunday Times: "Where it was inarguably innovative, was in slowing the beat right down, and opening up space in the instrumentation - the music isn't so much hip-hop as noirish, nightmarish slow-funk, stifling and claustrophobic, with electro, dub and disco also jostling for room in the genre mix - and thereby letting the lyrics speak loud and clear”. Not only does the song utilize an ingenious mix of musical genres to great effect, but it also allows the slow and pulsating beat to take a backseat to the stark and haunting lyrical content.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-15" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[15] ===Critical reception<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">] === <p style="margin-top:0.5em;line-height:20.3636360168457px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13.63636302948px;">In addition to being widely regarded as an all-time rap anthem, "The Message" has been credited by many critics as the song that catapulted emcees from the background to the forefront of Hip-Hop. Thus, shifting the focus from the mixing and scratching of the grandmaster as the star, to the thoughts and lyrics of the emcee playing the star role. David Hickley wrote in 2004 that ""The Message" also crystallized a critical shift within rap itself. It confirmed that emcees, or rappers, had vaulted past the deejays as the stars of the music".<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-16" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[16] ==Chart positions<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-family:sans-serif;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">] == <p style="margin-top:0.5em;line-height:20.3636360168457px;color:rgb(37,37,37);font-family:sans-serif;font-size:13.63636302948px;"><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-22" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[22] ==Remixes<span class="mw-editsection" style="-webkit-user-select:none;font-size:small;margin-left:1em;line-height:1em;display:inline-block;white-space:nowrap;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-family:sans-serif;"><span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">[ edit<span class="mw-editsection-bracket" style="color:rgb(85,85,85);">] ==
 * "The Message '95" (Die Fantastischen Vier Remix) (1995, East West Records)<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-23" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[23]
 * "The Message" - 1997, Deepbeats Records (DEEPCD001)<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-24" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:-webkit-isolate;font-size:10.9090909957886px;">[24]