The Message (Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five album)

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The Message
Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five-The Message (album cover).jpg
Studio album by Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five
Released October 1982
Genre Old school hip hop[1]
Length 36:58
Label Sugar Hill
Producer Jigsaw Productions, Sylvia Robinson
Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five chronology
The Message
(1982)		 Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five
(1983)Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five1983
Singles from The Message
  1. "It's Nasty"
    Released: 1981
  2. "Scorpio"
    Released: 1981
  3. "The Message"
    Released: 1982

The Message is the debut studio album of American hip hop group Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, released in October 1982 by Sugar Hill Records.

Release and reception

The Message was released in October 1982 by Sugar Hill Records.[2] It was the only album released while the group's original line-up was together.[3] The album charted at number 53 in the United States and at number 77 in the United Kingdom.[2] Music journalist Robert Christgau gave it an "A–" and said that, although "She's Fresh" is the "only instant killer", each song's attempt to experiment and "touch a lot of bases with a broad demographic ... justifies itself".[4] He named it the 21st best album of 1982 in his dean's list for the Pazz & Jop critics' poll.[5]

In a retrospective review, AllMusic's Ron Wynn gave The Message four-and-a-half out of five stars and called it the group's "ultimate peak" whose highlight was the title track.[6] Miles Marshall Lewis, writing in The Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004), gave its 2002 British reissue four out of five stars and cited "The Adventures of Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel" as the album's "clincher" and "the only prime-period example of Flash's ability to set and shatter moods, with his turntables and faders running through a collage of at least 10 records that sound like hundreds."[3] Colin Larkin also gave it four stars in his Encyclopedia of Popular Music (2006).[7] Mark Richardson from Pitchfork Media said that The Message features "two absolutely essential songs"—the title track and "Scorpio", which he dubbed "the greatest early electro track". However, he felt the rest of the songs were inferior and gave the album a score of 6.4 out of 10.[1]

Track listing

No. Title Composer(s) Length
1. "She's Fresh"   Milton Edwards, Bobbie Knight 4:57
2. "It's Nasty"   Clifton Chase, Melvin Glover, Sylvia Robinson, Tom Tom Club 4:19
3. "Scorpio"   Melvin Glover, Nathaniel Glover Jr, Eddie Morris, Keith Wiggins, Guy Williams 4:55
4. "It's a Shame (Mt. Airy Groove)"   Stevie Wonder, Syreeta Wright, Lee Garrett, Curtis Harmon, James Lloyd, Cedric Napoleon 4:57
5. "Dreamin'"   Melvin Glover, Nathaniel Glover Jr, Gary Henry, Eddie Morris, Keith Wiggins, Guy Williams 5:47
6. "You Are"   Gary Henry 4:51
7. "The Message"   Clifton Chase, Edward Fletcher, Melvin Glover, Sylvia Robinson 7:12
Sample credits

Personnel

  • Grandmaster Flash (Joseph Sadler) - turntables, drum programming, Flashformer transform DJ device
  • Keef Cowboy (Keith Wiggins) - Lead and background vocals, writer and arranger
  • Grandmaster Melle Mel (Melvin Glover) - Lead and background vocals, writer and arranger
  • The Kidd Creole (Nathaniel Glover jr) - Lead and background vocals, writer and arranger
  • Scorpio (Eddie Morris) - Lead and background vocals, writer and arranger
  • Rahiem (Guy Todd Williams) - Lead and background vocals, writer and arranger
  • Bass - Doug Wimbish
  • Guitar - Skip McDonald
  • Prophet Sequential - Reggie Griffin, Jiggs, Sylvia Robinson
  • Keyboards - Gary Henry, Dwain Mitchell
  • Drums - Keith Leblanc
  • Percussion - Ed Fletcher
  • Brass - Chops Horn Section

Charts

Album

Chart (1982) Peak
position
New Zealand Albums (RIANZ)[9] 14
UK Albums Chart[2] 77
U.S. Billboard 200[2] 53
U.S. Top Black Albums[10] 8

Singles

Year Single Peak chart positions
U.S. Hot 100
[11][12]		 U.S. R&B
[11][12]		 U.S. Club Play NZ
[9]		 UK
[13][14]
1981 "It's Nasty (Genius of Love)" — 22 — — —
"Scorpio" — 30 — — 77
[14]
1982 "The Message" 62 4 12 2 8

References

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Bibliography

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External links

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Strong 2004, p. 619.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Lewis et al. 2004, p. 341.
  4. ↑ Christgau 1990, p. 270.
  5. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  6. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  7. ↑ Larkin 2006, p. 308.
  8. ↑ Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five - The Message (Vinyl, LP, Album). Discogs. Retrieved on July 27, 2010.
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  10. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 Billboard chartings. Accessed October 17, 2009.
  13. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  14. ↑ 14.0 14.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
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