Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five

• 1. Formation And Early Years

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  Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five formed in 1978 within the South Bronx of New York City. The group began as a trio called the Three MC's featuring Cowboy, Melle Mel, and Kidd Creole. Cowboy performed a scat routine at a party held at The Black Door for a friend joining the U.S. Army. He mimicked the rhythmic cadence of army marching drills while singing hip hop words. This performance led to the term hip hoppers being used derogatorily by early detractors from the disco set. The name eventually evolved into Hip Hop and was adopted by the music industry. Melle Mel and Kidd Creole were the first rappers to call themselves Masters of Ceremonies or MCs. Flash recruited Scorpio and Rahiem Guy Todd Williams to complete the lineup. They became the number one rap group on the streets of New York before the industry embraced the genre. Their first single We Rap More Mellow registered under the name The Younger Generation. A producer changed the name because he considered it better.

• 2. The Message Breakthrough

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  In 1982 the group released The Message which became a driving force behind conscious hip-hop. Clifton Jiggs Chase produced the track alongside Ed Duke Bootee Fletcher who wrote the song. Sylvia Robinson added Melle Mel's rhyme from an earlier song to complete the recording. The song peaked at number four on the R&B chart and reached number sixty-two in the pop chart. It provided political and social commentary that established hip-hop's credibility in mainstream music. No members except Melle Mel actually feature on the record aside from background vocals at the end. The debut album named The Message went on to become a prominent achievement in hip-hop history. Other than Melle Mel no other members performed on the original hit single. The release marked a turning point where hip hop achieved mainstream success after the Sugarhill Gang proved the genre could sell records. The song remains one of the fifty inaugural recordings chosen by the Library of Congress for the National Recording Registry in 2002.

• 3. Legal Disputes And Splits

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  The original lineup reformed for a performance at a charity concert held at Madison Square Garden in 1987. They soon reunited for their first studio album in nearly five years titled On the Strength. The album was released in April 1988 and received lukewarm reception from critics. It failed to achieve the same levels of success as The Message did six years prior. The group never enjoyed the same popularity they had in the early 1980s following this release. They permanently broke up shortly after the album's distribution. Some members briefly worked together again after disbanding. Melle Mel Scorpio and Cowboy released another album called Piano in 1989 under the name Grandmaster Melle Mel and the Furious Five. Keith Cowboy Wiggins died on the 8th of September 1989 according to Vibe magazine reports from late 1994.

  The group was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame on the 23rd of January 2007. They became the first hip hop group to receive this historic honor. The Smithsonian National

• 4. Reunion And Final Album

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  Museum of American History in Washington D.C. displays vinyl records and the turntable used by DJ Grandmaster Flash in their archives. In 2021 they received their first Grammy Award for lifetime achievement becoming the second hip-hop act to win after Run-DMC. They were honored at the VH1 Hip Hop Honors in 2005 before the Hall of Fame ceremony. Billboard ranked them as one of the greatest rap groups of all time in 2023. Rolling Stone placed The Message number fifty-nine on its list of the five hundred Greatest Songs of All Time in 2021. These accolades cemented their status as pioneers who shaped the genre from its earliest days.