The Sugarhill Gang reflect on "Rapper's Delight" and the birth of hip-hop
NEW YORK - This year marks 50 years of hip-hop -- the music born in the Bronx that went on to change the world.
It's an art form that spent its first six years under the mainstream radar, being played at parties and clubs in and around the city, until the very first single, "Rapper's Delight," was recorded in 1979.
It's an unlikely story behind that song that changed everything, as CBS New York's Maurice DuBois discovered when he sat down with its original recording artists, the members of The Sugarhill Gang.
Birth of hip-hop
DuBois asked Sugarhill Gang original member Michael Wright, known more familiarly as Wonder Mike, about the origin of the term "hip hop."
"Why did that occur to you? Why did you use those words?" DuBois asked.
"Because it was new. It was - it was hip-hop. Like rock and roll, people say, 'let's rock.' That was hip-hop," Mike said.
The Sugarhill Gang is rap royalty, the original kings. DuBois met with their team, including another original member Guy O'Brien, or Master Gee, at their studio in Englewood, New Jersey.
Wonder Mike explained part of his process that helped to create the song that is part of music immortality.
"I always thought that letter B was percussive. And that's why I use it a lot in my raps," he said.
"I'm telling you, man, like, I still to this day can't really get a hold of how much of an impact that this music has had on the world. It's still very hard to digest," Master Gee said.
The third original member of The Sugarhill Gang, Big Bank Hank - Henry Lee Jackson - died in 2014.
"Hen Dog" Henry Williams has also been performing with them since beginning.
"Rapper's Delight" first hit the charts in 1979, making it to the Billboard top 40, and number four on the R&B charts.
Today the Sugarhill Gang is as busy as ever, performing across the country and around the world. But the story of their coming together is so unlikely.
It all started at a pizza shop
It all began at Crispy Crust - a pizza shop - in Englewood New Jersey.
"Somebody said that the guy Hank in the pizza parlor raps," Master Gee said.
That guy was Big Bank Hank, living in the Bronx, but working in Englewood, and rapping while he made pizza.
He was discovered by Sylvia Robinson, a former singer turned producer, and founder of Sugar Hill Records, on a mission to make a rap record.
The story goes that in August of '79, she had him audition in her car, in his apron, and knew he had "it."
Word got out, and she also auditioned Master Gee and Wonder Mike, both young, up and coming rappers in Englewood.
"Oh, they want to hear you rap. So now in my mind, I'm tripping because I'm like, oh, snap that. So I'm saying this in my mind. I noticed she's the big time recording artist. She's got the studio," Master Gee said.
So The Sugarhill Gang was formed with three guys who'd just met.
They laid-down the 15-minute version of "Rapper's Delight" in just one take.
There were some hitches: The music track had been sampled directly from the song "Good Times," by CHIC, and Hank was using rhymes written by Grandmaster Caz - an artist he actually managed.
With the meteoric success of "Rapper's Delight," CHIC co-founder Nile Rodgers threatened to sue, and was eventually credited as a writer and paid royalties. Grandmaster Caz took no action, and never got credit or royalties.
A song for everyone
At its peak, "Rapper's Delight" was selling 50,000 records a day.
To listen to the lyrics is to hear hip-hop taking its first steps into the mainstream. Wonder Mike's approach was to make a song for everyone.
He broke down the lyrics.
"There 'What you hear is not a test,' I got that from the outer limits. What is to be 'And me the groove and my friends, are going to try to move your feet.' Wow. OK, that explains it. Well, who are you? 'I am wonder Mike and I like to say hello' - to anyone, [I didn't want to] isolate anyone I included the world, into purple. I wish I had thought of something else. 'And black to the white, the red and the brown, purple and yellow. But first I gotta bang."
"So the record hits. What did you see? What did you hear? What was the reaction?" DuBois asked.
"That was crazy. So, I go back to high school, every single store, every single car, everywhere I went, I could keep hearing it, and it would play again. I was like, 'Yeah, this isn't - this is gonna be a little bit more than what I thought," Master Gee said.
He was just 17 at the time. Wonder Mike was 22.
"What's it like to be famous for something you did when you were 17? And 22? That still remains a high point of your lives," Dubois asked.
"You don't live off the reality of that. You live off the real reality of what you do from one day to the next. I will be known for that music, that song. But at the end of the day, there's still much more life to live, so you got to put things in perspective," Master Gee said.
Rapper's Delight
The song "Rapper's Delight" brought hip-hop to the masses back in 1979, and 44 years later, Master Gee said he still appreciates his lyrical introduction.
"I'm the M-A-S-T-E-R-G with the double E," he rapped to Dubois on the golf course at the North Shore Towers and Country Club at a charity event, where he said he's continuing to live his best life.
"Rapper's Delight," the very first hip-hop record, opened doors The Sugarhill Gang could never have imagined. Master Gee said he fully appreciates the recognition the groundbreaking record has always commanded.
Wonder Mike, said he knew "Rapper's Delight" would be a hit, and adds he made sure his rhymes brought everyone into hip-hop.
About 14 million copies have sold since the record's release in 1979. It's still central to their lives, decades after the needle first dropped. But there were dark days, even with the meteoric success of "Rapper's Delight."
Master Gee, along with Wonder Mike, say they were cut out of their record's financial success. Sugar Hill Records producer Sylvia Robinson, who put the group together, is said to have not included any of the group in profits or royalties.
Within about five years, Master Gee and Wonder Mike left Sugar Hill Records, and fell onto hard times. Mike said he painted houses to make ends meet. Gee said he was penniless.
"It always had to do with money," DuBois asked.
"Let me say this - that's not where we are. Today is where we are," Leland Robinson, Sylvia Robinson's son, said.
"You know, whatever happened, happened, OK. There's no way that we could be in this room together if we didn't overcome," said Master Gee.
Overcoming obstacles
And there was a lot to overcome. In 2005, the Robinson Family also blocked them from using the stage names that had been theirs for 23 years. It was more than a decade until the group and Leland Robinson reached a hard-won truce. They say they are partners now, and now continue to tour, with "Rapper's Delight" central to their continued success.
"We are 44 years stronger today than we were back then. We are family. We do business on a daily basis. This music has stayed around long enough for us to get it right. Look at that. That's an amazing thing," Master Gee said.
Back on the golf course, gratitude for all they have, and have been through, remains central.
"Sometimes I can't even grasp that I'm connected to it like I am, right? Because it's so, it's so meteoric. It's just, it's crazy, man. Mind blown," Master Gee said.
Hip-hop legend and Sugar Hill recording artist, Melle Mel, of Grandmaster Flash and The Furious Five, was also at the golf outing.
"I look at what rap music and hip-hop has become, it's a lot easier to be, to make the records, and then it's a lot easier to be the performer of the record. I come from the 'hood, like you come from the 'hood. But I'm a star. We just sort of be the first group in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame," Melle Mel said.
"So many people have come, stayed and gone. And we're still here... . I knew that it was going to be a big record, number one. I knew that it was going to open up a whole new genre of music because if it's catchy, things catch on. And that's exactly what happened," Wonder Mike said.
"Thankful and grateful. Every single day," said Master Gee. "This is something that I was given the gift to do. Like, you know, So every single day that I wake up, I'm thankful and grateful, and it's only getting better."
