Track #33 - “Rapper’s Delight” by Sugarhill Gang (1979)

From the album Sugarhill Gang

Music by Bernard Hill and Nile Rodgers; lyrics by Sylvia Robinson, Henry Jackson, Michael Wright, Guy O’Brien and Curtis Brown

Performed by:

Michael “Wonder Mike” Wright – vocals

Henry “Big Bank Hank” Jackson – vocals

Guy “Master Gee” O’Brien – vocals

Chip Shearin – bass

Albert Pittman/Brian Morgan – electric guitar

Moncy Smith – piano

Bryan Horton – drums

US Billboard Hot 100 - #36; US Billboard Soul Singles - #4

Rolling Stone Top 500 Songs of All Time - #427

I said a hip hop, the hippie, the hippie

The hip hip hop and you don’t stop rockin’

To the bang-bang, boogie, say up jump the boogie

To the rhythm of the boogie, the beat

Now, what you hear is not a test I’m rappin’ to the beat

And me, the groove, and my friends are gonna try to move your feet

You see, I am Wonder Mike and I’d like to say hello

To the black, to the white, the red and the brown

The purple and yellow, but first, I gotta

Bang-bang, the boogie to the boogie

Say up jump the boogie, to the bang-bang boogie

Let’s rock, you don’t stop

Rock the rhythm that’ll make your body rock

It’s a Saturday morning in the fall of 1979 in Brooklyn, New York, and I’m in the living room of a brownstone apartment on the corner of Grant and Atlantic Avenues. To give you some perspective, that’s about halfway between the Barclays Center in what’s now downtown Brooklyn, and JFK airport. I’m sitting cross-legged on the shag living room carpet, and whatever you’re picturing in your mind when I say “shag living room carpet” in 1979, yeah, just go with it and let your imagination run wild with that image. I’ve probably had two bowls of Cocoa-Pebbles, Lucky Charms or HoneyComb by now, and my brain is buzzing from all the sugar. You might think I’m doing that thing on the floor that kids do when they’re half paying attention, sort of rolling around but still staring at the TV, and once in a while standing up, and jumping or doing something to expend all that energy, but surprisingly, I am not; I am rapt, staring up the TV. And how could I not be? After all, this was my time. This was Saturday morning, man! No school, stay in pajamas till noon, sugar cereal, and…wait for it…Saturday morning cartoons. These three or four hours were the pinnacle of entertainment back for me when everything else on television needed to be monitored by my parents. On Saturday mornings, they let my brother and I watch whatever we wanted, knowing it was all mostly G-rated. Saturday morning cartoons in the 1970s were the silver lining to the school year starting; the summer may be over, but what did those TV people have in store for the new fall season? Over the years, I’d seen some real classics on ABC over dozens of Saturday mornings: Hong Kong Phooey, Captain Caveman, Land of the Lost, Dastardly & Muttley and Their Flying Machines (“Stop the pigeon, stop the pigeon!”), and Josie and the Pussycats. Of course, there were the mainstays: The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Show (“…and oh what heights we’ll hit! On with the show, this is it!”); The Scooby-Doo Show (That Daphne really had it going on); and my all-time favorite, Super Friends; now that might have inspired me to get up off the floor and pretend I was flying like Superman or fighting bad guys like Batman. And in between each show, usually on the half-hour was…Schoolhouse Rock!, the greatest educational institution in the history of the world. “Interplanet Janet”; “Conjunction Junction”; “I’m Just a Bill”…man, these kids today have no idea what they missed out on. Yes, Saturday mornings were glorious. Sundays, well, they were for church and family dinners; Sundays even smelled different when I was a kid. Bacon and eggs usually wafted from the kitchen first as my mom made a big breakfast and then I’d smell her tomato sauce simmering all day. Saturdays were for hanging out, playing with action figures or Matchbox cars, maybe errands and some chores. Sometimes if we were lucky my mom would make pancakes, but believe me, I was happy with whatever cereal would make the milk pink or chocolatey. But as 11AM approached, my mom would start to demand my brother and I finally get dressed and get off the living room floor so she could run the vacuum. She would also tell us to pick up our rooms, to get all the toys off the floor and at least attempt to make our beds. Every Saturday for the most part, this was the drill. But I quickly learned the motivation behind the hard stop at 11AM when I was 7 or 8 years old. You see, from 11AM to 1PM on Saturdays, was Mom’s time. If she was going to vacuum, dust and otherwise clean up after the three men in her life, she was going to enjoy it. As I got dressed, and started to straighten up my room, I could hear what would become a very familiar TV intro coming from our living room…the funky bassline and wah-wah guitar, and then the disco hi-hat, and then that voice bellowing “Soooouuuuuul Train!!!” would fill the apartment every Saturday promptly at 11AM. My mom would also watch American Bandstand at noon, right after Soul Train, and even though I know she harbored a crush on Dick Clark for years, I know she would have much rather been a Soul Train dancer. I remember it being on every week, without fail. Soul Train began in 1970, airing exclusively in Chicago at first, then moving into syndication in October 1971, and was hosted by backup radio disc jockey Don Cornelius. Cornelius would become the face and creative force behind Soul Train, with his distinctive voice, afro and wide neckties. Back then, there were no Black TV programs being produced for a Black audience; Soul Train and Cornelius changed all that. And once the show went into syndication and really caught on, musical acts clamored to appear on the show, knowing it would give them an instant career boost. For almost 35 years, Soul Train was a musical institution, and I discovered it at a time when it was on the air less than a decade, in its infancy really.  By the time the voice over said, “And now your host, Don Cornelius”, you can guess who was right back in the living room, planted back in front of the TV. There was just something about the energy, the flashy clothes, and the feeling of community of that show that drew me to it. And of course, the music; the first time I heard and saw Stevie Wonder, Al Green, The Commodores, The Spinners, Marvin Gaye, George Benson, even The Jackson 5, was on Soul Train. It was also the first time I heard a band called Chic. Formed by session musicians Nile Rodgers (guitar) and Bernard Edwards (bass), Chic would become one of the most influential R&B acts of the 1970s, and record some of the most iconic songs ever, in any genre. They would also produce and arrange music for other acts like Sister Sledge and Diana Ross, and later David Bowie, Duran Duran, and Madonna. But in 1978, they appeared on Soul Train to perform “Le Freak” from their album C’est Chic, and I just remember instantly loving the “Aaahhh freak out!” refrain, the disco guitar riff, and the string accompaniment. The song had such an effect on me that for weeks I repeated the chorus when I was doing homework or playing. A quick aside here: my mother had me thinking that the word “freak” was sort of a curse word and urged me not to sing the refrain while at school; when I asked her why, she just said not to say the word “freak” outside the house. I guess she thought the nuns would not appreciate it. Anyway, “Le Freak” would end up selling 6 million copies, become a #1 single, and be selected for preservation in the Library of Congress in 2018; not bad for a song written when Rodgers and Herman were denied access to Studio 54, the iconic NYC nightclub. The chorus was supposed to be “Aaahhh fuck off!” as an angry retort to the Studio 54 doormen, but cooler heads prevailed, and the chorus was changed. But in 1979, Chic would put out an even more influential song. Influential in the sense that it may have launched a whole new genre of music; a song with a sample that according to whosampled.com, has been used 227 times in other songs. The bassline even inspired Queen’s John Deacon to write “Another One Bites the Dust.” I’m talking about “Good Times” from Chic’s 1979 album, Risque. Now, you may not know all 227 songs that have sampled “Good Times”, but I guarantee there’s one you do know, and it might be the only one that matters. In the summer of 1979, three (or four, depending on whose version you believe) aspiring rappers from New Jersey partnered with an R&B singer and producer to lift a sample from “Good Times”, and release one of the first rap songs ever recorded.

Sylvia Robinson was born Sylvia Vanterpool in Harlem in 1935. In 1956, she met and began to record with guitarist Mickey Baker, and they formed the duo Mickey & Sylvia. They released a few singles before they split in 1958; Sylvia would meet and marry Joseph Robinson that same year. In 1961, Mickey & Sylvia reunited and recorded a few more songs, before Mickey finally moved to Paris in 1962, disillusioned with the music business. The Robinsons moved to New Jersey in 1966, and formed their own record label, All Platinum Records. Sylvia wrote songs and produced records, and the label had some minor hits, but in 1972, she found herself returning to her own solo career. Robinson wrote a song called “Pillow Talk” and sent a demo to R&B legend Al Green. Green thought the lyrics were too racy, so Robinson recorded the song herself. “Pillow Talk” became a major hit, going all the way to #1 on the Billboard R&B chart, and crossing over to the Billboard Hot 100 to #3. She would go on to record four more albums, and eventually formed Sugar Hill Records with her husband in the mid-1970s. By 1978, the label was floundering, and Robinson went on the hunt for a new act, something that might be revolutionary. While at a backyard party in the summer of 1979, she heard DJ Lovebug Starski talking over musical breaks in disco songs, including Chic’s #1 hit that summer, “Good Times”; the response from the crowd was electric. “The kids were going crazy...I didn’t even know it was called rap”, Robinson would recall in an interview in 1997. Her sons, however, knew all about this new music genre that was literally taking shape in the streets of New York City and other urban areas outside Manhattan; rappers freestyling lyrics over samples of music being played by a DJ. Robinson asked her son Joey to start looking for rappers that might want to record a song; she had the Chic sample already in mind for the new track. Finding rappers who wanted to record in a studio would prove problematic. Most rappers did not want to record, as they felt rap was better suited in front of a live audience, given the improvisation of most of the lyrics. Finally, Robinson and her son heard Henry Lee Jackson, or Big Bank Hank as he was known, freestyling in the pizza parlor he worked at in Englewood, New Jersey. They auditioned him on the spot and hired him immediately. They quickly recruited Michael Wright (Wonder Mike) and Guy O’Brien (Master Gee), and the Sugarhill Gang was born. Robinson enlisted members of her label’s house band to play the “Good Times” sample over and over…perfectly…for 15 minutes. Bassist Chip Shearin recalls he and the drummer were “sweating bullets because that’s a long time.” This was way before electronic loops and samples, kids, so they needed to record enough music for the Sugarhill Gang to rap over. Robinson just told the band to play the loop exactly how Chic had laid it down; “I’ve got these kids who are going to talk real fast over it…”, she told them. The rap itself was recorded in one long take, in one all-night session, and soon, “Rapper’s Delight” was ready for release. On September 16, 1979, no less than six versions of the song were released, including a full, uncut version that ran over fourteen minutes. The single version would only top out at #36 on the Billboard Hot 100, but it didn’t matter. Club DJ’s and radio stations, especially New York radio stations got hold of it, and it went into heavy rotation right through the early part of 1980. Hip hop had been born, and when I finally heard it in December of 1979, I chased it down on the radio every chance I got, right up until the day my family followed the moving truck to the suburbs.

If you ask me what radio stations my parents listened to when we lived in Brooklyn, I’d mostly be guessing. If I had their record collection back then, I probably wouldn’t have listened to the radio much, but I sort of remember WPLJ (pop and rock) and WNEW (AOR, or “album-oriented rock”) tuned in sometimes, and 99-X, a full-on pop/easy listening station on the kitchen radio most mornings. But occasionally, my mom would put on 92.3 WKTU, a bona-fide disco station. In 1978, WKTU switched formats from rock to disco, and began to garner higher ratings than WABC and WBLS, an R&B station. By 1979, the word “disco” began to carry some negativity, as the format began to saturate the market, and the genre was maligned in the media. But that didn’t stop WKTU from playing it all day, and my mom seemed to disagree with the masses, so the disco played on in our apartment. By December of that year, my parents had broken the news that we would be moving to Long Island in February, just three months away; this would be our last Christmas in Brooklyn. You’ve heard all this before, my uprooting from the only home I’d ever known, moving to a place I’d never heard of, new school, etc. So, I remember this time very vividly, this final holiday season in Brooklyn, especially a particular Saturday afternoon just before Christmas when my mom had WKTU tuned into the stereo. By now I recognized most of the songs, not only from the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack, which was played a lot in our house, but from some of the bigger disco acts appearing on Soul Train and American Bandstand. So, when a familiar bassline began to play from the speakers, I barely looked up. I’d heard Chic’s “Good Times” a hundred times by now; it was grooved in my nine-year old brain. But something was different; yes, the bassline was there, but no familiar groovy guitar riff. I looked up, now more interested and wondering what might happen next. There were no familiar female vocals declaring, “Good times, these are the good times, leave your cares behind…” Noooo. Instead, this is what I heard: “I said-a hip, hop, the hippie, the hippie, to the hip hip hop-a you don’t stop rockin’ to the bang-bang boogie, say up jump the boogie, to the rhythm of the boogie, the beat…” What?? This sounded like nonsense!! This guy was barely singing…but then he introduced himself: “See, I am Wonder Mike, and I’d like to say hello, to the black, to the white, the red and the brown, the purple and yellow…” Nonsense…but I think I liked it; no, I definitely liked it. It sounded like a commercial almost, but I liked it. By now, my mom had noticed this was not her regular Saturday afternoon disco, and I’m fairly certain she made a face: “What is this? Who is this singing?” Then, incredibly, she made a move to change the station. “No!! Mom, leave it on!!” And more incredibly, she listened to me. Before I knew it, Wonder Mike had introduced his two partners: Hank, who “had a color TV, so I can see the Knicks play basketball…”, and Master G, who declared, “Now, I’m not as tall as the rest of the gang, but I rap to the beat just the same…” So, if you can picture the nine-year old boy staring rapt at the TV a few paragraphs ago, that was me now, staring at the stereo like these three guys were going to jump out into the living room and start singing (or doing whatever it was they were doing). I waited for the DJ after the song was over, who announced we had just heard “Rapper’s Delight”, by the Sugarhill Gang. “Rapper’s Delight”, I repeated out loud. Without a doubt, the second “What the f*** was that??” moment of my young life. (The first was Star Wars in 1977; the original Star Wars, kids, not the stuff on Disney+). I had little knowledge of what was “cool” when I was nine, but somehow, I felt “Rapper’s Delight” might be “cool”. I loved the talking, the “rapping” over the music loop I knew so well, the simple sassy words that I wanted to memorize so badly. There was no verse, then chorus, then verse again, and so on…it was one long sentence. What I really liked though, what made it unique, was how the three guys threw the song back and forth to each other, like it was a hot potato: “It’s your turn, now it’s my turn, now it’s your turn…”, each waiting to grab the microphone and outdo the last guy.  So began my endless quest to listen to this song. For months, I begged my parents to tune into WKTU whenever we were home or in the car; sometimes they obliged me and sometimes they told me they weren’t in the mood for disco music. And when they tuned it in, I think I heard “Rapper’s Delight” maybe four or five more times. I supposed I could have asked them to get me the 45-record, but every weekend those first two months of 1980 were filled with packing boxes and getting ready to move to our new house, so I knew they didn’t have the time. Then at the end of February, the moving truck arrived, and our days in Brooklyn were over. And all those New York City radio stations I had become familiar with would also go away, the frequency too weak to reach our new house 50 miles east. No more WKTU; how would I listen to “Rapper’s Delight”, this amazing new song I had just discovered?

My brother and I spent the first few months of being the “new kids” just trying to get used to our new house and surroundings. I remember us getting friendly with our immediate neighbor’s kids, playing in their backyard and in their playroom, marveling at all the new toys we had access to. I discovered hockey; my brother took up soccer. We rode our bikes up and down our dead-end street without any thoughts of traffic. And it was quiet; no older kids drinking on the street corner outside our apartment windows to be chased away at night, no traffic, or police sirens. It was eerie, not having all that ambient noise to fall asleep to at night, and that might have been the hardest thing to get used to, besides a new school. I found local classic rock station WBAB on my little transistor radio totally by accident very early on, after stumbling on Heart’s “Barracuda” the weekend before I was to start at my new school. And soon, my mom had one of the bigger Top 40 stations tuned in every morning as we got ready for the day, WBLI in Patchogue. I mentioned how we didn’t really live in that diverse of an area of Brooklyn; for a New York City borough, it was predominantly white, mostly Irish and Italian Catholics, with Hispanic, Black and Asian pockets scattered around. Our new neighborhood proved to be no more diverse; and that wasn’t my parents’ fault. I just think that’s how it was back in 1980 in Suffolk County. This was totally reflected in the music I was surrounded by now. I have no memory of any R&B stations on the radio dial back then. There was definitely some R&B crossover: songs from Michael Jackson’s Off the Wall, “Upside Down” by Diana Ross, “Funkytown” by Lipps, Inc. and “Celebration” by Kool & the Gang all received heavy airplay on pop stations back in 1980. But “Rapper’s Delight” was nowhere to be found. Rap had not hit the mainstream airwaves like it had in New York City, so I would sadly not be hearing my new favorite song anytime soon. In fact, when I mentioned it to some of the kids on the block, they looked at me like I was nuts. They probably figured I was making it up, or that I had it mixed up with something else. So, I just let it go and settled into the Top 40 being thrown at me, and once in awhile I’d tune my little transistor radio to WBAB, and listen to Fleetwood Mac, the Eagles and Billy Joel. Then that May, about a month before the school year was to end, about seven of us were hanging out and one of the kids invited us inside his house. I had not been in this house yet, so of course I was curious; this family also had a swimming pool in the backyard, so I immediately figured they were rich. We get into the house, and his den is dominated by a ping pong table, and one of those huge console TV’s that sat on the floor, the kind you could put plants and books on top of. And before you ask, yes, there was wood paneling on the walls. So, the kid whose den it was grabbed a 45 from a stack and put it on the record player; it was “What a Fool Believes” by the Doobie Brothers. I knew this one for sure, recent Grammy winner for Record of the Year. When it was over, he grabbed another one, and said, “Hey I just got this one, it’s called ‘Hip Hop Hip-it’”, or something like that. I looked up; it couldn’t be…could it? Then the record started, and I swear as sure I’m sitting here, I yelled “What?? Where did you get this??!” “Just the record store, why?,” was the reply.

“This is the song I tried to tell you about…’Rapper’s Delight!!’” But by then, no one was paying any attention to me. All those kids were raising the roof on this den, just repeating over and over, “Hip hop, the hip-it, hip-hop the hip-it!!” It didn’t even sound like the real words, and worse, I couldn’t hear the song I had chased since my last days in Brooklyn. What the hell was wrong with these dopey Long Island kids?? Couldn’t they just shut up for four minutes?? When it was over, I asked him to play it again, and he actually did play it one more time, but by then I had made up my mind that I would need to figure out a way to get to a record store and buy it. And just to make sure I wasn’t crazy, I snuck a look at the label spinning there on the turntable: “Rapper’s Delight”, Sugarhill Gang. I would love to tell you that I ran home, and my mom took me to Record World and I came home with “Rapper’s Delight”…but that’s not what happened. I did try to buy it about a week later, but it was sold out. I believe the clerk’s words were, “We can’t keep it in the store.” Wow. That little rap song had made its way to the suburbs and people were buying it. As my first summer on Long Island came and went, I sort of forgot about “Rapper’s Delight” for a while. In fact, I don’t think I heard it again until deep into high school, and of course I heard it everywhere once I was able to go out to clubs and bars. And I didn’t own it until my friend Todd recorded the 12” vinyl version he owned for me, when we made those hip-hop and R&B mixtapes in his basement. But “Rapper’s Delight” is a special song; it was my send off from the city to the suburbs, the first song of its kind: a rap song that got played on the radio. A song that literally disappeared into the air, since the radio stations that played it didn’t reach where I now was. And “Rapper’s Delight” was the song I associate with that huge shift in my life, and in my family’s life. Those Saturday mornings that had so much routine to them for so long, suddenly changed. Saturday mornings were now for outdoor chores, hockey and soccer games, and trips to home stores. Taking care of a house was different than an apartment, and my parents also decided they didn’t want us in front of the TV every Saturday when we could be outside, enjoying everything the suburbs had to offer. Eventually, the cartoons, Soul Train and American Bandstand faded into the background. Sure, we still watched on occasion, but the magic of those Saturday mornings in Brooklyn was replaced by the march of time, and my brother and I growing up. I think of those times often, the innocence of it, and how secure the routine of those Saturday mornings made me feel. And the music…I miss hearing that music every Saturday, and watching the artists lip-sync their songs while my mom had her time, even if that time included vacuuming in between those great songs. Sometimes I’d catch her dancing while she buzzed around our apartment, and trying to remember the lyrics as she sang along. Thinking about it now, my mom dancing along to Soul Train and taking care of her family every Saturday…I think that was right where she wanted to be.

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In 1979, the Sugarhill Gang performed on Soap Factory Disco Show, one of a slew of syndicated TV shows that highlighted disco performers and their music. The performance became their official video; enjoy! 😊

Next time…if I handed you a cassette tape and a pencil, would you know what to do? We’ll talk about how to MacGyver a broken tape and we’ll finally talk about the UK metal band who covered my walls when I was sixteen.

P.S.

“Rapper’s Delight” would end up selling 8 million copies worldwide, and 1.3 million copies in the US, and it peaked at #36 on the Billboard Hot 100 in January 1980. There were six different versions released, all different lengths to accommodate radio airplay and club spins. Each version also contains different lyrics and placements of those lyrics as well. If you look at the song’s page on songfacts.com you’ll see the complete lyrics from the 14-plus minute version. The version above in the video is considered the 12” long version, or the version with the “food verse” at the end: “Have you ever been over a friend’s house to eat, and the food just ain’t no good…” If I’m being honest, that’s not my favorite; I think the rant about the bad meal at the end is sort of corny, but this is actually the version most people are familiar with. I prefer the single version, the one I first heard all those years ago on WKTU. When Big Bank Hank is introduced, he announces himself as “Casanova Fly”, and being “six foot one” and “tons of fun,”, and he also talks about his “color TV, so I can see the Knicks play basketball.” So…remember I mentioned way up top about that fourth person who was responsible for “Rapper’s Delight”? When Henry Lee Jackson (Big Bank Hank) was discovered by Sylvia Robinson at the pizza parlor, he was managing a group called The Cold Crush who had a member named Curtis Brown, otherwise known as Grandmaster Caz, or Casanova Fly. When Jackson landed the Sugarhill Gang gig, Jackson asked Caz for his book of lyrics, since he had never rapped before; Caz obliged, but never received credit as being the real writer of most of Jackson’s lines in “Rapper’s Delight.” When Big Bank Hank spells out “Casanova Fly” in the song, he’s name checking Caz; the passage about stealing Lois Lane from Superman was also lifted from Caz’s lyric book. In fact, most of the rhymes Hank uses in “Rapper’s Delight” had been heard before in clubs, in performances by other rappers. Hank had a committed a hip-hop no-no, by lifting other rhymes and not giving credit. In 2014, Caz would contend he never gave permission for Jackson to use his lyrics, and that Jackson only asked after the song was recorded. Then in September of 1979, while Nile Rodgers was at a New York City club called Leviticus, he heard a very familiar syncopated bass line and then some very unfamiliar lyrics being sung over it. Rodgers went up to the DJ booth, and the DJ informed him that he had just purchased the record that day, at a record shop in Harlem. Calls were made, lawyers were deployed, and Nile Rodgers and Bernard Herman received songwriting credits and royalties from sales of the 12” version. Most publications will list the Sugarhill Gang themselves as “uncredited” as songwriters, but I listed them here; my feeling is they must have written some of those rap lyrics. Sylvia Robinson is often called the “Mother of Hip-Hop”; she not only produced “Rapper’s Delight” but she also signed Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, and produced their influential track, “The Message.” Robinson died in September of 2011. Big Bank Hank died in November of 2014, but the Sugarhill Gang resurrected in 2016, when the remaining living members of the Sugarhill Gang, plus new member Hen Dogg, went on their first tour in over a decade. In 2019, they celebrated the 40th anniversary of “Rapper’s Delight” by going on another tour and recording new music.

It's impossible to overstate the influence that Nile Rodgers, Bernard Herman, and the music of Chic have had over the past 50 years. Aside from their own music that inspired generations of musicians to pick up a bass or guitar, or to write songs, they have produced, written, and arranged songs for hundreds of artists. Together they produced and introduced Sister Sledge to the world (“We Are Family”, “He’s the Greatest Dancer”) and Diana Ross’ smash anthem, “I’m Coming Out”. Rodgers transformed David Bowie’s career with the Let’s Dance album, and remixed Duran Duran’s “The Reflex” into a #1 single. He’s also worked with Madonna, Daft Punk, the B-52’s, INXS, and Mick Jagger, among countless others. He’s also contributed to numerous film soundtracks and continues to perform live and collaborate with other artists. If you need more proof of the breadth and influence of Chic’s and Rodgers’ careers, check out Chris Molanphy’s excellent two-part episode of his podcast Hit Parade, “These Are the Good Times Edition.” And as far as “Rapper’s Delight”, at first Rodgers was miffed when he first heard it, but now considers it one of his favorite songs of all-time.

Soul Train would air 1,117 episodes over a 35-year run; the last original episode aired in 2006. Don Cornelius stepped down as host in 1993 but remained very much in control behind the scenes. Hosting duties were assumed by various guest hosts, until actor Dorian Gregory took over in 2003 until the show ended. Don Cornelius would die by suicide in 2012; it was later learned that he suffered from seizures, and family members surmised he may have developed dementia by the time he died. Cornelius would admit while hosting the show that he did not understand the appeal of hip-hop and rap music, and felt the themes had a negative connotation on Black culture. Rap and hip-hop artists were featured on the show, but Cornelius was not a fan, and the rise of the genre was a factor in him stepping down as host. For what it’s worth, the Sugarhill Gang performed their hit “8th Wonder” on Soul Train in May of 1981. The cultural and musical influence Soul Train left over the course of 35 years is impossible to measure, and there’s no way I can do it justice in this space, but I’ll say this: Soul Train made its way into our living room every Saturday for years, and if not for that show, my brother and I might never have seen or heard, at least at that age, the wide range of Black and R&B artists that we did. Our parents listened to R&B, but having the visuals right there in front of us every week put the music on a whole different level. It opened up our minds and influenced how we listen to music even now. I’ve often wondered if I would have become the huge rock and metal fan I became if my family didn’t move to the suburbs. I realize that Soul Train was important in that it was a Black TV show produced for a Black audience, but for one white Italian-Irish family in Brooklyn, Soul Train was vital; watching it meant that it was Saturday and all that amazing music was our soundtrack, no matter how we were spending that time. And in case you’re curious, American Bandstand ran from 1952 to 1989, just over 3,000 episodes. Dick Clark was the host from 1956 until the show’s final season. Don Cornelius admitted being influenced by American Bandstand when Soul Train was created but downplayed it as his own show gained popularity. There is so much content out there about Soul Train, it was challenging sifting through it all when I was researching the post. But here is a great deep dive by pop culture publication Vox, and this is an awesome YouTube playlist of some of the greatest Soul Train performances.

I would never consider myself any kind of authority on hip-hop or rap music. Luckily there were plenty of great articles and content to allow me to get a full grasp on the history and early influential artists. Since 2023 was the 50th anniversary of hip-hop, I guess my timing was pretty good 😊. For a literal summary and timeline of significant dates and events in the history of hip-hop, head to this link at digitaldoor.com. NPR did a piece with individual essays on hip-hop’s rise in various areas of the US, and how the styles and influences in say, New York are different from those in Atlanta, etc. And if you just want a gallery, here’s a great one from The Guardian. And if you’re into documentaries, I recommend Hip-Hop Evolution on Netflix, hosted by Canadian rapper Shad. There are four short seasons of four episodes each. The first season takes the viewer from the first hip-hop party in 1973 in the Bronx to the birth of gangster rap in the 90s; Shad interviews all the pioneers of hip-hop and rap in the neighborhoods most of them started out in. The episode that covers “Rapper’s Delight” is intriguing; let’s just say the DJs and MCs that basically invented the genre had, er, not the best things to say about it. Watch it and you’ll see what I’m talking about.

And finally…of all the tracks I’ve taken on so far, researching this one was by far the most fun I’ve had. Once I landed on the Saturday morning theme and tying in Soul Train and Chic to “Rapper’s Delight”, it all came together quickly, and I was surprised how much I remembered. Recalling those times brought back a flood of nostalgia for a time that truly was a landmark era in pop culture. I have to warn you, however, that typing “Saturday morning cartoons” into a Google search is dangerous, lest you have spare time on your hands. You will tumble down a rabbit hole that you may not escape for hours! There are channels on YouTube devoted to highlight reels of cartoons, old 70s commercials, Schoolhouse Rock!, and other bits that, if you grew up in this era, will have you wishing you were eight years old again…and if you didn’t, well, it may have you longing for a time without streaming TV and smartphones. And I’ve already mentioned the wealth of Soul Train content; proceed with caution. OK, as far as the playlist goes, I really wanted to stay true to this era of hip-hop; the beginnings and the so-called “Golden Age”, so I put together what I think is a decent collection of songs from that time. Some of them I knew very well growing up, but some I became more familiar with as I was putting together the post. I’m sure I missed some, so please let me know in the comments and I’ll add them! And if you go to my Spotify page, there’s a also a giant R&B playlist I’ve been working on since last summer that includes dozens of Soul Train artists, and some great dance tracks.

And…I’m leaving this here; sorry I just couldn’t resist… 😊

See you next time…

JS

3/29/2024