musings, rants, rambles, and typographical errors from a toronto librarian. Now with vinyl.
Tuesday, May 17, 2016
Grandmaster & Melle Mel: White Lines (Don't Don't Do It) (1983)
Grandmaster and Melle Mel is sometimes inaccurately referred to as Grandmaster Flash and Melle Mel, as noted in the Discogs entry:
Name of the artist here should actually be "Grandmaster & Melle
Mel". This unique wording was the result of an ugly legal suit between
Melle Mel (Melvin Glover) and Grandmaster Flash (Joseph Saddler). When
Flash was essentially pushed out of his own group - especially in the
fact that he was a non-player on the breakthrough Grandmaster Flash
& Furious 5 track "The Message" - Melle Mel (with the encouragement
of Sugarhill Records label head Sylvia Robinson) decided that he would
take Flash's place in the band - and essentially take his name as well.
During this time, the definitive singles "The Message II" and "New
York, New York" were released under the name of Grandmaster Flash &
The Furious 5, even though Flash had nothing to do with these releases.
The net result of the lawsuit forced Sugar Hill and Melle Mel to
cease the theft of Flash's name - which resulted in the White Lines
singles all being pressed with the name "Grandmaster & Melle Mel",
with Melle Mel's name in larger type than "Grandmaster".
White Lines eventually proved to be Sugar Hill's downfall, as the
famous bassline and much of other components of the song were stolen
from the sub-underground (but now much more justifiably well known)
track "Cavern" by Liquid Liquid, which resulted in another lawsuit - of
which Sugarhill would never recover from.
Subsequent releases from Mel were released as Grandmaster Melle Mel.
Mel later dropped the "Grandmaster" & reunited with Flash in the
late 80's - and toured with the reunited Grandmaster Flash & The
Furious 5 in the early 90's.
Despite the theft of the bassline -- or perhaps because of it -- this is a really cool track. It got lost of play in the club I used to hang out in so long ago.
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