Customer Reviews

Grandmaster Flash & Furious Five - Greatest Hits

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Unless you want chopped up versions of classic tracks by Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five, avoid this CD. On the surface it looks great, 14 tracks by one of the genre defining groups of hip hop, but most of these songs have been badly edited in some way. Several tracks, including "Freedom", "It's Nasty", "The Message", and "White Lines" all start fading out early, cutting off as much as 4 minutes of the song. How do you dare cut the original 7 minute version of "The Message" down to 3 minutes?! One of the worst examples is the classic track "Beat Street" with a chopped 2 minutes even going as far as to fade out during the rap! This is unexceptable. There are a few original versions of songs on here like "Step Off", "Scorpio", and "Message II", but that doesn't really matter considering those songs can be found on other compilations. If you want a single disc summation of GMF & F5's hits, I highly recommend Rhino's 11 track "Message From Beat Street: The Best". All the songs that are edited here are featured on that CD in their original 7 minute forms. It gives you a few less tracks, but all the essentials are on that collection and most importantly they're uncut! Now, if you want more than that, check out the 3 CD definitive collection "Back to the Old School: Adventures on the Wheels of Steel". It's a travesty that groundbreaking music is ever edited in this way, don't do a disservice to yourself or this music by getting "Grandmaster Flash & Furious Five - Greatest Hits".

Also recommended for all the old schoolers:

The Best of Kurtis Blow
The Best of Sugar Hill Gang: Rapper's Delight
The Sugar Hill Story (3 CD or 5 CD Box Set)
Afrika Bambaataa: Looking for the Perfect Beat
The first 4 RUN DMC Albums
The Best of Mantronix

Don't forget other early pioneers of rap & hip hop:
Kool Moe Dee, LL Cool J, Beastie Boys, Public Enemy, Boogie Down Productions, Jazzy Jeff & Fresh Prince, Big Daddy Kane, De La Soul, 3rd Bass, A Tribe Called Quest, MC Lyte, Jungle Brothers, Biz Markie, EPMD, Eric B & Rakim, Kool G Rap & DJ Polo, Rob Base & DJ EZ Rock, Ice T, Fat Boys, Slick Rick, 2 Live Crew, Digital Underground and many many more!

*Personal shout out to Digital Underground. Your first album was my first compact disc, which my Dad bought me when I was 14 since I couldn't buy it myself. Man, did that start something.

Grandmaster Flash is probably the first example of rap taken as a political art form, rather than as a medium through which the artist may boast and brag. This is exemplified by 'The Message and 'White Lines'. Less soul than the Sugarhill gang, but this is more of a benefit than a loss. Although all the tracks are good, the problem with this disc in particular is the length of the tracks. Many of the tracks, originally 7 minutes or so long, simply fade out after 4, often while someone is still rapping. While many Grandmaster Flash is a truly excellent group, if you are looking for a good example of their work, perhaps this edition should be avoided.

I have another Greatest Hits CD by Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five but was missing 2 cuts (which is on this CD). This CD have all the same songs from the one I have, these are short versions so I am not missing anything. I am not disappointed at all for the purchase.

The first Time I heard Grandmaster Flash I saw the film clip of "the Message" on Tv, and from then on I knew I had to get me his CD. When I first recieved it I listened, and heard some great stuff, this is HIP HOP At it's BEST! It just keeps getting BETTER AND BETTER!