Grandmaster Flash - The Message

"The Message" is an old school hip hop song by Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five released in 1982.

The song's lyrics were some of the first in the genre of rap to talk about the struggles and the frustrations of living in the ghetto.

The song was written by Sugar Hill session musician Ed "Duke Bootee" Fletcher and Furious Five MC Melle Mel. Flash and the other members of The Furious Five, although credited on the record, were uninterested in recording the song and are not found on the finished record.

The song's signature synthesizer riff has been sampled by popular rap artists such as Ice Cube and Diddy.

The song's chorus of "Don't push me 'cuz I'm close to the edge" has become one of the most well known choruses in rap music history. Lyrics, such as "Broken glass everywhere" and "Keep my hand on my gun cuz they got me on the run", have also been used many times in hip hop songs by artists such as Talib Kweli and Snoop Dogg.