The Greatest Hip Hop Song of all time is…

Well according to Rolling Stone:

Grandmaster Flash and The Furious Five’s 1982 hit “The Message” is the number 1 song on Rolling Stone′s first-ever list of “The 50 Greatest Hip-Hop Songs of All Time.”

The magazine argues that “The Message” earned the top honors because it was “the first song to tell, with hip-hop’s rhythmic and vocal force, the truth about modern inner-city life in America” including “drugs, prostitution, prison and the grim promise of an early death.” Its chilling refrain says it all: “Don’t push me, ’cause I’m close to the edge/I’m trying not to lose my head.” The song reached No. 4 on Billboard‘s R&B-singles chart.

Formed in the South Bronx in the late 1970s, Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five became the first hip-hop group to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2007.

Number 2 on the list is “Rapper’s Delight” by Sugarhill Gang, a group discovered by the late Sylvia Robinson, “the mother of hip-hop” and owner of the label Sugarhill Records, who died in 2011. When the six-and-a-half-minute song hip hip hoppie and bang bang boogied into Top 40 radio, rap became “a viable genre for recorded music,” according to the magazine.

Other hip-hop songs in Rolling Stone‘s top 10 include: “Planet Rock” by Afrika Bambaataa & the Soul Sonic Force; “Sucker M.C.’s” by Run-DMC; “Mind Playing Tricks on Me” by Geto Boys; “Nuthin’ But a ‘G’ Thang” by Dr. Dre, featuring Snoop Dogg (Dr. Dre was also the highest-paid musician of 2012, per Forbes); “Juicy” by Notorious B.I.G.; and “Paid in Full” by Eric B. and Rakim. Other influential artists in the top 50 included Eminem, Wu-Tang Clan, Kanye West, 50 Cent, Jay-Z and Missy Elliott.

I guess it’s not just my opinion that hip hop was a lot better back in the day. Read the whole thing here.