Sylvia
“It’s Good to Be the Queen” (Sugar Hill)

Before Sean “Puffy” Combs and other rap executives elbowed their way into the spotlight, there was Sylvia Robinson. But at least the “queen” of Sugar Hill Records had a lengthy career as a performer before launching the first hip-hop label, and her innate sense of musicality helps make this disco-fried parody of Mel Brooks’ novelty rap “It’s Good to Be the King” superior to the original. “This rapping is a sho nuff treasure,” she says, tossing in plenty of kitschy “oohs” and “aahs” to boot. “What it is is what it is.”

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