Sylvia Robinson Dies At 76

Silky R&B crooner and hip hop pioneer Sylvia Robinson has died at the age of 76. Her biggest pop hit was the sexytime proto-disco moaner Pillow Talk, which topped the Billboard charts in 1973 and predicted Donna Summer's Love To Love You, Baby two years later. But Robinson will best be remembered as the founder of Sugar Hill Records, the groundbreaking hip hop label which produced (arguably) the world's first hit rap record, Rapper's Delight. She went on to release the infinitely superior Grandmaster Flash classic The Message, and my personal Sugar Hill favorite, Funk You Up by The Sequence.