Duke of Earl

February–March 1962

Being that I am a child of the 90s, Gene Chandler's "Duke of Earl" was originally known to me thus:

Like it or not, the Cypress Hill track is one of the defining rap songs of that decade, and it's a great sample in my opinion, even though Chandler's song title gets clipped and looped in the middle of the second word.

As for the original hit: it's another example of a song where the backing vocals are more recognizable than the lead singing, due to that distinctive doo-wop bass voice (cf. "Blue Moon").

Other than that, well... it's a pretty cool old song. Chandler based his whole persona on the concept of "Duke of Earl" (he never had another top ten hit), and here he is in full garb:

I'm not sure how well this was known to our friends across the pond, but they must have thought it was bloody silly—is he a duke or an earl? Whichever he may be, he certainly isn't a web designer; his website rivals Joey Dee's for looking like it was designed by a high schooler in 1999. I'm surprised it doesn't end in "tripod.com."

B+