SUGAR BEAR- THE ONE SHOT WONDER FROM LONG ISLAND

Back in 1988 when I was sixteen years of age, submerged in the golden era of hip-hop, I constantly heard this one track which always started with the now immortal words: “I said it before, time after time, whoaaaaaa… don’t scandalize mine” before the track whip-cracked into the Talking Heads sample from “Once in a Lifetime”.

It took a while to find out who this rapper was and when I found out it was the self-confessed “Powerful Powerlord from Strong Island” known as Sugar Bear- who took his name from the advertising cartoon mascot of the 1950s American breakfast cereal Super Sugar Crisp- I was duly impressed. “Scandalize” played well with everything at the time, especially Doug Lazy’s epic hip-house track “Let it Roll”.

Sugar Bear, a.k.a Teddy Jackson was, at the time, the manager for Townhouse 3-who became Son of Bezerk-and wrote rhymes in his spare time, mainly as a hobby. Befriending Chuck D on his pioneering radio show Spectrum City (the original name for Public Enemy) at Adelphi University, Sugar Bear would showcase his rhymes along with his crew, the Players Club. Opening for such acts as The Fat Boys, Sugar Bear gained some valuable experience of the rap music industry, especially in how to rock a crowd.

Sugar Bear’s crowning glory came with the single “Don’t Scandalize Mine” b/w Ready to Penetrate”, the brainchild of Sugar Bear whilst testing out ideas with Paul Shabazz, friend and studio space sharer of Bomb Squad producer Hank Shocklee.

Producer GM Web D, nowadays a producer for MF Doom, laid down the track for “Scandalize”, which, originally, wasn’t the “Once in a Lifetime” sample, but a far slower incarnation. Once the Talking Head’s sample had been laced under Sugar Bear’s rhymes, he knew he had something.

But Long Island and the rest of North America wasn’t really feeling “Scandalize”. Save for a little radio play in New York, the single didn’t really bring the noise, despite being pressed up by little-known Coslit Records and then picked up by Next Plateau, also home to the Ultramagnetic Mc’s. Why the track may not have had the impact it should have could be linked to fellow New York rappers DJ Chuck Chillout and Cool Chip, who had already used the same sample on their seminal track “Rhythm is the Master”, with backing from big label Polygram.

Ironically, U.K hip-hop and club heads embraced the single with surprising results: it became an underground hit with crossover appeal. So much so that Sugar Bear got exposure and a lucrative tour in the U.K and Europe.

The U.K has always embraced the ‘real’ hip-hop coming out of New York, especially in the 1980s and “Don’t Scandalize Mine” (a metaphor for ‘mind your own business’) remains-along with Most Wanted’s “Calm Down”, Mantronix’s “King of the Beats” and Masta Ace’s’ “Letter to the Better”- a New York bastard child adopted by British surrogate parents.

Interestingly, the ‘B’ side of “Scandalize”, “Ready to Penetrate”, became reincarnated by Public Enemy four years later for “Tie Goes to The Runner”, off their otherwise poorly conceived “Greatest Misses” album.

Very little is known about Sugar Bear in the intervening years. It has been documented that he’s happily married with children and, I assume, has a normal life, away from the music industry.

His brush with fame, whilst all too brief, was, for a one-shot wonder, more interesting and longer-lasting than most. Perhaps if he had actually joined Public Enemy, he may have made it to the hall of fame, the pantheon of hip hop greatness. I suspect he’s happy he was just a part of it all in the first place.