Hours in a studio in Virginia, where they both grew up, produced one otherworldly experiment after another, shaping songs that featured era-defining stars such as Aaliyah, Lil Kim, Busta Rhymes, and more, and that sounded like transmissions from a distant, futuristic planet. Two weeks: That’s how long it took for Missy Elliott and Timbaland to build an album as seminal and mind-bendingly avant-garde as Supa Dupa Fly - testament to the alchemical connection between the two sonic architects. Missy “Misdemeanor” Elliott, ‘Supa Dupa Fly’ (1997).Jay Dee came out of the 1990s Soulquarians scene, but here he’s alone with the music - throwing all his brilliance into one last gift to the world. Donuts is wildly inventive mixology, 31 brief fractals that weave in and out of each other, a swirl of funk, soul, cartoon music, and prog rock. But he packs a lifetime’s worth of sonic imagination into these instrumental grooves. Dilla knew he didn’t have time to waste - he died three days after the album dropped. The Detroit beatmaster made most of Donuts in his hospital room, as he lay dying from a rare blood disease. The record’s most incendiary track, “Fuck tha Police,” was “400 years in the making,” according to Ice Cube. Some tracks were misogynistic (“I Ain’t tha 1”), some were about drinking and driving (“8 Ball”), some were about dealing drugs (“Dopeman”), and all we’re about not giving a fuck.
Dre and Yella, and lyricists/news anchors Ice Cube and MC Ren. When N.W.A recorded Straight Outta Compton, they weren’t calling their music “gangsta rap,” it was “reality rap.” Tracks like “Gangsta Gangsta,” “If It Ain’t Ruff,” and “Straight Outta Compton” reflected the everyday lives of proud former gangster Eazy-E, producer-DJs Dr. As Sermon said, “It was just two kids who heard wack stuff on the radio and wanted to do better.” Their debut is a true summer classic, pioneering the laid-back but menacing sound that would take off on the West Coast as G-funk. “Strictly Business” was their theme song: Erick Sermon and Parrish Smith talking their shit, looping “I Shot the Sheriff” into a whole new futuristic groove, with woofer-eating bass designed to blow up Jeeps. To a fan coming up in the era of Cardi or Tyler or Polo G or Playboi Carti, the golden age is now.Įverywhere you went in the summer of 1988, you heard EPMD - two suburban dudes from Strong Island with their own hypnotic funk sound, perfect for backyard barbecues. One of the incredible things about hip-hop is that it evolves and expands faster than any other genre in music history. to Houston to Chicago, and beyond.Īs we dug and listened, we found ourselves a little less swayed by “golden age” mystique than we might’ve been had we done this list 10 or 15 years ago. and Rakim and others, through the gangsta era, the rise of the South, the ascendance of larger-than-life aughts superstars like Jay-Z and Kanye West and Nicki Minaj, and on and on into more recent moments like blog-rap, emo-rap, and drill, from New York to L.A. The result was a list that touches on every important moment in the genre’s evolution - from compilations that honor the music’s paleo old-school days, to its artistic flourishing in the late Eighties and early Nineties with Public Enemy, De La Soul, Eric B. When confronted with a choice between the third (or fourth or fifth) record by a classic artist (Outkast, for instance, or A Tribe Called Quest) and an album from an artist who would make the list more interesting (The Jacka or Saba or Camp Lo), we tended to go with the latter option. Relatedly, a list of hip-hop-adjacent albums from the worlds of dancehall or reggaeton or grime would be fun and fascinating, and something for us to revisit down the road. That’s one reason we limited our scope to English language hip-hop. But the history of rap LPs is so rich and varied, we were forced to make some painful choices - there are so many iconic artists with deep catalogs, so many constantly evolving sounds and regional scenes. Two hundred seems like an almost luxuriantly expansive number when you’re making an albums list, and in any other genre, maybe it would be.
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