The Greatest 50 Hip-hop Albums Ever - #2 & #1

[Twentytwofifty]

Nas - Illmatic (1994)


Eric B. & Rakim - Paid In Full (1987)


    He was hailed as the second coming of Rakim.  April 19, 1994 is the date where a young MC named Nas from Queensbridge released hip-hop’s most celebrated album, Illmatic, an album so dope the name has been now used to describe hip-hop perfection.  The buzz started three years earlier on Main Source’s “Live At The Barbeque” from their album Breaking Atoms where he stole the show on his first appearance.  For his debut album Nas was lucky to score a small army of some of the best producers hip-hop had to offer which included DJ Premier, L.E.S., Pete Rock, Large Professor and Q-Tip who came thru with some of their best work.  But more importantly, Nas takes his place as one of hip-hop's greatest street poets — his rhymes are highly literate, his raps superbly fluid. He's able to evoke the bleak reality of ghetto life without losing hope or forgetting the good times, which become all the more precious when any day could be your last. As a narrator, he doesn't get too caught up in the darker side of life — he's simply describing what he sees in the world around him, and trying to live it up while he can.  This no-frills 10-track LP showcases a person holding wisdom far beyond his years, whose reaction to a harsh ghetto environment is to look out with a cool perspective and an open mind, whose lyrics convey perfectly the community focused aura and uncrushable optimism of the projects.

    Seven years earlier the MC/DJ duo of Eric B. & Rakim released their debut LP Paid In Full but like for Illmatic the buzz started early.  In 1986 the duo dropped one of the best two sided singles in hip-hop history, “Eric B. For President” b/w “My Melody”.  Rakim was the MC you never heard coming.  Until him, rappers had pretty much done it all.  They’d screamed about hard times and growled their messages.  They’d danced and shouted, broke it down and worked crowds into froths with the perfect beat.  They moved you – but not without breaking a sweat.  Then, the unexpected.  The god spoke.  One of the most influential rap albums of all time, Eric B. & Rakim's Paid In Full only continues to grow in stature as the record that ushered in hip-hop's modern era.  The stripped-down production might seem a little bare to modern ears, but Rakim's technique on the mic still sounds utterly contemporary, even state-of-the-art — and that from a record released in 1987, just one year after Run-D.M.C. hit the mainstream.  Rakim basically invents modern lyrical technique over the course of Paid In Full, with his complex internal rhymes, literate imagery, velvet-smooth flow, and unpredictable, off-the-beat rhythms. 

    If the excitement for Illmatic wasn't already ratcheted up to the highest degree, "Genesis" took it even higher. Some people knew the score when they heard this intro, and other people were left scratching their heads.  Sampling from the classic hip-hop movie Wild Style and mixing it with the aforementioned "Live At The Barbeque" though was just Nas' way of letting us know it was on.  This was to be an album steeped in the rich traditions of hip-hop history, mixed with the most advanced verbal styles and fat beats that could be put on wax. “N.Y. State Of Mind” is the opening cut, and it's all there.  DJ Premier's clean, menacing rhythm, a crisp piano loop and paired with a Rakim sample on the chorus.  The exquisite rhymes - "Inhale deep like the words of my breath, I never sleep, cause sleep is the cousin of death, I lay puzzle as I backtrack to earlier times, nothing's equivalent to the New York state of mind”.  The aura of “N.Y. State Of Mind”, the straight reflection of the NY street mentality onto a rhyme book, is echoed repeatedly throughout the album.  The way in which Nas drops invaluable knowledge while discreetly observing the goings on of the ghetto is masterful.  “The World Is Yours” revitalises with its upbeat rhymes and cool Pete Rock production,  “Memory Lane” soothes with its slum philosophy:

Poetry, that's a part of me, retardedly bop
I drop the ancient manifested hip-hop, straight off the block
I reminisce on park jams, my man was shot for his sheep coat
Childhood lesson make me see him drop in my weed smoke
It's real, grew up in trife life, did times or white lines
The hype vice, murderous nighttimes, and knife fights invite crimes
Chill on the block with Cog-nac, hold strap
with my peeps that's into drug money, market into rap
No sign of the beast in the blue Chrysler, I guess that means peace
For niggaz no sheisty vice to just snipe ya
Start off the dice-rollin mats for craps to cee-lo
With sidebets, I roll a deuce, nothin below (Peace God!)
Peace God -- now the shit is explained
I'm takin niggaz on a trip straight through memory lane

    Of course, nothing was a more significant symbol of the old school than a simple step up to the mic to spit for the fuck of it.  Nas acknowledges this to the fullest, the majority of tracks here are just straight, raw, unadulterated urban street flows.  These rhymes, straight out a QB street corner cypher, form the basis of “Halftime”, “One Time For Your Mind”, and the classic single “It Ain't Hard To Tell”.  Both “Halftime” and “One Time For Your Mind” are wonderful, and demonstrate the extent to which Nas could hold it down and destroy any cat on the mic back in his heyday.  But “It Ain't Hard To Tell” is something special.  The Large Professor creatively samples Michael Jackson's “Human Nature” with devastating effect, creating a track backdrop which stays raw, ill and powerful whilst maintaining a dignified, chilled approach. Nas blesses the track with some of his finest ever lyrics.

    These fun, upbeat battle tracks are the epitome of dopeness, but they don't overshadow any of the album's other crown jewels like “Life's A Bitch” or “One Love”.  These two tracks, singularly and together as a part of the album, symbolise perfectly the attitude, hope and optimism of the NY hood.  “Life's A Bitch” featuring the only guest appearance, by AZ.  It goes straight from the brief intro into one of the finest verses of all time.  With no warning, AZ bursts into action, spits a tremendous stream of words and redefines the concept of flow, as the lyrics rush over the beat distributing knowledge on a par with anything you'll ever hear.  It's just so, so good.  The two MCs are kept apart by AZ's hook - "Life's a bitch and then you die; that's why we get high, cause you never know when you're gonna go" - which says so much with so little.  The production is simple but effective in the atmosphere it creates behind the vocals.  “One Love” is melancholic without being hopeless, it's optimistic while staying wise.  The top drawer xylophone-laden Q-Tip production is very much like the entire album- blissfully simple, but yet sharp and potent.

    Rakim wastes no time on Paid In Full showing the world his mic skills and bragging about them and his love for the mic on his debut with the killer opening cut “I Ain't No Joke” as he starts off:

I ain't no joke, I use to let the mic smoke
Now I slam it when I'm done and make sure it's broke
When I'm gone, no on gets on, cause I won't let
Nobody press up, and mess up, the scene I set
I like to stand in the crowd, and watch the people wonder "Damn!"
But think about it, then you'll understand
I'm just an addict, addicted to music
Maybe it's a habit, I gotta use it
Even if it's jazz or the quiet storm
I hook a beat up, convert it into hip-hop form

    The perfect start as Rakim flawlessly flows over one the best beats on the album.  The b-side to his first single “My Melody” is an almost seven minute long, five verse long lyrical assault.  It almost contains Rakim’s 21 MC theory which is possibly the most famous lines ever which have been flipped by other artists time and time again, Pete Rock and Eminem are two that come to mind.

I take 7 MC's put em in a line
And add 7 more brothas who think they can rhyme
Well, it'll take 7 more before I go for mine
And that's 21 MC's ate up at the same time 

    Another big single pops up, “I Know You Got Soul” which samples Bobby Byrd and James Brown’s song of the same name and which almost single-handedly kicked off hip-hop's infatuation with James Brown samples.  Rakim doesn’t slack off over the fantastic production as he’s as sharp and innovative as ever:

I start to think and then I sink
Into the paper like I was ink
When I'm writing, I'm trapped in between the lines,
I escape when I finish the rhyme...

    Two more singles follow, one where he describes what MC means to him, the wonderful “Move The Crowd” and the single verse gem “Paid In Full” (“But without no money it's still a wish/ Cause I don't like to dream about gettin paid/ So I dig into the books of the rhymes that I made/ To now test to see if I got pull/ Hit the studio, cause I'm paid in full”).  But it’s the remix of the latter by Coldcut that really tookoff.  His “Seven Minutes Of Madness” remix stands as one of the greatest remixes in hip-hop history and really did a lot to popularize the upcoming trend.  "Paid In Full" is also a record that has been sampled to death with artists like Mobb Deep and Snoop Dogg remaking the track and countless MC freestyling over the instrumental.  Before the instrumental outro we have the biggest song of all, “Eric B. Is President”.  Ask your favourite rapper what their favourite songs are and this one will probably come up.  This is the party jam that introduced Rakim to the world.  “I can in the door/ I said it before/ I let the mic magnetize me no more”.  Without a doubt this jam is one of the greatest ever.
 
    These two albums have a lot in common.  These are the debut albums of two of the greatest MCs ever to grace the mic and they were made when these two were very young men at the time these albums were released as Rakim was 19 and Nas 20 and even at that age these two made other MCs step up their game with these pair of ten track albums.  These are also two albums just full of hip-hop classics.  Ask any hip-hop head what their favourite songs are and you’ll hear “I Ain’t No Joke” and “N.Y. State Of Mind”, you’ll hear “Paid In Full” and “The World Is Yours”, “My Melody” and “It Ain’t Hard To Tell” and so on.  Far from glorifying the violence of the streets or celebrating the excess of conspicuous consumption, Nas presented what could only be called pure poetry set to some of the all-time most bangin' tracks ever made and Paid In Full is essential listening for anyone even remotely interested in the basic musical foundations of hip-hop — this is the form in its purest essence.  The mic god Rakim set the table for every MC that came up after him and influenced just about every MC from Kurupt to Buckshot to Ras Kass to Nas himself.  No gimmicks-just rhymes crafted with microchip intricacy and a baritone that struck like an iron fist in a velvet glove.  Simple ain’t it?  But quite clever.


50. Dr. Dre – 2001 (1999)
49. Outkast – Southernplayalisticaddicmuzik (1994)
48. Jay-Z – Reasonable Doubt (1996)
47. Kool G Rap & DJ Polo – Wanted: Dead Or Alive (1990)
46. Redman – Whut? Thee Album (1992)
45. De La Soul - De La Soul Is Dead (1991)
44. Fugees – The Score (1996)
43. The D.O.C. – No One Can Do It Better (1989)
42. Common Sense - Resurrection (1994)
41. Makaveli - The Don Kiluminati: The 7 Day Theory (1996)
40. Public Enemy – Fear Of A Black Planet (1990)
39. Ice Cube – Death Certificate (1992)
38. Gza/Genius - Liquid Swords (1995)
37. N.W.A – Efil4zaggin (1991)
36. Main Source – Breaking Atoms (1991)
35. Geto Boys – Grip It! On That Other Level (1989)
34. Brand Nubian – One For All (1990)
33. Scarface – The Diary (1994)
32. Kool G Rap & DJ Polo – Road To The Riches (1989)
31. Beastie Boys – Licensed To Ill (1986)
30. Ultramagnetic MC's – Critical Beatdown (1988)
29. LL Cool J – Radio (1985)
28. 2Pac – All Eyez On Me (1996)
27. Mobb Deep – The Infamous… (1995)
26. Eric B. & Rakim – Follow The Leader (1988)
25. Big Daddy Kane – It’s A Big Daddy (1989)
24. Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth – Mecca And The Soul Brother (1992)
23. Black Moon – Enta Da Stage (1993)
22. Outkast – Aquemini (1998)
21. A Tribe Called Quest – People’s Instinctive Travels And The Paths Of Rhythm (1990)
20. Run-D.M.C. – Run-D.M.C. (1984)
19. Boogie Down Productions – By All Means Necessary (1988)
18. Raekwon – Only Built 4 Cuban Linx… (1995)
17. De La Soul – 3 Feet High And Rising (1989)
16. Snoop Doggy Dogg – Doggystyle (1993)
15. Ice Cube – AmeriKKKa’s Most Wanted (1990)
14. The Notorious B.I.G. – Ready To Die (1994)
13. Run-D.M.C. – Raising Hell (1986)
12. EPMD – Strictly Business (1988)
11. Big Daddy Kane – Long Live The Kane (1988)
10. A Tribe Called Quest – Midnight Marauders (1993)
09. Boogie Down Productions – Criminal Minded (1987)
08. N.W.A – Straight Outta Compton (1988)
07. Public Enemy – It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back (1988)
06. A Tribe Called Quest – The Low End Theory (1991)
05. Slick Rick – The Great Adventures Of Slick Rick (1988)
04. Wu-Tang Clan – Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) (1993)
03. Dr. Dre – The Chronic (1992)
02. Nas – Illmatic (1994)
01. Eric B. & Rakim – Paid In Full (1987)

[Da Flamboyant 1]

gyea i was rite bout this shit now jus bump up da pac albums n chronic2001 n doggystyle n u got urself a perfekt list

[ToOoOoN!!!]

props for the list...was cool to read 

[makaveli11]

My two favorite rap records from the east. It makes sense putting the last two together. Nice list for a difficult task. The only question I have regards 2pac 'me against the world'. I thought it was more influential then makaveli, but even if it wasn't I thought it was too good skill/quality wise not to make top 50. I just want to know what's your take on it. Anyway thanks for the dope hookups. I downloaed like 40 out the 50 albums.

[Wicked977]

propz on the whole list alot of shit I ain't Know some albums did influancial wise

[Kill]

The logical conclusion, good idea doing it together...

I´ll comment on the list later, right now I´m tired

[Twentytwofifty]

My two favorite rap records from the east. It makes sense putting the last two together. Nice list for a difficult task. The only question I have regards 2pac 'me against the world'. I thought it was more influential then makaveli, but even if it wasn't I thought it was too good skill/quality wise not to make top 50. I just want to know what's your take on it. Anyway thanks for the dope hookups. I downloaed like 40 out the 50 albums.

I was planning on putting up some honorable mentions which were albums that were on the list but got cut for whatever reasons.  I'll make a new thread for that or put them in the sticky thread.  I'll address that question and some others that have been unanswered there.

[Kill]

ok fuck it, I should go to sleep, but unlike like half an hour ago I feel wide awake, so:

I think you should have included:

ATLiens - Really, I´m not the only one who thinks this is the best Outkast album. Maybe the most beautiful hiphop album ever, and ten times better than "Southernplayalistic..."

Paul´s Boutique - Some of the greatest work in sampling ever AND one of the most important records that helped non-hiphop fans get into the music at least a bit. A LOT better than "Licensed To Ill" and much more innovative

since this is, of course a top 50, you´d have to leave 2 albums out in order to include these. I would leave out:

Breaking Atoms - Good, but not HIGHLY influential IMO. Also, it´s not immaculate, has its weaker moments and is nothing hiphop feeds off that much today

One For All - I admit I hadn´t even heard the whole thing when you posted it up, but IMO this is not a top 50 record either. It´s good, but while Brand Nubian are pretty respected and put out some quite good shit, they never had a huge impact, at least not one that I could see

...or you could have replaced the 1st Outkast album with the 2nd

...I would have ranked higher:

Reasonable Doubt (top 40)
Mecca & the Soul Brother (top 15)
Makaveli (top 35)
Road To The Riches (top 30)
Death Certificate (top 30)
The Diary (top 30)


I would have ranked lower:

Enta Da Stage (top 50)
People´s Instinctive Travels... (top 30)
Licensed To Ill (top 45 or maybe 40)
Efil4zaggin (top 45)


my top 10, if I gtried to make an "objective" list:

1. Paid In Full
1. Illmatic (won´t even decide)
3. The Chronic
4. 36 Chambers
5. Low End Theory
6. It Takes A Nation Of Millions...
7. Long live the Kane
8. Strictly Business
9. Criminal Minded
10. Str8 Outta Compton

personal top 10:

1. Illmatic
2. The Chronic
3. Only Built 4 Cuban Linx
4. ATLiens
5. The Infamous
6. Mecca & The Soul Brother
7. Paid In Full
8. 36 Chambers
9. Makaveli
10.Aquemini

...or something like that

peace

[Sikotic™]

Predictable conclusion. It's a decent list, props for all the time yo uyput into it.

[eS El Duque]

and it comes to and end..its been a fun ride. I remember the first thread...people were going nutz!

now people know!...props knuckles!

[ωεεźγ ғ]

props knuckes cheyaaaa illmatic

[Larrabee]

Props to Knucks, man. Great countdown.

[BizzyR.I.P.]

Nice list props but I would have liked to have seen Me Against the World and East 1999.

[herpes]

props on the list knuckles, it was the best thing going on the dubcc.

[Young Dan Iza]

how isnt jay-z blueprint on this list