27. OutKast - Aquemini 1998 5/5

 

Highlights: Return Of The "G", Da Art Of Storytellin' (Pt. 1), Aquemini

 

 

We're definitely getting to the good part of this list now. Three 5/5 flawless albums in a row. We previously saw André 3000 and Big Boi before with their 2003 release, Speakerboxxx / The Love Below (#124) but now we go back to year I was born with the pair's third album 'Aquemini'. Their first two albums had both been large commercial successes and garnered the duo critical acclaim, but this was the album that truly changed everything for Southern rap. This album received a rare, coverted '5-Mic' rating from the Source and, at the magazine's award show the year before this album's release, OutKat won the award for 'Best New Artist'. This was one of the most iconic moments in Hip-Hop history as the pair collected their award to boos by the New York audience and declared "the South got something to say, that's all I got to say". This is seen by many as the moment where southern rap truly gained respect and it has pretty much been the dominant sub-genre of rap since. Wayne, Thug, 21, Cole, Future and Travis all owe OutKast a debt of gratitude for legitimatising the region and making their career's possible.

 

This doesn't hold the same place in my chart as 'S/TLB', but there's no doubt that this is easily a 5/5 album. The production on this album is just so clean. It isn't sample-heavy like most 90s rap albums and the live instrumentation and use of revolving session musicians give it a unique sound that no other rap album had really gone for at the time. The topics are wide-ranging, from addiction, alien invasions, human nature and technology and it can feel slightly unorthodox and searching at times but it's the consistency in the rhymes that give it cohesion. André is one of the most innovative and creative MCs to ever grace music and he's right at his prime here. His final verse on the title track is absolute butter and there's absolutely no-one else who would have released something like 'Da Art Of Storytellin' (Pt. 2)'. Huge props for warning us about the dangers of Virtual Reality all the way back in 1998 (on 'Synthesizer'). It's crazy how topical that song still feels today. Big Boi might not have the same spark as Dre and I think his would be considered truly as one of the absolute greatest if it wasn't for having an icon as his partner. Big Boi is the King of the gangster-side and its the pairing between the two that really helps make each other's best qualities sing. Big Boi's two solo cuts are both great and showcase perfectly what he brings to the table. There definitely is a contrast between the duo both in terms of style and in the substance of their lyrics. Dre has always been experimental and conceptual with his bars while Big Boi is much more the stereotypical gangsta and brings the more hardcore elements to their music. And this is what makes 'Return of the G' all the more powerful of an opener. André's still has always been more ecentric and out-there with his style and fashion than his counterpart and on the track they address that people we're telling them that they were incompatible and the rumours that Dre was either gay or on drugs and that Big Boi should drop him. It just feels cathartic to hear Big Boi rhyme "Stickin' together like flour and water to make that slow dough. We worked for everything we have and gon' stick up for each other, like we brothers from another mother. Kind of like Mel Gibson and Danny Glover". The title of the album refers to this unlikely combination as it is a portmanteau of their Zodiac signs (Aquarius and Gemini). If you were to pick one track as a low point it would be 'Mamacita'. I actually don't mind its simplistic hook but Dre provides his weakest verse of the album with a tone that verges on the uncomfortable.

 

'Rosa Parks' was released as the lead-single and led to a lawsuit from the legendary civil rights activist. After running until 2004, it was eventually settled with OutKast agreeing to work with Rosa Parks charity to raise awareness of her legacy. Listening to the song, it's hard to hear why a lawsuit was formed as the track doesn't really directly reference her and certainly doesn't paint her in a bad light. And it doesn't appear like the lawsuit really came from Parks herself anyway as she was suffering from dementia for most of the time of the lawsuit and passed away only months after it was settled. In 2005, her niece, Rehea McCauley, was quoted as saying "I know, dementia or not, my Auntie would never, ever go to this length to hurt some young artists trying to make it in the world … As a family, our fear is that during her last days Auntie Rosa will be surrounded by strangers trying to make money off of her name".

 

This album was released on the same day as Jay-Z's 'Vol. 2... Hard Knock Life', Black Star's 'Mos Def & Talib Kweli Are Black Star' and A Tribe Called Quest's 'The Love Movement'. Has there even been a more stacked day for rap releases than that?

 

Something tells me we haven't seen the back of the duo yet in this countdown...

26. Jay-Z - Reasonable Doubt 1996 5/5

 

Highlights: Ain't No N*gga, Brooklyn's Finest, Feelin' It

 

 

We've seen Jay already in this countdown with The Black Album (#113) and his Kanye collaboration Watch The Throne (#77) but we go back to his origins and his 1996 debut album 'Reasonable Doubt' for this entry. Now he's one of the most famous people in the world and an icon in music, it's easy to forget that he started off as a nobody just like anyone else. In 1989, was taken under the wing of a rapper called 'Jaz-O' who let Jay guest on a few of his songs, but when Jaz-O was dropped from his record deal, Jay was still a virtual unknown who began to deal drugs to stay afloat. After being Big Daddy Kane's support act in 1994 and catching some momentum through selling his mixtapes, he signed a deal with 'Payday Records'. However, he only released a couple of singles with them and, disappointed. with their marketing, left his deal and started up his own indie record label, 'Roc-A-Fella Records' to release his debut album. Although listening to this album, you would never know that it came from such humble beginnings. It samples Nas and he had agreed to feature on one track (although he ended up snubbing Jay and made it difficult to clear his sample leading to the infamous fued) and even has a feature from Notorious B.I.G. Apparently, Biggie heard the beat and wanted it for himself but the producer, Clark Kent, said that it belonged to Jay. Biggie agreed to jump on the track instead and spend the whole track in a lyrical war, it's basically a battle track between the pair desperate to show the other up. We almost never heard it to as Diddy tried to block it's release and he felt that appearing on an unknown artist like Jay-Z was at the time, was not a smart business move for Biggie.

 

This album proves that Jay-Z had it from the start. He perfected the 'Mafioso' style with his first attempt and with good reason. When Jay recorded this, he intended it to be his only album. Producer Clark Kent said of it's recording: "I think that’s the reason why it was so good, because it was more, like, effortless. ‘Yeah, we gon’ do it. We gon’ put this record out and we gon’ walk away.’ That’s what the plan was.". It's something about this pressure that gets the best out of Jay with his other entry, 'The Black Album' also being recorded with the intention of being his last. What makes this stand-out amongst the packed 'Mafioso ' sub-genre is Jay's mature viewpoint even at a younger age. He explained that "the studio was like a psychiatrist's couch for me" when recording this and you hear it in the music. Of course, it has it's braggadocios and cocky moments but this album gives you a hollistic view of the mafia lifestyle. It talks about the fun side but it's never afraid to also discuss the darker side. The album paints a picture of the high-life with all the material possessions it brings with references to Carlito's Way and Scarface, just listen to 'Cashmere Thoughts' or 'Can I Live' and you'll discover what I'm calling the birth of the 'rap quotable', something Drake has based a whole career off: "'Cause all beef return well done filet mignon", "when you hoes try to con a pro", "Forgettin' all I ever knew, convenient amnesia", "I'd rather die enormous than live dormant". But tracks like the closer, 'Regrets' and 'D’Evils' show a level of maturity that he has come to be known for and doesn't shy away from the pain and carnage the lifestyle precedes.

 

My favourite track is actually the one that many consider to be it's weakest. 'Ain’t No N*gga' was used on The Nutty Professor soundtrack but it's unorthodox, funky, production harkens back more to the days of Blaxploitation soundtracks and the re-working of The Four Tops' 'Aint No Woman' works a treat. This was also the track that introduced the world to a 17 year old 'Foxy Brown' who impressed so much on her verse, she quickly gained herself a record contract. Fun fact: Jay-Z who now has his own Weed line but was not a smoker at the time is actually high in the music video and also peep the Biggie cameo.

25. Eminem - The Marshall Mathers LP 2000 5/5

 

Highlights: Stan, The Way I Am, The Real Slim Shady

 

 

Eminem's second appearance after The Slim Shady LP (#85) is that album's follow-up 'The Marshall Mathers LP'. This is certainly one of the albums that defined the whole decade of the 00, breaking sales records at the time and staying relevant enough to inspire a sequel in 2013. Despite his apparent distain for the awards ("You think I give a damn about a GRAMMY? Half of you critics can't even stomach me, let alone stand me), this was awarded the Best Rap Album GRAMMY in 2001 and Eminem made headlines for his performance with Elton John.

 

I'm not sure what I can say about this album that hasn't already been said by thousands of others. This was Eminem at his most controversial, most omnipresent and lyrically, at the top of his game. Love him or hate him, when this album was released, he was impossible to ignore. The album focuses on a wide-range of topics, from the serious to the silly but one thing it never loses is that every word is designed to offend. Eminem knows exactly what accusations and criticisms the media were throwing at him and he decided to prove every single on right. There's certainly parts of this album that I find uncomfortable. the unhuman-like way he screams "bleed" on 'Kim', the homophobic disses towards Insane Clown Posse, but they are all important parts in making this album what it is. For anyone my age who's into Hip-Hop, this is a vital part of our childhoods and you can hear it's influence in countless albums ever since.

 

'Stan' is one of the best songs ever recorded. This album could have just been that and an hour of white noise and it would still be an all-time classic. The tale of an obsessed fan who keeps writing letters to Eminem with a eventual tragic conclusion was the perfect antidote to his critics who claimed that he didn't have any talent and relied purely on shock-value. There's not many more concise and engaging stories ever told in less than 10 minutes. The Dido-sampled chorus works so perfectly the sum up the whole tale that it's crazy that it wasn't written specifically for the song. And then in an unreliable run of singles, the lead of this album was 'The Real Slim Shady'. He says in the song just before it on the tracklist that "I'm not gonna be able to topple My Name Is" but with this, I think it's safe to say he did. This track is the epitome of the pop-culture bashing, radio-friendly Eminem lead-single with rhymes that remain just as biting today (Will Smith don't gotta cuss in his raps to sell records. Well I do, so fuck him and fuck you too"). And then we have one of the most underrated singles in his discography. The song is a masterclass is writing with a crazy, Dr. Seuss-esque rhyme scheme and an unmatched delivery. And for all the nonsense on this album, when this album does make some serious points, they land hard (With the bullshit they pull, 'cause they full of shit too. When a dude's gettin' bullied and shoots up his school. And they blame it on Marilyn and the heroin. Where were the parents at? And look where it's at: Middle America, now it's a tragedy!Now it's so sad to see an upper-class city havin' this happening. Then attack Eminem 'cause I rap this way").

24. Nas - Illmatic 1994 4.5/5

 

Highlights: Life's A Bitch, Halftime, Memory Lane (Sittin' In Da Park)

 

 

Nas has already appeared with It Was Written (#140), but now it's time to go back to his historical debut release, Illmatic. Before even listening to it, I cannot believe that this is only #24 in this list. It's probably the most iconic album in Hip-Hop history and is always in the consideration when people discuss the greatest rap album of all-time. Pitchfork ranked it as their #1, Rolling Stone placed it at #44 in their greatest albums list and here's a quote from Billboard: "Illmatic is widely seen as the best hip-hop album ever". It's one of only 15 albums that received the coveted '5 Mic' score in it's original review in The Source. I've been so excitement to listen to this one as it has been my biggest blindspot when it comes to Rap.

 

Nas was 20 when he recorded and released this album so his lyrics about gang rivalries and poverty in New York were fresh on his mind. There is a poetic sense to his style that gives Nas a unique flavour. I know that Hip-Hop is instinctively a poetic genre by nature but there's something different in Nas's descriptions here than in most other MCs straight retellings. The poet Kevin Coval describes Nas's approach as a "hip-hop poet-reporter...rooted in the intimate specificity of locale" and Jeff Weiss described him as a "baby-faced Buddha monk in public housing, scribbling lotto dreams and grim reaper nightmares in dollar notebooks, words enjambed in the margins. [...] Sometimes his pen taps the paper and his brain blanks. In the next sentence, he remembers dark streets and the noose". One other consideration that has made this such an important album is that it is credited with being the revival for East-Coast Hip-Hop. Since the birth of Hip-Hop, New York had always been the Kings the sound but the release of Dr. Dre's 'The Chronic' in 1992 had completely changed the game with G-Funk and West-Coast artists dominating the game. But with Illmatic and then Biggie's 'Ready To Die' releasing a few months after, New York was back with a vengeance.

 

And now I've finally listened to it, here's a controversial opinion, I prefer 'It Was Written'. There is certainly plenty I really appreciate here. Nas's pen-game is immaculate and his delivery is spot-on. Especially on 'Memory Lane (Sittin' In Da Park)" where the rhyming is absolutely insane. It's remarkably concise and perfectly designed. It's only 10 tracks with a 40 minute run-time but it packs in enough substance that it feels like a double album. But despite having an incredible list of producers (DJ Premier, Pete Rock, Large Professor, L.E.S., Q-Tip), there were a couple of tracks where the production wasn't doing anything for me. Everything is quite minimalist, with no real hooks and it feels like the producers didn't want to take the attention away from Nas and wanted to give him the space to shine.

 

Maybe it's a case of too high expectations but this album just left me a little cold. It's good but it's not all-time classic good for me. I'm definitely going to go back to it and see if my opinions change though.

23. UGK - Ridin' Dirty 1996 5/5

 

Highlights: One Day, Pinky Ring, 3 In The Mornin'

 

 

As with most artists at this stage, this is the second appearance from UGK after 'Super Tight...' (#163). For this entry we go to their third album, released in 1996 before the group took a five year hiatus. Despite their fifth album reaching #1 on the Billboard, this remains the duo's best selling album overall despite it's lowly #15 peak. Bun B later said of 'Ridin' Dirty': "“As far as Pimp and I are concerned, it’s the first real UGK album". Label influences had soured their first two albums for them (the label had reproduced previous tracks so they didn't have to pay to clear samples and rejected whole album concepts) and while the label also pushed back on this one, not allowing them to record any music videos or push any singles to radio, they were happy that they still managed to create their vision. Some of this album is fun, see Pinky Ring or the satirical 'F*ck My Car' where they bemoan girls who are only interested in them for materialistic means, but what impressed me the most and what I left the album thinking about is the opener 'One Day'. Apparently, Scarface played it for Tupac and he was just as impressed, being quoted as saying "I don’t know who these cats is. Face just gave me this album [and] these cats talkin' ‘bout what we talkin’ ‘bout, these cats gonna be down with us". The song itself is both introspective and personal and the final verse from Pimp C in particular really hits hard. He ends his verse by discussing a fire that killed his friends son: "My man BoBo just lost his baby in a house fire. And when I got on my knees that night to pray, I asked God 'Why You let these killers live and take my homeboy's son away?'. Man if you got kids, show you love 'em 'cause God just might call 'em home. 'Cause one day, they're here and, baby, the next day, they're gone". Four days before this tragic incident, Pimp C and DJ Screw had been arrested and put in jail for two days for weed possession while driving to the studio to record. Before these incidents, UGK had not been happy with the tracks had created but these incidents inspired them so they threw away the earlier tracks and created a classic.

 

What makes this album seminal is two things. One is a legendary verse from Bun B on 'Murder' that is that is much loved, with T.I. being a vocal fan, and two is the production. Pimp C was a multi-hyphenate artist who, aside from providing verses and showing off his singing ability on the odd hook, also produced this whole album alongside N.O. Joe. Inspired by the G-Funk sounds coming out of California from Dr. Dre, they created a new, smooth, but still funky style that came to define the South. Pimp C and Bun B are both good lyricists but the topics they cover here and probably not anything you haven't heard before, but it is the different style in production that makes this a stand-out. Critic Leo Stanley wrote in his review "f UGK doesn’t really have something new to say, at least they have come up with an engaging way to say it – the sound of their record is vibrant and direct, bringing you right into the thick of things". The two most direct and obvious inspirations from this album are Chamillionaire's 'Ridin' that is a homage to this album and Jay-Z's '99 Problems' where he word-for-word lifts the opening four lines from Bun B's verse on 'Touched to start his third verse "Now, once upon a time not too long ago. A n*gga like myself had to strong-arm a ho. Now, this was not a ho in the sense of having a pussy. But a pussy having no goddamn sense, tryna push me".

 

This album runs for over an hour but honestly doesn't feel like it at all. Each tracks runs smoothly into the next but if I really had to criticise something it would be the recurring snippets from an incarcerated Smoke D. I don't think his interludes add much, especially the one that opens 'Touched' where he just rambles on about two men kissing each other. I'm also not 100% sure the outro had to be 9 and a half minutes long.

22. DMX - It's Dark And Hell Is Hot 1998 5/5

 

Highlights: Damien, Fuckin' Wit' D, I Can Feel It

 

 

DMX was a rapper and actor from New York who sadly passed away in 2021 at the age of 50. He had an interesting childhood suffering from bronchial asthma and being taken to the hospital most nights. He was also raised as a Jehovah's Witness but soon lost faith after he has hit by a car and his family rejected a $10,000 insurance payment due to their religious beliefs. Reading his Wikipedia is difficult with descriptions of horrible abuse from his mother and aunt that led from him running away from home at 14 and ending up homeless before being sent to a youth care home. Here he bonded with others over Hip-Hop and when he returned to New York, met a local rapper named Ready Ron who allowed DMX to beat-box for him. He built up hype and was eventually signed to 'Ruffhouse Records' after appearing in The Source Magazine's 'Unsigned Hype' column. After his debut single didn't catch on, he was dropped by his label but a series of acclaimed features on songs by Mase, The LOX and Mic Geronimo, earned him buzz and an eventual sign by Def Jam Records. He released his first two albums in 1998 with both of them being hugely successful and landing #1 spot on the Billboard charts, In fact, his first 5 studio albums all debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200 making him the first artist to achieve this feat. While continuing to find success, his career was hampered by drug addiction and a range of legal issues that saw him spend multiple stints in jail. DMX's legacy as a true original and respected creative has been secured through his ability to make the uncommercial, marketable. The Ringer summed up his legacy in their obituary for him as ""Throughout his nearly three-decade career, DMX came to embody passion, rawness, and pure emotional honesty like few hip-hop artists ever have, barking his way through hits like "Ruff Ryders' Anthem" and "Get at Me Dog" one moment, and repenting and philosophizing on tracks like "Slippin'" the next. His was a decidedly anti-commercial approach, but it worked, and it made him the genre's first new superstar in the wake of the killings of Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G. To this day, few have been able to reach the heights he did—he's the only rapper to have his first five studio albums debut at no. 1, and he was the first living hip-hop artist to have two projects go platinum in the same year".

 

It's Dark And Hell Is Hot was DMX's debut album and sounded the complete antithesis of what everyone else was releasing at the time. The last 8 albums in this countdown have all been released between 1994-2000 and the only one that sounds anything like this is Eminem's 2000 release. Tell me Em didn't hear the r**e line on 'X-Is Coming' and start making notes. Especially in the New York scene, mafiaso rap was at it's peak and Jay-Z, Nas, P Diddy etc all portray themselves as effortlessly cool but DMX is not afraid to get dirty. Jaz-Z raps about violence, but he doesn't do it with the same degree of glee and gratuitous detail as X. This is a horror-album, it even has a track that is a remake of Freddy Krueger's 'Freddy's Coming for You' theme from Nightmare on Elm Street (X-Is Coming). This album is raw, it's emotive and above-all-else, mesmerizingly enthralling. He's never afraid to go to places where other big names wouldn't. Despite the occasionally overblow imagery, this album feels real. You listen to P. Diddy and you don't relate but there's sincerity to X and you can see why the streets adored him. My favourite track was 'Damien'. A song where X portrays himself, his son and the devil and tells the story of how he sold his soul to Satan in exchange for his music career. It might not be literal, but you believe it more than Diddy talking about being a boss. It's not all dark though. There is room for moments of levity such as 'I Can Feel It' that lifts the hook directly from 'In The Air Tonight' or the Faith Evans collaboration 'How's It Goin' Down' that begins with him starting an affair but ends with him breaking it off as he doesn't want to break up her family. Nice guy X! A born again Christian, there's even a track towards the end that is just a spoken-word prayer to the most high.

 

But what makes this album, and DMX himself, so special is in his delivery. He's the only other artist that reminds me at all to Ol' Dirty bast*rd. They both share this unorthodox, magnetic, melodic flow that somehow sounds off but beautiful at the same time. If you only know X from 'X Gon Give It To Ya', you might be surprised hearing this to discover that it's not all shouting and aggressiveness. He finds pockets here that I've heard no other rapper find. Irv Gotti produced a couple of tracks and it was he who convinced Def Jam to sign X even when they told him that if X flops then he's fired. Gotti is a legendary producer and he could hear just how good X sounds over a beat, even if his style wasn't in fashion. The success of this is what moved rap back towards gangsta/street life instead of mafiaso and allowed Cam'Ron and 50 Cent to launch their careers. It also might not be too obvious, but Kendrick Lamar has cited this album as a major influence on himself and it just goes to show how big this album actually was.

21. Lil Wayne - Da Drought 3 2007 5/5

 

Highlights: Ride 4 My N*ggaz, Black Republicans, President

 

 

Lil Wayne makes his third appearance but this time it's not one of his studio albums as part of 'Tha Carter' collection (after 'II', #90 and 'III', #40) but instead we get one of his legendary mixtapes 'Da Drought 3'. Wayne is an artist who is almost as well known for his mixtapes as he is his studio albums and this is one of his most decorated. A lot of his mixtapes are him rapping over the beats of (mostly) recent big hits and that's what you get over this double-album tape. Wayne says on the intro to disc 1, "I can jump on any n***a song and make a Part Two" and with how good some of these ones are, I'm more inclined to say he's made the part 1.

 

You might notice that I've given this the full 5/5 because while I only recently awarded 'Illmatic' a 4.5. But that doesn't mean that I think this is a superior work of art, it's just operating on completely different set of rules. There's different criteria for what makes a mixtape released for free and a fully realised debut studio album great. There are things you could point out as weak points on this album, it's overblown and you do wonder if it needed to be 29 tracks , the topics can come a little bit repetitive and some tracks feel like filler but when there's this much effort put into something that was released for free, then you really can't complain that much. You won't be able to find this on Spotify due to every track using the beat of a hit record but it's well worth talking the time to seek it out. The way Wayne adapts to each instrumental is impressive. 'Crazy' is crazy! I'm not even sure it's a good song but his dedication to aping every last bit mannerism of the flow from the Gnarls Barkley original is admirable. and you have to at least applaud the experimentation. This album is just simply Wayne having fun. He delayed it's release because he wanted to add more songs and make it a double disc and I'm glad he did. It's not often you hear a project where it's so clear that the artist is enjoying what they are doing this much. The two other most notable moments is 'Upgrade' which is a re-do of Beyoncé's 'Upgrade U' and builds of the track brilliantly and 'Can't Stop, Won't Stop' which served as an introduction to a young rapper he had just signed called Nicki Minaj.

 

It was a tie between 'I Can't Feel My Face' and 'President' for my third highlight and I picked the former just so there would be some representation from disc 2. 'Presidents' is a reworking of Jay-Z's 'Dead Presidents' which recently appeared on 'Reasonable Doubt' (#26) and while Jay is great, I honestly prefer the energy that Wayne brings to the track. 'I Can't Feel My Face' predates the Weeknd hit by some time and uses the beat from the less known 'Everlasting Bass' by Rodney O & Joe Cooley and is a great example of why Wayne's flows are so legendary. My absolute favourite is 'Ride 4 My N*ggas' where flows over Mike Jones' 'Mr. Jones' and creates an incredibly hype hook. He decimates the original, I don't know why anyone would ever go back to listen to it again.

 

20. Future - DS2 2015 2.5/5

 

Highlights: Lil One, Stick Talk, Groupies

 

 

Future is a rapper from Atlanta, Georgia who is known for being a pioneer in the modern trap music sounds, interpolating auto-tune and a 'mumble', melodic rap style to the genre. Future has won two GRAMMYs in his career, one for Best Rap Performance on the track 'King's Dead' from the Black Panther soundtrack and the other this year for Best Melodic Rap Performance on the track 'Wait For U'. One of the biggest names in Hip-Hop today, Future has released 9 studio albums so far in his career, with the most recent 7 all becoming Billboard #1s, a run that started with today's album, his third release, 'DS2'. Titled that way as it is the follow-up to an earlier mixtape called 'Dirty Sprite'. Known for his frequent collaborations with Drake, this partnership landed him his only two #1 singles ('Way 2 Sexy' and 'Wait For U') and another #1 album with the 'What A Time To Be Alive' mixtape. In fact Drake is the only feature across this whole album, appearing on 'Where Ya At'.

 

In general, 'Trap' is far from my favourite sub-genre of Hip-Hop. '21 Savage' is the only artist who makes predominately Trap that I would say I consistently enjoy, otherwise it's usually just the odd single here and there. And this album has done nothing to win me over. I think calling this album better than any of the last albums in the 21-30 section is crazy. Future certainly isn't a lyrical MC so the appeal of his music is always going to be in the sound and mood of the track and there was a spell where the album was popping. My three highlights all came in a row but there was too often where it wasn't landing for me. All it takes is a disappointing beat or a weaker hook and the whole track comes unstuck.

 

I have not taken them in consideration for the review, but I decided to listen to the tracks added for the deluxe version of the album as they are specifically mentioned in the Rolling Stones write-up and I wanted to see if the does actually get any better. I can say that I almost uniformly thought that every one of the bonus tracks are much stronger than the ones included on the standard version of the album. 'Trap N*ggaz', 'Real Sisters' and 'Fuck Up Some Commas' all do a similar job to the standard tracks but just do it much better. 'The Percoet & Stripper Joint' is the most interesting song of them all. It has a completely different vibe to everything else. It's so chill has a perfect beat that you can imagine anyone sounding good over. 'Kno the Meaning' is another slower effort were you actually feel what Future is spitting. If the bonus tracks were instead just released as a separate EP it would be a solid 4-4.5. Maybe it sounds so much better because I just listened to it and didn't try to keep up with the lyrics too.

19. Lil' Kim - Hard Core 1996 4/5

 

Highlights: Crush On You, Spend A Little Doe, We Don't Need It

 

 

Lil' Kim is a rapper from New York who's career started after she was discovered by The Notorious B.I.G. and invited to join his group, Junior M.A.F.I.A. The success of the group's debut album 'Conspiracy' and the singles 'Get Money' and 'Player's Anthem', helped Kim launch her solo career with her double-platinum selling debut solo album 'Hard Core' in 1996. Kim has released 5 studio albums in her career with the fourth 'The Naked Truth' being the only album by a female artist to get the coveted '5 Mic' review in the Source Magazine and was released the same week Kim started a career-marring year-long prison sentence after being found guilty of perjury. Her single 'Lady Marmalade' with Christina Aguilera, Mya & P!nk reached #1 on both sides of the Atlantic and won her a Grammy for 'Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals' in 2002.

 

As a Bad Boys Records associated artist, this album features all the names you'd expect, there's Diddy, her Junior M.A.F.I.A. band-mate Lil' Cease and B.I.G. appears on four tracks, With Biggie working on it, you know that there is going to be at least a certain level of quality to this album and he does deliver when he's called on. There is a chance that she put too much emphasis on the Biggie connections at times. 'Dreams' is a good track but it is just a gender-flipped reworking on Biggie's track where he announced his attentions to sleep with all the leading women in R&B at the time. It's fun but on a debut album, you want her to spend more time introducing her own style. She did have the idea 20 years before Nicki Minaj's 'Barbie Dreams' though to be fair.

 

What this album is renown for is it's influence on female MCs to come with her focus on sex-positivity and explicit, raunchy lyrics. Without Lil Kim, there would be no 'My Neck, My Back', 'WAP' or 'Anacaona'. Before this album, the popular female MCs (MC Lyte, Queen Latifah, Roxanne Shanté etc) had all rapped about the same topics as their male counterparts but Kim was keen to embrace her sexuality and be very open and vocal about what she wants. NME say in their retrospective that "she out-filthed the male rappers at every turn" and you can hear that in this album, especially on tracks like 'We Don't Need It' and 'Not Tonight' where she makes it very clear that she expects her man to reciprocate any actions she does for him I don't want dick tonight. Eat my pussy right". I can see how this was huge at the time but now where in an age of Cardi Bs and Doja Cats, the lyrics on here don't feel all that shocking anymore and even a bit tame when compared to 'WAP' for example.

 

While I think a few of the beats are a bit too minimalistic and my favourite track was actually 'Crush On You' where Lil' Cease actually provides all three of the verses, I don't want to it to seem that I think Kim was wack. She is a really solid MC and her delivery throughout is on point. She sells everything she raps about perfectly and the album is well worth the listen. I'm just not sure it's top 20 of all-time good and I'm expecting big things from albums ranked this high.

18. Madvillain - Madvillainy 2004 5/5

 

Highlights: Figaro, Accordion, Strange Ways

 

 

Madvillain was Hip-Hop duo consisting of producer Madlib and emcee MF Doom. We've previously seen Doom both a member of KMD (Mr. Hood, #198) and as a solo artist (Operation: Doomsday, #62) while Madlib has appeared with his collaboration album with Freddie Gibbs (Bandana, #197). Despite constant rumours of a follow-up and Madlib confirming that he had finished all the beats, the duo only released one studio album before Doom's death in 2020.

 

This album is one of the biggest cult releases of all-time. Madlib produced all the beats using some pretty basic equipment, just a Boss SP-303 sampler, a turntable and a tape deck and sent them to Doom with little instruction and allowed him to work his magic. Doom said of the recording process "I’m staying in L.A. and trying to get back to my children… working as fast I can without sacrificing the quality. [He] would give me another CD, and I’m writing. We might stop, and he’ll burn one and listen to the beat, and that’s it. We hardly spoke. It was more through telepathy. We spoke through the music". It's almost mythic status was also boosted by it becoming one of the first albums to experience an internet leak before it's official release. In late 2002, an unfinished demo was stolen and distributed on the internet which almost meant that we almost never got the full album. The two lost the desire to finish an album that people had already heard and the album was shelved while they both moved onto different projects. But after Madlib released an album with J Dilla and Doom released two studio albums, they rediscovered the motivation and finished what would become their magnum opus.

 

In the TikTok age, we might be all be very used to short, zany tracks but compared to what else was being released at the time, this album sounded fresh and exciting. The production is almost exclusively based around obscure samples from music from all across the globe and the occasional old-time movie and Doom's free-associative lyrics can best be described as unfocused and obtuse but never not exciting. It toes the line between insane and genius but there's nobody else that could have made this. Known for his non-sequiturs and humorous one-liners of which there are many here, what really impresses me on the album is that he still found time to record something as deep and clear as 'Strange Ways'. The track spends it's two verses pointing out the hypocrisy of the police force and the irony of the fact that those who perpetuate wars never have to face the horrors. It's a hard-hitting track made only more impactful by it coming only a few minutes after you listen to a track where Doom describes his experience of meeting a girl who had bad breathe ('Operation Lifesaver AKA Mint Test'). The whole premise of the album is portraying Doom and Madlib as the worlds most dangerous villains but he takes the time out of this fun, whirlwind of a project to let us know who the real villains are.

 

MF Doom is such an electrifying presence. On a technical level, he is comfortably one of the best rappers of all-time, his verses are full of every literary and poetic devices you can think of with his multi-syllabic flow never sounding better than on 'Figaro' which is an all-timer of a verse. And the lack of Doom's prescience is felt when he's not there. The three instrumental tracks ('Sickfit', 'Do Not Fire!' and 'Supervillain Theme'), the tracks where Madlib picks up the mic himself (Shadows of Tomorrow) and the track where featured artist Wildchild takes the rain (Hardcore Hustle) are all solid tracks and work well in isolation but you just wish Doom could have been involved.

 

This album is absolutely essential just for creativity and uniqueness alone and while I wouldn't have it as a top favourite of my own, it's fully deserving of it's place in any best album discussion.

Madvillainy :wub: one of the greatest records of all time

Madvillainy :wub: one of the greatest records of all time

 

Yeah, can't argue with it's inclusion at all. Definitely the most appropriate album in the top 20 so far.

17. Kanye West - Yeezus 2013 5/5

 

Highlights: Blood On The Leaves, Black Skinhead, Bound 2

 

 

Kanye West makes his fourth appearance with his sixth studio album, Yeezus. Certainly his most experimental album, the album draws inspiration from a range of genres that you wouldn't usually associate with rap including acid-house, punk and most prominently, industrial music. Matching the tone of the lack of album artwork, Kanye embraced minimalism in all aspects of this album. He purposely did little promotion for the album ("Number one question they asking, Fuck every question you asking"), preferring the music to speak for itself. In fact, two weeks before this album was set to release, Kanye enlisted Rick Rubin to go through the album and find any places they could further strip back the sound and make it even more minimalistic. One of Rubin's most discussed changes was to the track 'Bound 2'. According to Rubin, the original version of the track was quite a traditional R&B track until it was completely reworked 2 days before the deadline with the sample added. The track does sound in a completely different style to the rest of the album and I think this helps explain why. I remember hating it in 2013 with the awful video of Kim and Kanye on a motorbike, but the song has grown and grown on me more every year. We just weren't ready for it 10 years ago. Rick Rubin has been quoted as saying that there are plenty of versions of each song that they could release an alternate version of the album that would still bang: "There are versions just as good as what’s on the album, just different. I know as a fan of the album, I’d like to hear that. Maybe some day, whenever he wants. But it exists! That shit exists".

 

I'm still not sure if 'Blood On The Leaves' is sacrilegious but it sounds amazing. It feels wrong to incorporate a sample of one of the most gut-wrenching, powerful songs of all-time ('Strange Fruit') on such an unpolitical track with lyrics such as 'Let's take it back to the first party when you tried your first molly and came out of your body" but there's not many other tracks that sound this good. The whole track is such an epic experience; when the horns come in, it's impossible not to just lose yourself in the excitement. Legendary film director David Lynch was suitably impressed and had agreed to direct a music video that never materialised but he did say of the track: "I think it's one of the most modern pieces and so minimal, so powerful but at the same time so beautiful. It's a great, great song". It's probably the best produced piece of music you'll hear during this whole countdown, Kanye at his absolute exhilarating best. And then we have 'Black Skinhead'. Another track that sounded like nothing else at the time and is perfect motivation song. It's so raw and '300' mistake in the lyrics aside, produces some of Kanye's most-memorable non-jokey lyrics.

16. Cardi B - Invasion Of Privacy 2013 4/5

 

Highlights: Be Careful, Get Up 10, Bodak Yelow

 

 

Cardi B is a rapper from New York who first found fame as a cast-member on the realty show 'Love & Hip Hop: New York" before her Kodak Black inspired track 'Bodak Yellow' blown up, slowly climbing to #1 on the Billboard charts making her only the second female Hip-Hop artist to reach the top with a solo release and kickstarting her music career. As J. Cole famously notes in his track '1985 (Intro To The Fall Off)' ("Just remember what I told you when your shit flop. In five years you gon' be on Love & Hip-Hop"), most rapper's careers go in the opposite direction which makes Cardi's continued success all the more impressive. Her first notable musical release was a feature on a remix to a song by Shaggy and, interestingly, her first music video was for her remake of British rapper Lady Leshurr's 'Queen's Speech 4', titled 'Cheap Ass Weave'. Despite only releasing the one studio album so far, Cardi has an insane number of accolades and achievements including 5 Billboard #1 singles, a GRAMMY, 6 Guinness World Records and an inclusion on TIME Magazine's annual list of the most influential people in the world in 2018. She's also the creative director of Playboy, who knew?

 

Invasion Of Privacy was one of the most critically-acclaimed albums of the 2010s, winning the GRAMMY for 'Best Rap Album', receiving a glowing '8.7' review in Pitchfork and featuring on over 75 publications 'Best albums of 2018' lists. It was a huge hit with the public, it was the first album to have every single track achieve platinum status in the US, it's the most streamed album by a female MC on Spotify and Apple Music and is the longest charting album by a female rapper in Billboard history. But for whatever reason, it just feels so wrong for this album to placed this high in such a list. I know when this list was first published, this inclusion is definitely the one that was causing the most headlines with all the big Hip-Hop heads reacting to the list seeming to find particular issue with it appearing here. I think most people agreed that it was far from the worst album on the list and it was more the high position. Before today, I'd only heard the singles which had ranged from good (Be Careful) to meh (I Like It) for me so I was going into this thinking that I would be of a similar opinion.

 

And I largely am. I was pleasantly pleased with how consistently solid this album is. 'I Like It' is comfortably the weakest track and while there's a few others that were just alright ('Money Bag' and 'Bickenhead' and 'She Bad' in particular), there's no stinkers here and with an unbloated 48 minute run-time, it was perfectly timed to end before you can really get fatigued. Aside from the singles, the track that really impressed me was the album opener 'Get Up 10' where I really saw a different side to Cardi, where she tells her rags-to-riches story with a still humorous, but reflective tone. It's a proper 'rap-rap' song that makes you sit up and take notice and establishes her right from the start as someone to respect.

15. Eric B. & Rakim - Paid In Full 1987 4.5/5

 

Highlights: Paid In Full, I Know You Got Soul, As The Rhyme Goes On

 

 

Eric B. & Rakim have already appeared with 'Follow The Leader' (#79) which was the first 80s album in this countdown that I awarded the full 5/5 but for their second appearance, we go a year back to their 1987 debut 'Paid In Full'. If you compare this album to any others popular Hip-Hop track from the same time then it's easy to hear why Rakim is held in such high regard. On a purely technical level, his ability is a step-above the rest; his flows are more intricate, his rhymes are sharper and the content is more poetic. You wouldn't be mistaken into believing that this was a new release, but his style is much closer to modern MCs such as Nas and Eminem, than it was to his peers of the time. I just read an extract from an online essay (written by someone called Balogun) that attempts to argue that Rakim is the GOAT and I found it pretty fascinating so I'll quote a large portion of it here:

A little-mentioned fact about him is that he was a saxophonist, and he was a pretty good one, too. With time, as he started rhyming, he began to model the sound of his instrument as he heard it in jazz songs. Rather than confine his flow in a meter, he decided to go beyond it, couplets pouring over from one bar to the next (e.g. “I Ain’t No Joke”: “When I'm gone, no one gets on, cause I won't let/Nobody press up, and mess up, the scene I set”). And instead of having just one syllable rhyme within couplet endings, he increased it to two or three, thus inventing the art of multi-syllabic rhyming (e.g. “I Ain’t No Joke”: “I like to stand in the crowd, and watch the people won-der-‘Damn!’/But think about it, then you'll un-der-stand”). Thus not only was he the inventor of the flow, as we call and know it today in hip-hop; he was also the founder of multi-syllabic rhyming.

 

But no, he didn’t stop there.

 

He now began to rhyme within couplets, too (e.g. “Microphone Fiend”: “The prescription is a hy-per-tone that's thorough when/I fiend for a mi-cro-phone like heroin!”), thus becoming the inventor of internal rhyming. And he began to speed up his rhyming in a machine gun-like style, setting the precedent for the Rap Golden Age when rappers from that era spat relatively faster than any period before and after (save for a few exceptions, of course, like Bone Thugs ‘n’ Harmony). And whereas his predecessors or his peers rarely, if ever, did so, he began to mess with figures of speech extensively, sharing credit with Kane as a pioneer of the trend. His use of metaphors, similes, puns, alliteration and personification is now legendary – in fact, he still remains the best-rounded rapper ever in this regard.

 

It may be blasphemous but, personally, I thought their-follow up was a tad stronger than this album. I didn't find the instrumentals as interesting ('Eric B. Is on the Cut', 'Chinese Arithmetic'), especially the album closer 'Extended Beat' which is exactly what it says on the tin, an extended version of the beat from an earlier track ('Move The Crowd') and I didn't feel I needed to hear it again. But what can't be denied on this album is Rakim. Remarkably, the claimed to have written all his verses within an hour after hearing the beats and then they recorded it all in a week, using single takes and 48-hour shifts to get it finished within budget. Rakim later said "When I hear my first album today I hear myself reading my rhymes but I'm my worst critic". He certainly is the only-person who thinks that because fans and critics all agree that he killed it. Listening to this album, you're bound to hear countless lines that have lifted into massive hits for years to come. Most notably in M|A|R|R|S' #1 single from the same year 'Pump Up The Volume' and on Eminem's 'The Way I Am'.

14. Ghostface Killah - Supreme Clientele 2000 4.5/5

 

Highlights: Nutmeg, One. Wu Banga 101

 

 

I had forgotten about this album when I said that 'Built 4 Cuban Linx' was the highest Wu solo album as it's of course Ghostface Killah's 'Supreme Clientele'. This is the third Ghostface album on the list after 'Fishscale' (#131) and Ironman (#69). This was his second album of out 13 and was seen as re-establishing Wu-Tang at the forefront of rap after critics has started to point to oversaturation and dwindling quality of their releases leading to their loss of relevance. This album was recorded at an important time in Killah's life, he was facing serious health issues from his diabetes and took trips to Africa to try alternate medical techniques and it was here where we wrote some of the most abstract, wildest verses on this album. The recording was then interrupted by his sentencing of 6 months in Riker's Island Prison. These experiences led to this album having a completely different style to his 1996 debut 'Ironman'. He's said previously that his debut album was marred by him struggling to leave the street life behind, while by this album, he'd gained much more confidence as an emcee that leads to this album being much more experimental and free in its nature. This album is dense and rewards multiple listens and encourages discussion. It was calculated that this album has a 50.4% unique word percentage across the whole album, which was the highest of any of the albums in the study.

 

This is a Wu-related album so you know you're going to get verses from a bunch of the other members and incredibly consistent and tone-setting production from RZA. But RZA actually shines more on the mic than on production here. He provides three-guest verses for the album and steals two of the tracks for himself. His top-notch verse on 'The Grain' was almost enough to sneak it into my top 3 highlights. But it was the appropriately titled 'Wu Banga 101' that ends up nicking the 3rd spot. It's everything the Wu do best, a brilliant posse-cut with each member (GZA, Cappadonna, Masta Killa and Raekwon) adding their own unique style and bouncing off each other with unrivalled chemistry.

 

This album has some of the best rapping I've ever heard but there's a few reasons why I personally don't think it's as good as 'Ironman'. The opening two tracks on this album ('Nutmeg' and 'One') absolutely blow away ever other track on the album. They set such an impossibly high bar that you can't help but feel a little disappointed for the next hour. 'Nutmeg' was one of the tracks written while he was in Africa and is really trippy with its free associative lyrics being entirely cryptic and difficult to decipher but sound impossibly cool ("Scooby snack Jurassic plastic gas booby trap"). It's not that everything that follows is bad, it would still be a top-tier album without the first two tracks, it just never gets that exciting and mind-blowing again. The main other reason why this album isn't my favourite is the skits. Most artists know to keep their skits about 90 seconds tops but the skits on this album are the same length as the songs. I just have no intertest in a three minute conversation with a drug addict looking to score crack or a 2-and-a-half minute track of 'Who would you fuck' and I especially don't need a 3 minute track telling us you're going to beat up 50 Cent, concluding with an unnecessary homophobic slur.

13. Dr. Dre - 2001 1999 5/5

 

Highlights: Forgot About Dre, Still D.R.E., The Next Episode

 

 

After 'The Chronic' was at #40 on the list, I was unsure whether this was going to be included but I'm really glad it has been. Both albums are hugely important in Hip-Hop with Dre practically defining the sound of an era with both releases, but 'The Chronic' is usually almost universally regarded as the best album, receiving all of the critical acclaim. But mainly due to the god-tier singles, I think '2001' is the better album. This album certainly had a turbulent journey to release. There was 7 years between Dre's opening two albums and in this time, Eazy-E and Tupac had both died, two Dre-related projects had flopped (The Firm and the compilation album 'Aftermath') and he had left Death Row Records on bad terms. If you're thinking that '2001' is an odd title for an album released in 1999 then you're right. When he was still on Death Row, the album was originally intended to be named 'A New World Odor (Poppa's Got A Brand New Funk)'. When he left the label, the title was changed to 'Chronic 2000' until Suge Knight (Death Row creator) heard about it and decided to rush-release a compilation album with the same name and after Dre then changed it to 'Chronic 2001', threatened to sue if Dre used the trademarked term 'Chronic'. All of this had made Dre hungry. He felt he had a point to prove, all of the negative press and criticisms had got to him and you can hear the determination to shut them up throughout this album "For the last couple of years, there's been a lot of talk out on the streets about whether or not I can still hold my own, whether or not I'm still good at producing. That was the ultimate motivation for me. Magazines, word of mouth and rap tabloids were saying I didn't have it any more. What more do I need to do? How many platinum records have I made? O.K., here's the album – now what do you have to say". For his verses, he recruits what must certainly be the greatest team of ghost-writers imaginable, Eminem, Jay-Z, The D.O.C. and Royce da 5'9" all written for Dre in this and that's why Dre's rapping is at the strongest it's ever been. But Dre's greatest strength is his production and there's not many albums that just sound as good as this. I've mentioned before that Kanye is my favourite producer and he has admitted that his whole style came from imitating this: "'Xxplosive', off 2001, that's [where] I got my entire sound from—if you listen to the track, it's got a soul beat, but it's done with those heavy Dre drums. Listen to 'This Can't Be Life,' a track I did for Jay-Z's Dynasty album, and then listen to 'Xxplosive'. It's a direct bite".

 

I could write a whole paragraph here explaining why this album is great but all I need to say is: 'Still D.R.E.', 'Forgot About Dre', 'The Next Episode'. Is there another album that has a run of singles that perfect? Probably not.

 

This album also has the exact same problem that I noted with 'The Chronic'. The first half of this album is outstanding. Everything's hitting, you get the three classic singles, absolute bangers like 'What's The Difference' and 'Xxplosive' and you start to think this might be the greatest album of all time but then on the second half of the album, there's a bunch of (unfunny) skits and Dre hardly has verses on any tracks. Like 'The Chronic' was the introduction to Snoop Dogg and he appeared on most of the tracks, Dre seemed keen to repeat the same trick with the rest of the album basically sounding like a solo-release for 'Hittman'. He appears on 10 tracks on the album and while he's good, he just lacks the same charisma that made Snoop a star. It doesn't stop this album from being brilliant with Dre's production remaining immaculate but you can see why Hittman soon faded into obscurity.

12. Clipse - Lord Willin' 2002 5/5

 

Highlights: Cot Damn, Ma, I Don't Love Her, Gangsta Lean

 

 

'Lord Willin' is the second appearance from the brother duo of Pusha T and No Malice after 'Hell Hath No Fury' (#97). Pusha also had a solo entry with 'Daytona' (#108). I mentioned in their previous write-up that this was their debut album. They had recorded and intended to release an album (Exclusive Audio Footage) in 1999 but were dropped and we it was never officially released until 2020. However, in 2001, The Neptunes founded their own record label and Pharrell decided to recruit his childhood friends as their first signing. As you would expect based on that, the Neptunes have their hands all over this album, producing it in full with Pharrell also providing vocals on 6 of the 13 tracks too.

 

And herein lies the albums biggest strength but also it's biggest weakness. Pusha & Malice are both great rappers but their styles are both pretty calculated and conventional. They know that its their lyrical content is what makes them stand-out so they keep the flows fairy simplistic and this is in such contrast to The Neptunes production. Their electronic, brash, eclectic beats can often feel the antithesis to what you expect when you listen to this type of rap and is exactly what makes this album stand out so massively in a crowded field. And while it sometimes doesn't work (see Pharrell unconvincingly trying to sound gangsta on 'Young Boy'), most of the time it leads to some incredibly special, outstanding songs. 'Cot Damn' and 'Gangsta Lean' are absolute bangers, 'Ma, I Don't Love Her' is a welcome change of pace with Faith Evans on the hook with Clipse almost humorously trying to convince her that they are not cheats and 'Virginia' would have been an easy highlight on most other albums, managing to come off as genuinely menacing on their ode to their home state.

 

 

'Comedy Central' is actually one of my least favourite tracks on this album but Pusha's verse is extraordinary. Everything about it is perfect, just from the delivery of the opening line "I keep the streets so numb they call me "Novocain". I turn over 'caine over and over again" you know you're in for something special. The theme of the track is that Clipse are laughing at other rappers who pretend that they're dealers while Clipse know that they live the life and you certainly believe everything Pusha has got to say. This is drug rap at its most premium and there's no one who could execute it better. I do also seem to be completely out of loop with general opinion on this album's lead single 'Grindin'. Everyone seems to think it's one of the greatest rap songs of all-time (see BBC's list) but I think it was potentially my least favourite on the album. And look, this is a 5/5, near-perfect album so it's still a great track, it's just not the one I'd pick as the one deserving of all the praise. The only additions to the deluxe version is to add two remixes of this very track, one with 'Birdman, Lil Wayne & N.O.R.E. and one with 'Sean Paul, Bless & Kardinal Offishall!).

11. Drake - Take Care 2011 4.5/5

 

Highlights: Take Care, Over My Dead Body, Lord Knows

 

 

Drake gets his second appearance (after 'If You're Reading This It's Too Late', #125) with his second studio album 'Take Care'. He might have done it to death now, but it's easy to forget just how fresh and exciting Drake's sound was around this time. He might not be the first rapper to croon and add a melodic spin on his delivery but he might be the most notable. He's often clowned on, but Drake can really rap when he needs to, he was the undisputed king of the diss-track ('Charged Up', 'Back To Back') until Pusha took aim and when he goes full Hip-Hop on here it leads to great results ('Lord Knows', 'Under Ground Kings'.) but what made Drake a star was the new-wave of rap of which he authored the blueprint. It's much more melodic and R&B-influenced and the verses can often sound like an extra chorus. The production is quite sparse and subtle, creating an atmospheric sound that allows Drake's voice to rise to the forefront. And then there's the lyrics. I don't think anyone would accuse Drake of being afraid to show off his success, he devoted plenty of time to the braggadocios bars that you'd expect from any emcee, but he also isn't afraid to be vulnerable and open up about his emotions more than most other rappers in the game. This is most perfectly evidenced in "Look What You've Done". The track is an ode to his mother and uncle who he credits with making him the man he is today and going above and beyond in looking after him throughout his childhood. It's a genuinely sweet track and the outro from his Grandmother is sure to warm anybody's heart. He also touches on topics that many rappers would be to embarrassed to discuss. It's hard to imagine many other rappers making a track about falling in love with a stripper that he knows has slept with other big name rappers without making some sort of joke or derogative comment towards her and her work but that's what he does here on 'The Real Her'. Even guest feature Andree 3000 can't resist ending his verse with an STD joke "Please be careful, bitches got the rabies". And then you have 'Martin's Room'. The tale of a drunk and emotionally scarred Drake, calling up an ex late at night and tries to winner her back. There's a similar track on Madvillian's album ('Fancy Clown') but instead of sounding in control and going off on the girl like Doom, Drake embarrassingly attempts to win her back. He purposefully comes off as desperate and cringy and it feels really honest and revealing from him.

 

'Take Care' is a bloated album. It runs for 1 hour and twenty minutes and while it does manage to stay engaging pretty much throughout, I can't help but feel there's an all-killer 45 minute album in here somewhere. I'm not sure what I'd cut out because there's nothing that's obviously filler, but it is one where I start to feel the length when I'm listening to it. I would still listen to 4 hours of this over ever hearing 'Certified Lover Boy' again. Seriously, what is Drake playing at nowadays?

10. Lauryn Hill - The Miseducation Of Lauryn Hill 1998 5/5

 

Highlights: Doo Wop (That Thing), Superstar, Everything Is Everything

 

 

We're kicking off the top 10 with Lauryn Hill's iconic debut solo studio album after already hearing her as a member of Fugees ('The Score', #70). For a whole assortment of reasons (including a short prison stint), this remains her only studio album but what an album for that to be. The album received 10 nominations at the 1999 Grammys with Hill picking up 5 of the awards, including the coveted 'Album of the Year', it has been inducted into the National Recording Registry, it was the first album to receive a perfect 'XXL' rating in XXL Magazine and has been named by pretty much every popular musician in the industry today as an influence, from Ariana Grande to Pusha T, from Maroon 5 to Lizzo. This debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200 with record sales for a female artist and the lead-single 'Doo Wop (That Thing)' was the first ever to debut at the top of the Billboard Hot 100. This also ranked at '10 on the 2020 edition of Rolling Stones' '500 greatest albums of all-time' and was the highest placed Hip-Hop album. I believe the fact that its comparatively lower on this list is because it's such a genre-bending album. Wikipedia lists 'neo-soul' and 'R&B' before mentioning 'hip-hop' under its genre tab and I think that's fair. The album was certainly recorded in the spirt of Hip-Hop and on the (all-too rare) occasions where Hill lets rip with some traditional rapped verses, it's thrilling. But Lauryn Hill is such an accomplished, all-round musician with a heavenly voice which means that no matter which genre she attempts, it sounds great.

 

And there is plenty on this album that doesn't sound very Hip-Hop. The D'Angelo collaboration 'Nothing Even Matters' is just straight-up R&B and a straight-cover of Frankie Valli's 'Can't Take My Eyes Off You' might not scream Hip-Hop but it is beautiful and comfortably my favourite version of the song. The non-rap track that I found to be really powerful is 'To Zion'. This album was recorded at a time where the Fugees had just disbanded and the first few tracks are seen as being disses directed at Wyclef Jean. But another important factor during the recording process was that Hill was pregnant with her first child for much of it and this track is dedication to him, over Carlos Santana's guitarwork. It's a really touching track and the lines where she suggests that everyone was telling her to get an abortion for the sake of her career are particularly effecting. But in this countdown, were here for the rapping and we get the best of both worlds on 'Doo-Wop' and 'Everything Is Everything' where Hill gets to show just how extraordinary she is on the mic as well as demonstrate her ability to integrate her incredible vocals.

 

I'm pretty conflicted on the interludes. On one hand, I think they're pretty vital for the whole concept and message of this album and they make the whole album feel cohesive but, on the other hand, they're not that interesting to listen to and with an album that runs for just under 80 minutes, I'm always looking for areas where it can be condensed. If you haven't heard the album, the interludes appear at the end of every few tracks and portray a teacher (played by poet 'Ras Baraka') discussing the concept of love with his class of children. The interlude that perfectly sums up the concept of the album is the 'Intro'. On here, the teacher does the register and we find out that 'Lauryn Hill' is not present