Top row: Big Pun; Bahamadia. Bottom row: The Game, Prince Paul.
Since I had to conceal the “Parental Advisory” sticker to convince my mama to purchase my very first compact disc—Bone Thugs-n-Harmony’s E. 1999 Eternal—from Blockbuster Music back in 1995, I’ve accumulated somewhere just south of 1,000 CDs.
After 21 years of collecting so much music, I’ve forgotten about certain albums that were significant to me in a space and time, especially when most other people don’t bring them up. The best part of this, of course, is digging through the crates from time to time and pulling out a disc I haven’t bumped since I was trying to kill my Jergens habit and actually lose my virginity.
As much as I love nerding out on hip-hop, it’s pretty boring at this point to discuss the musical and cultural impact of Illmatic. I no longer gain anything from the Reasonable Doubt-vs.-The Blueprint debate. I don’t even care much about the best-solo-Wu-Tang Clan-album discussion anymore. (The answer is GZA’s Liquid Swords.)
But I get truly excited when my man Ed—one of maybe three people I know with a mutual deep knowledge of hip-hop—brings up an obscure, truly dope album like The Essence of J. Rawls or some other s–t that no one with a “2” in front of their age would know or care about. Those rare discussions about underrated, underdiscussed, underappreciated albums motivated this list.
These are hip-hop albums that you forgot, or never knew, are really good. Not all are perfect, but each brought something to the fabric of the genre and is often forgotten, even by my fellow nerds. Camouflage pants, backpacks and unkempt Afros are essential apparel for reading this list.
1. All We Got Iz Us (1995), by Onyx
Onyx will always be best-known for their 1993 Timb-stomping anthem “Slam” from Bacdafucup. But their ink-black sophomore album is vintage mid-’90s, shank-a-nigga New York hip-hop. The whole album is fire, but the classic “Last Dayz” alone—used to great effect in 8 Mile—merits it a spot on this list.
2. The Great White Hype soundtrack (1996)
Just because I’ll stop and watch this movie whenever it comes on TBS doesn’t make it a good movie. The soundtrack, however, is a hip-hop masterpiece, thanks largely to two elements that mattered in the mid-’90s: Wu-Tang and Bone Thugs-n-Harmony. “Shoot ’Em Up”? Classic. “Bring the Pain”? Classic. Even Camp Lo and Insane Clown Posse each have one of the best songs each group ever made on here. Shoutout to the Ghostface Killer joint, too.
3. Organix (1993), by the Roots
The Roots are one of the best bands of all time in any genre, and 1999’s Things Fall Apart is one of the best albums of all time in any genre. But Organix deserves attention as the smoky-coffeehouse debut of the Square Roots, a young, scatting Philly band that included a prehedonistic Scott Storch. It’s also proof that Black Thought has been elite for decades.
4. Connected (2004), by the Foreign Exchange
I include this because I’ve been arguing for years that Connected is better than Little Brother’s debut, The Listening. Bonds have been tested, mamas have been talked about and niggas have almost been slapped stupid over this debate. I maintain my position: Nicolay is one of the—if not the—baddest white boys to ever bless the boards, and Connected is his magnum opus.
5. Industry Shakedown (2000), by Bumpy Knuckles
I’ve always appreciated Freddie Foxx because he’s the best emcee on every Gang Starr track he ever blessed, and because I’m pretty sure he could genuinely f–k someone up with his two paws. His second album has damn near the same producer lineup I would’ve wanted if I cut a major-label rap album at the turn of the century (Primo, Pete Rock, Alchemist, Diamond D). A breath of fresh air during the commercial ascendancy of Cash Money Records.
6. Soul Survivor (1998), by Pete Rock
Pete Rock is a top five GOAT producer, and his jazz-driven aesthetic was at its peak for this “solo” album—basically a compilation, since Pete knows he can’t carry an album rapping on his own. Fortunately, he had the majority of the Wu-Tang Clan on here, along with Black Thought, MC Eiht, Big Pun and other heavy hitters who bodied his production. Unlike several albums on this list, Soul Survivor has aged remarkably well.
7. You Can’t Stop the Reign (1996), by Shaquille O’Neal
Most millennials were fortunate to miss the trend of athletes s–tting on wax and calling it rap. While no one would put Shaq in their top anything, dude had a few ’90s bangers thanks to a great rap network. (RZA must’ve gotten paid.) His third album is full of better hip-hop than most albums that have dropped in the last decade and a half. It makes this list for four reasons: “Still Can’t Stop the Reign,” with its dope Loose Ends sample and Biggie verse; “No Love Lost,” with its still-hungry-Jay Z verse; “Legal Money,” with Mobb Deep; and Rakim bodying “Game of Death.”
8. At the Speed of Life (1996), by Xzibit
Most people know Xzibit as the dude who hosted that show that “put together” s–tbox cars. But X has always been an above-average emcee, and his debut album is a West Coast masterpiece. “Paparazzi” and “The Foundation” are classics in their own right, but this is one of a few no-skip albums in my expansive collection. It also gets a shoutout for being one of the first enhanced CDs. You aren’t an ’80s baby if you didn’t struggle to get an enhanced CD working on a machine running Windows 3.1.
9. A Prince Among Thieves (1999), by Prince Paul
If not hip-hop’s first concept album, certainly the only one in the genre that really matters outside of Lupe Fiasco’s The Cool. People don’t talk about this seminal hip-hop opera anymore, but it was well-respected at the time it dropped.
Busta Rhymes is arguably the most underrated rapper of all time, and his debut album remains his Reasonable Doubt. Sure, “Woo Hah!! Got You All in Check” had mainstream success, but the entire album featured some of Easy Mo Bee and the Ummah’s best production. It also has “Flipmode Squad Meets Def Squad,” one of my favorite posse cuts ever.
11. Jesus Piece (2012), by the Game
Hear me out. Game will never be mistaken for a top-tier emcee, but the reason he’s still putting out relevant albums on a regular basis after 11 years is that he has a nonpareil industry Rolodex and a ridiculous ear for beats. Jesus Piece is one of the best-produced rap albums of this decade. Cool & Dre, Boi-1da and Black Metaphor created a sublime soundscape for a hilariously blasphemous album. They had me when they flipped Florence + the Machine’s “Seven Devils” for “Ali Bomaye.”
12. Capital Punishment (1998), by Big Pun
Pun’s only full-length contribution to hip-hop while still living is one of the last great albums of the genre’s golden era. However, it’s shamefully almost never included in conversations about classics. The modern Puerto Rican anthem “Still Not a Player” is actually one of the worst tracks on an album that showcased Pun’s crazy wordplay over fire production from the Beatnuts, Rockwilder, RZA and others. Jay Z was in his prime when Capital Punishment dropped, but this album got more burn from me than any of his at the time.
13. Kollage (1996), by Bahamadia
The best hip-hop album from a female rapper of all time. Period. It’s not even close. I’ve never heard a woman’s flow sound anything like Bahamadia’s, and DJ Premier and Da Beatminerz laced the f–k out of the whole damn record. If The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill had been a full rap album, that might have been the only real competition Kollage ever had.
14. Slum Village (2005), by Slum Village
Everyone rightfully loves Fantastic Vol. 1 and Vol. 2. The fifth S.V. album, however, served as the perfect vehicle for the era of Elzhi, the lyrically strongest member the group ever had. Similar to what Kanye West and Just Blaze did with Jay Z’s The Blueprint, this album was made great by B.R. Gunna, the now-defunct production duo of Black Milk and Young R.J. Whatever the hell Slum Village is now, I’m pretty certain that this will be the last great album to come from the group.
15. Enigma (1996), by Keith Murray
One of the albums that made me really fall in love with hip-hop. As is the case with Redman’s earlier works, your opinion on how this album aged will depend largely on how tightly you hang on to mid-’90s rap and Erick Sermon’s somewhat dated production. I think very few people under the age of 30 would appreciate Enigma now, but it still bangs in the whip, and Murray will remain one of those historically unsung emcees, despite what happened later.
