Best rap hip/hop last 20 years?

How about the people that don't like rap bugger off instead of posting just to bash the genre? I could go on all day about how mind numbingly dull classical music is.

Some rap recommendations from me, these are all worth listening to for the music AND the lyrics:

Nas- Illmatic: nothing he made after even comes close. Lyrical wizardary with DJ Premier making some top beats. Start to finish this CD is gold.

Jay Z- Reasonable Doubt: Like Nas, Jay-Z never made anything that came close to his debut. Every track on here is pretty much a winner. Highlights are 'Regrets' and 'Dead Presidents'.

Mos Def- Black on Both sides: lovely stuff- some really nice mellow beats and decent lyrics. Check out Umi Says and New World Water.

Reflection Eternal- Train of Thought: DJ Hi-Tek and the formidable Talib Kweli make thought provoking lyrics with some great beats.

If its more the tunes and production you're interested in the old Death Row stuff was great. Chek out Snoop Doggy Doggs 'Doggystyle' and Dr Dre's 'The Chronic'.

quote:

Originally posted by SteveGa:


How about this one? And some history:

Last Poets were rappers of the civil rights era. Along with the changing domestic landscape came the New York City-hip group called The Last Poets, who used obstreperous verse to chide a nation whose inclination was to maintain the colonial yoke around the neck of the disenfranchised.

Shortly after the death of Martin Luther King, The Last Poets were born. David Nelson, Gylan Kain, and Abiodun Oyewole, were born on the anniversary of Malcolm X's birthday May 19, 1968 in Marcus Garvey Park. They grew from three poets and a drummer to seven young black and Hispanic artists: David Nelson, Gylan Kain, Abiodun Oyewole, Felipe Luciano, Umar Bin Hassan, Jalal Nurridin, and Suliamn El Hadi. They took their name from a poem by South African poet Willie Kgositsile, who posited the necessity of putting aside poetry in the face of looming revolution.

"When the moment hatches in time's womb there will be no art talk," he wrote. "The only poem you will hear will be the spearpoint pivoted in the punctured marrow of the villain....Therefore we are the last poets of the world."

The Last Poets has brought together music and the word. Like Haki Madhubuti (Don L. Lee), they are/were modern day griots expressing the nation- building fervor of the Black Panthers in poems written for black people. As the great poet Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) says, "The Last Poets are the prototype Rappers... the kina nigger you don never wanna meet!" They teach what America does to its Black men, what Black men do to themselves, and WHY!

Last Poets. Now you’re talking. My favourite of theirs is Oh my people. Predictable for me really – it was the comeback album with Bill Laswell. Also keen on their solo albums – Umar Bin Hassan’s Be Bop or Be dead is amazing as is Jalal’s (Jalaluudin Mansuur Nuriddin) and Grandmixer DST’s Mean Machine, On the One, featuring Tariq Babyman Nuriddin and Adrian Sherwood and Science Friction featuring Bernard Alexander. The 10 inch single Mankind is an amazing piece of work. Abiodun Oyewole’s 25 years is pretty good but I don’t think it’s as good as the others’ records.
The single by Lightnin Rod and Jimi Hendrix – Doriella Du Fontaine is umm interesting. Lightnin Rod was actually Jalal.
Umar Bin Hassan puts in some good appearances on Elixir’s Hegalien, Aiyb Dieng's Rythmagick and Hashisheen’s The End of Law.
Of course the Last Poets used to be a bit miffed when anyone called their stuff rap. Spoagraphics was the preferred description. It’s true that it sounds very different to any other rap out there so maybe they had a point.
Other than them I’m partial to Public Enemies Apocalypse 1991 The Empire Strikes Black, Fear of a black planet and the version of Fight the power featuring Branford Marsalis on the Do the right thing soundtrack. . Professor Griff and the Last Asiatic Disciples sounded good at the time but sound a bit blah now. Sister Souljah’s stuff is crap but Terminator X’s Terminator in the valley of the Jeep Beats stands up well.
NWA were pretty good, Dr Dre’s the Chronic is still a good record and some of Ice Cube’s records are great. MC Ren’s and Eazy E’s are rubbish. Did they do anything of their own in NWA?
French rap is a particular interest for me. Mc Solaar’s Prose Combat is awesome and most of the NTM sound clashes are really good. MC Mello is pretty cool. Not sure exactly why French rap is so strong and innovative. The French can’t rock but they certainly can rap. The Brits are the exact opposite. I wonder why.

Sorry i'm a bit behind with this thread but well impressed with

Lazy B - Underpants Goes Inside The Pants (Universal)

Very clever

Sorry to hijack

Diccus

forget to mention:

-blackaliciuos
-mobb deep-the infamous (!!)

mos def's 1st album was a bit of a disapointment for me after all these great excellent 12"es.

you have to buy 12" singles if you take hip hop serious in a way...

The rap album that stands head and shoulders above the rest is The Goats debut album “Tricks of the shade”.

If you appreciate rap/hip hop you need to listen to this album.

If you simply appreciate music you need to listen to this album.

Hi all


Don't forget UK Hip-Hop I find it to have much more humour while rapping about British things. They also try to distance themselves a bit from American Rap and create there own charactor with it.


Sway - This Is My Demo
New Flesh - Universally Dirty
Ghost - Seldom Seen Often Heard

Also don't forget that so called Trip-Hop is not that at all its plain Hip-Hop with a twist. Massive Attack, Nightmares On Wax, Portishead, Howie B

The Stereo MC's are missing from all the postings (unless I missed them) what great catchy tunes, lyrics which are simply superb (lyrical genious in some cases) and well executed rifs etc. The ammount of stuff going on in the background is brilliant!
There are some great tunes on their albums from 33, 45, 78, through to their third album "Connected" being my favourite - the follow-up, "Deep Down & Dirty" I felt wasn't as strong, but still very good.
Some brilliant stuff!

Another favourite is of course "The Crown" by Gary Byrd and the GB experience.

Not all Rap is C Rap.........

Originally posted by Whizzkid:
Don't forget UK Hip-Hop
____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Especially not Rae & Christian's Northern Sulphuric Soul.

Malky

I completely forgot about that album, I might play it again now.

really sorry to say but stereo mcs (as much as i like them) are neither rap nor hip hop - more like vanilla ice trying to be black.

UK Artists

Tricky - Maxinquaye
Asian Dub Foundation - Rafi's Revenge

Most UK artist that I like who have rap heritage or roots lean more towards dance (big beat) than a Hip Hop sound, such as Massive Attack and Leftfield.

SJH[/QUOTE]

Other UK artists:

Roots Manuva? His last album Awfully Deep is awfully good. Run Come Save Me, aint too shabby either. The guy's got some talent.

And from the 'grime' scene, Dizzie Rascal. You might not like the grime style( A spin off from the UK garage scene) but his lyrics are superb.

C'mon, I read a lot of crap here. In the days when I was into rap/HH the real stuf was Gangstarr, NWA / Ice Cube, Dr Dre, Snoop Dogg, Ultramagnetic MC's, HiJack, ...

Yo MTV Rap!

quote:

Originally posted by Bas V:
C'mon, I read a lot of crap here. In the days when I was into rap/HH the real stuf was Gangstarr, NWA / Ice Cube, Dr Dre, Snoop Dogg, Ultramagnetic MC's, HiJack, ...

Yo MTV Rap!

Yo! Chill Out Jerry..Don't even trip!! PE and Wu Tang smoke every one of the groups you mention... Cube was good for one decent album before he became a caRICATURE OF HIMSELF..only decent thing Dr Dre did was producing Eminem...Peace Out..BB

quote:

Originally posted by Big Brother:

quote:

Originally posted by Bas V:
C'mon, I read a lot of crap here. In the days when I was into rap/HH the real stuf was Gangstarr, NWA / Ice Cube, Dr Dre, Snoop Dogg, Ultramagnetic MC's, HiJack, ...

Yo MTV Rap!

Yo! Chill Out Jerry..Don't even trip!! PE and Wu Tang smoke every one of the groups you mention... Cube was good for one decent album before he became a caRICATURE OF HIMSELF..only decent thing Dr Dre did was producing Eminem...Peace Out..BB

Yo BB, nothing but respect for PE. But Wu tang came way later in time! But nothing against them too. I just read a lot of non-rap/hh like Tricky, DJ Krush, Fun Lovin Criminals, ... WTF?! May I then mention Neil Diamond? Or the Blues Brothers?

Peace

quote:

Originally posted by Bas V:
May I then mention Neil Diamond? Or the Blues Brothers?
Peace

quote:

really sorry to say but stereo mcs (as much as i like them) are neither rap nor hip hop - more like vanilla ice trying to be black.

Ahh! So if you're not the right colour you don't count Of course Stereo MCs are rap/hip-hop. What's wrong with inner city white kids who grow up in largely black communities making their own version of that music?

As Charles Hazelwood described at Prom 58 yesterday afternoon, the Nazi's were incensed by Kurt Weill introducing Negro/Jazz influences to german classical music. Comments like yours are just the modern version of the same music fascism.

Jonathan