Top Ten Rap/ Hip Hop Albums (7-10)

10) All Eyez on Me : When deciding on a top ten, its always hard to select the #1 spot. But it's also really hard to decide on the #10 slot as well. Most people think that the #10 slot isn't really that good, which is a very obscene misconception. Tupac's All Eyez on Me is in my opinion, the most awaited and criticized album of all time. Most critics consider it one of the, if not the best, album of the 1990s. Released right after Tupac was bailed out of jail, there was a lot of media hype behind this album. It remains one of the top selling rap albums of all time, going NINE TIMES platinum, that's crazy.


9) Straight Outta Compton: The Godfather of all of gangsta rap albums. NWA showed just exactly what they were made of when this mind- blowing, controversy sparking, media attracting piece of art was dropped. With classic Hip Hop tracks like "Straight Outta Compton", "%*$@ the Police", and "Gangsta Gangsta", they basically took a sledgehammer to the brittle glass window that was separating the negative stereotypes thugs from Hip Hop artists. And they loved it. Every rapper gives thanks to God every night before they sleep that this album was released. Only a few artists could have the balls to do what NWA did on this album, and their work has produced one of the most respected, often replayed albums of all time.


8) The Chronic: Dr. Dre's debut album, its hard not to place this album much, MUCH higher than what I have it. Dr. Dre is easily one of the most respected men in the entire game as a producer, but many people don't realize the outstanding rap performance on this artifact of the golden age of Hip Hop. With funky, "G- Funk" beats and a really tough gangsta style tone, Dr. Dre shoved aside the hodgepodge that was known as East Coast rap and elevated the West Coast to a peak it would never reach again. "Ain't Nothing But a G Thang", a single featuring Snoop Dogg was easily the most important, pivotal song in this album, making its mark in history and still remains one of the best music videos ever produced.


7) The Diary: Scarface, King of the South. This album was released right in the midst of the rise of Nas, Biggie, Tupac, Dre, all of them. Underrated as it was, The Diary is nothing short of a masterpiece. With stunning, eye opening tracks like "Hand of the Dead Body" which really articulated the prejudice and racism in this country, Scarface was someone who wasn't afraid to get his hands dirty so to speak on this album. Everything that he saw in the United States that he didn't like, he explictly stated that in this album. Recognized as a classic, it recieved top ratings from both The Source and XXL magazines. Very, very few albums achieve either one of these awards, let alone both. Its most famous for the featuring of its song "No Tears" in the hit movie, Office Space.

Top Ten Rap/ Hip Hop Albums (4-6)

6) Get Rich or Die Tryin': 50 Cent's debut album, no doubt a top five choice. 50 Cent is reminiscent of Tupac when he first came out; with a BANG. His famous single "In Da Club" topped charts and easily showed what kind of potential this man had. Other hit singles including "Many Men" showed how diverse he was on the mic, and his extremely thuggish, gangster style of life. He was a no fooling around person, and he made sure that was clear on this album. Other singles like "If I Can't" and "P.I.M.P." showed how light- hearted he actually could be any his extremely humorous personality. The second best selling rap album of the decade following The Marshall Mathers LP, its no doubt that this album is a classic.


5) Reasonable Doubt: This is one of the hardest decisions when it came to deciding between two of one artist's albums. I did not know whether to choose this one, his debut, or The Blueprint, a work he did a bit later, both are considered top ten material, I just don't have room, and one had to stay. I chose Reasonable Doubt because it had contained the ingredients for a classic. One of the first people to take the "mafioso" approach to gangsta rap, Jay Z showed he had a lot of balls by releasing his DEBUT album, the one where first impressions are made and where many, many artists' careers end, by rapping about a seldom discussed concept. It's amazing how he managed to feature Biggie, and get most of his songs produced by DJ Premier, a true icon on the DJ scene. Most of the work Premier has done is now considered a classic, by working with Jay, he brought so much more anticipation and close scrutiny on the album, which jay Z handled very professionally. Always known for his style, this album had lots of slow, funky beats and simple choruses, which is exactly what rap was turning its head away from by 1996, which is when this was released. Its like he was the last person to jump onto the moving train before it took off past the platform, barely able to sneak in a true old- school classic.


4) The Marshall Mathers LP: Eminem's second studio album, The Marshall Mathers LP holds the record for the fastest selling rap album of all time. It sold 1.7 MILLION copies in its FIRST WEEK. Almost TWO MILLION copies were sold over a seven day period, its no wonder as to why this happened, with the outstanding lyricism found on his debut, what else could you expect? A much darker- themed album than most, this album showed us a side of Slim Shady that not many people knew. He really expressed the rawness that he contained, and crafted it into an exquisite album.

Top Ten Rap/ Hip Hop Albums (3-1)

3) Ready to Die: Biggie's debut album, no doubt this HAD to be on my top ten. Time magazine included it in its list of top 100 albums of all time, and its the highest ranking rap album on the top 500 list. No rap album that came after this one wasn't influenced by it. That simple. This album contained my radio friendly singles like "Big Poppa", "Juicy", and "Warning", plus it included some more explicit, hardcore rap hits such as "Ready to Die", and "Who Shot Ya?" Cold lyrics, funky beats and a light- hearted tone much different than that of this latter album, this one was a very, very big commercial success, dwarfing all other rap albums in the 1990s buy A LOT.


2) Illmatic: The most influential album of all time, really. It may not have been quite good enough to land itself the number one slot, but it helped rewrite modern day rap. It wasn't expected to be that great, even with promotions that the producers made for the album. But when it dropped, it was pretty evident that Nas was going to be a really big name in Hip Hop. It contained easily the best beats of any rap album, ever. His lyricism was unmatched, clever word play and hilarious anecdotes and subliminal messages made his songs very interesting, and still remain so. Like so many other classics though, it was only until much after its release did people realize its true value; it was dubbed a platinum record in 2001.


1) Life After Death: I didn't even need to think about this one, its automatic, the best rap album of all time. Its common practice to regard Ready to Die as Biggie's best album, but I disagree. While it was his debut album, and had quite an impact, as a rap album, Life After Death was better. Good artist, like Biggie, tend to get better as time goes on, which is exactly what happened. In the time between both albums, he gained LOTS of skill as a rapper. If you weren't too fond of the deeper, mafia- like style he adopted, then you had to give in to the lyrics. He blew up with the release of Ready to Die, but he perfected himself as a rapper in Life After Death. All of the minor mistakes that were found in his first album were gone: his beat varieties increased, his delivery became a lot better, and he had a much bigger variety of genre within the album. Comedy, dance, gangsta, stories, everything. No Comparison IMO...