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This kind of spawns from the 'horrible mainstream music' thread, where a couple people were making the point that rap isn't all crap. 

In my opinion, the early Hip Hop stuff (up to about 93 or so) was pretty damn creative.  So I thought I'd make a post with a couple songs, and people could add stuff that they thought was pretty good from back in the day. 

A lot of hiphop is pretty ridiculous, but some of the best of it told stories, and the rappers involved really did have a gift with words, style, the cadence of it all... When people think of 'rap' they think of gangsta rap or the stupid thug stuff, but a lot of early rap was pretty intelligent, and if it wasn't intelligent it at least offered a view of the life the rapper was living.  It's amazing how with all the posing, posturing, bragging, and exaggerating, most rap comes off as pretty HONEST, because they're talking about their life, and things that matter to them, no matter how superficial and ridiculous it is. 

So i'll start it off, these aren't the best of all time or anything, just a couple songs I heard on the radio the last couple days.  I listen to a lot of XM and there's a classic rap channel "Backspin" that plays some great stuff. 

I hope people that have always thought rap is crap will at least give some of the songs posted in this thread a chance, and hope that if you heard any of this stuff back in the day it'll bring back some good memories for you. 


MC Lyte - Poor Georgie - 1991

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9r5MzLsaVWc

Great sample, not sure what of.  Female Rapper, pretty talented to be honest.  Tells a great story about a guy she meets, and the trouble they go through.  Nothing too deep, but to her this was her life, how can you discount that?  Even if you think she's ignorant, you've got to relate to somebody being so honest about their life. 



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De La Soul - A Roller Skating Jam called "Saturdays" - 1991

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ig5Xi-S0Fjo

These guys were some of the most creative rappers of the late 80's.  They liked having a good time, and hated the NWA style 'fake gangster' rap that caught on back then.  They weren't afraid to make fun of themselves, and were widely ridiculed for having daisies all over the cover of their debut album "3 feet high and rising".... named of course after the Johnny Cash song.  Literally, a song about going to the Roller skating rink.    Check out the sample of Chicago's "Saturday in the park".
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Sir Mix A Lot - Posse on Broadway - 1988

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBPpy_SVV_0

Before "Baby Got Back" he had "Posse on Broadway".  Interesting thing about Sir Mix Alot, he was of course extremely hedonistic but like EVERY SONG was about how he hated domestic abuse, he goes on about it again in this one.  The guy's hilarious.  Extremely talented in my opinion, guys like him back in the day were actually rapping about NOT doing drugs... about being successful, about black and white people getting along and hanging out, about treating women the way he felt was right, not calling women bitches.... such a contrast to the way rap music went.


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Biz Markie - Vapors - 1988

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fP_hKDpXTug

This song is literally about how all of his friends were disrespected when they were younger by everybody from their parents to their neighbors, to the girls they knew, bosses... couldnt' get a job, etc.... and how now "Damn it Feels Good To See People Up On It!"  and how they all get respect now and they're all successful.  This guy was talented as hell.  He ALLUDES in the last verse to how when he was younger people assumed he was gay because he focused on his music instead of girls.  Honest as hell!  Can you even imagine a rapper of the last 15 years saying something like that? 

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LL Cool J - Around the Way Girl - 1991

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbegAGlaBaw

LL Cool J's patented version of a love song, this was as close as it got for him.  Great sample, and LL really knew how to connect to his audience.  The girl he descirbes in the song could be any girl, he's specifically saying he wants the girl next door.  Every girl from 16 to 30 growing up in the hood heard this and thought they had a chance with LL.  Just frankly brilliant marketing strategy, know your market, appeal to it, rinse, repeat.  The businessman of the rap industry.  Here's a guy who makes more money NOW than he did back then, when he was more famous. 


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EPMD - Strictly Business - 1989

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJHEI8fJdiM

Speaking of businessmen.... These guys were some of the coldest rappers ever back when this came out.  Erick Sermon starting each verse, Percy finishing it.... Erick was barely dechiperable because of his heavy drawl, but lyrically he was go great compared to some of the other acts out at the time.  These guys took Swagger to a whole new level.  Like other acts around at the time, they were actually opposed to drug use, he goes into a PSA about two minutes in.

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Scarface - Now I Feel Ya - 1993

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1pNzviB_dP0

One of the most interesting gangsta rappers ever, Scarface did some work with the Ghetto Boys and was from Texas... he was incredibly paradoxial, even more so than Tupac was.  He would rap about doing things and then do other songs decrying it.  He had a seemingly endless string of rhymes, some of his songs were very long, in this particular song he covers several aspects of his life from his kid to his grandma to his days selling dope.  Just a great storyteller, the guy could go on for hours, never had a bad rhyme either. 

As I said on another thread recently, the only two rap songs I like is one by Grandmaster Flash and one by Ice Cube (I forgot the titles for both those songs).

The rest? I could literally live without

Not sure if it counts as "early", but Eminem's 'Stan' is a true masterpiece to me, on every level imaginable. Can't think of another artist that would make this grim, disturbing, devastating, yet perfectly anchored in reality tale come alive more than Eminem does.

Going along with Ovi's post, I gotta give more praise to Eminem. I know it's not "early" rap, but to my ears it's some of best rap ever made.

A few songs by him I would consider masterpieces:

Sing For The Moment - http://youtu.be/D4hAVemuQXY (http://youtu.be/D4hAVemuQXY)
Rock Bottom - http://youtu.be/l096UQ7xcTM (http://youtu.be/l096UQ7xcTM)
Hailies Song
Headlights

'Dance With The Devil' by Immortal Technique, it's like a knockout punch to your emotions - it delves into the life of inner city kids, and how gangs only cripple the people in them.

I'm going to pick some that are really obvious, but they're obvious for a reason. Hopefully they will be something that serve as a good introduction for anyone who hasn't found a way to get into any rap yet.

Beastie Boys, "Hey Ladies." (1989) Anyone who only knows or remembers them from their first LP (and uber-hit) Licensed to Ill really missed on the absolute masterpiece album that followed, Paul's Boutique. To me, it has a legitimate claim of best rap album ever and one of the best 15-25 albums or so of any genre, ever. I could pick any number of songs, but I went with this one because it's so damn catchy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Naf5uJYGoiU

Kurtis Blow, "The Breaks." (1980) One of the great early voices in rap, this classic shows the form's roots, taking great dance hooks and extending them with what now seems like simple raps atop them. Basically, this shows how the form in large part was party music. No killing, no fighting, just fun. Silliness.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZDUEilS5M4

Brand Nubian, "All For One" (1990) One of the great groups with fabulous wordplay and intelligence, not to mention music that used soul, jazz...great stuff. Plus, who doesn't want to hear a reference to David Ruffin in the opening line of the opening song of their first album?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uisHTDkB7iA

De La Soul, "The Magic Number." (1989) Ron already used them, but I've got to add to it. Their album 3 Feet High and Rising is (to me) up there with Paul's Boutique as the greatest ever. Anyone claiming rappers (and DJs and producers) have no talent either hasn't heard, or isn't willing to hear, De La Soul. This is smart, funny, catchy ... great stuff. Produced by Prince Paul.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0irL1M15DH8

I've got many other ideas but will give these some time to sink in!

I'm going to check out all those links you posted, I've heard them all of course but it'll be interesting to hear them again with your commentary on each. 

To add a couple quick other De La Soul tracks since you brought them up too, the Buhloone Mindstate album was AWESOME, the first 3 or 4 songs run together and then culminate with "Patti Dooke" which is just ridiculous.  I mean just talent, this is as crazy as that intellectual/jazz rap stuff got, it's a lot like Cantalopue was.   The way Plug one is rapping with the cymbal line and the saxaphones about 4 minutes through is just ridiculous.  On top of that, you can't even understand half of what they're talking about, they insist on making half of each song inside baseball. 

De La Soul - "Patti Dooke" - 1993

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exdbzs15ebw


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Another of my favorite De la Soul songs is "Oodles of O's".  I have no clue what the hell he's talking about.  It possibly could be O's = Kisses (X's and O's) from the girls, and "OHHHH!!!" (cheers from their fans).  Just the way the song runs is awesome, they ride over the beat so well on this song.  They literally could rap about anything and it was interesting. 

De La Soul - Oodles of O's - 1991

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-2-qVgGQak

I'll check all these out too, thank you for the links.  Eminem's very talented, I wish he would get back into more of his less serious stuff, I always liked that better about him.  I heard "Monster" the other day and there's a little bit of that in there so maybe he's lightening up a little bit :)

I was in high school when Eminem had all his big early hits, and for me, he (along with 50 Cent, Nelly, Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Jay-Z, Puff Daddy, Ludacris, etc.) represented the absolute nadir of modern popular music. A decade plus later, I'm still not interested in reevaluating Mr. Mathers' back catalog. I'd rather be forced to listen to Tommy Roe's "Dizzy" on repeat for 2 weeks straight than have to hear another Eminem song during my lifetime.

As far as good rap goes, Public Enemy takes the cake in my book.

Grandmaster Melle Mel - "White lines" 1983

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFQzSJCs_ss

His new album has some less serious songs like Love Game, So Far, So Much Better. Definitely give MMLP2 a listen, it's his best since The Eminem Show, imo.

Some things I bet y'all will like but haven't yet mentioned...

A Tribe Called Quest's first three albums are bondafide classics: "Push It Along" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qRPvKh4JCLg), "I Left My Wallet In El Segundo" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WILyWmT2A-Q), and "Bonita Applebum" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xE6ZWwJezg) (People's Instinctive Travels And The Paths Of Rhythm, 1991); "Excursions" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZWS6CITutY), "Check The Rhime" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQT2DfzpCLA), and "Scenario" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGjbDg0Uvh8) (The Low End Theory, 1991); "Award Tour" ft. Trugoy The Dove (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P800UWoE9xs), "Electric Relaxation" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WHRnvjCkTsw), "Keep It Rollin'" ft. Large Professor (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q92GBRxQdbw) (Midnight Marauders, 1993).

Digable Planets are also an excellent jazzy hip-hop group that have two great albums, 1993's Reachin' (A New Refutation Of Time And Space) and 1994's Blowout Comb. Their first album has a great track intelligently and sympathetically defending access to abortion, "La Femme Fetal" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCgCu9zCOIQ), as well as a lot of head-nodding vibes like "Nickel Bags" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUYvjhsL5a4) and "Rebirth Of Slick (Cool Like Dat)" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cM4kqL13jGM). Their second album is a bit more "out there" and not as "commercial" but is no less excellent (as "Black Ego" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbMGHEQNmgo) shows), and has some stellar features like Jeru The Damaja on "Graffiti" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQItMHm5TSs).

can't think of anything positive to say so I'll leave it at that

:o Really liking this!

The point of this thread is obviously people sharing what they think is great about rap--early rap, in this case. And one reason behind this is presumably to introduce it to people who might have certain preconceptions that are negative. May I ask, did you listen to any of this before posting? If not, why even bother posting in the thread? There are five thousand threads here with plenty of people posting their dislike for [rap][modern music][whatever]. If you haven't tried with an open mind, I'd suggest you do. If you have and don't like it, I'd respectfully suggest that not posting that you have nothing positive to say is more positive than posting that you have nothing positive to say...

Man thanks for looking all these up.  Now I have some good stuff to listen to tonight!  I appreciate it. 

Also  OregonRiverRider thanks for the Melle Mel track, that's awesome! 

Keep em comin', guys.

Public Enemy
Wu-Tang Clan a little later
Lotsa great individual fun danceable tracks like "Humpty Dance", "Big Butts", "Bust a Move" all that
And they're completely stoopid but I'll always have a soft spot for the Fat Boys who just happened to have a hit with our fellas

There's a lot of hip hop that I hate. I hate all the smooth R&B type stuff and I hate the sexism, machoism, materialism and homophobia that I hear in so many rap lyrics. But then again, as long as it's raw and has some intelligence, hip hop can be really great. Groups like the Beastie Boys, Cypress Hill, Osdorp Posse, Public Enemy and NWA have got some really great songs.

Since hip hop originated roughly in the late 1970s and Eminem broke through around 2000, I don't think he qualifies as "early hip-hop" by any standard.  ;)

True. Just wanted to give props to the song and jumped at the opportunity when I saw the hip-hop thread.

All of OutKast's albums are great (except Idlewild but I don't count that as a proper studio album anyway...) but their first, Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik, released on LaFace/Arista in 1994, tends to get overshadowed these days by their more experimental, successful later albums. This is a shame because it's a fucking great debut that helped establish the South as an artistic force in hip-hop that could not be ignored (as it had more or less been previously): "Ain't No Thang" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IEJ-o63F0-8), "Call Of Da Wild" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lqct4_0U-SM), "Player's Ball" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5nJu3PgCbE), "Crumblin' Erb" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zh9QdGjZZYQ)... I could go on but I'd end up listing the whole album, which you should listen to because it's solid from start to finish!

Not to get into the definitions of what is early and what isn't, but I trust you'll forgive me:

De La Soul is allowing people to download their entire catalog for free through sometime Saturday. If you have any curiosity about what great hip hop sounds like, here are some examples that will cost you nothing. Do this.

http://www.wearedelasoul.com/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x124uV2T_ds
WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU WU

Thanks for sharing. I've never heard anything by them, but why not.

Thanks for letting us know.

I've never listened to them before, but I've been interested, so I'm glad I was able to get this when I did - even if it did take over thirty hours to finally get the music to me.
Looking forward to listening to this.

Yes, it definitely was slow going. I read on NYT that demand was far more than they'd anticipated, which slowed it. Still, getting stuff for free, and legally, no less, is a pretty cool thing.

A LITTLE off topic but there's nowhere else to put it.  A lot of HipHop is kind of comedic, in that it's so ludicrious that it's actually funny.  So a lot of booty music, stuff like that is pretty funny if you don't take it too seriously.

You may have seen this video a while back, but if not, it has to be seen at some point in your life.

Some dude got the bright idea to buy the actual animatronic setup from Chuck E Cheeses, and then reanimate the animals to not sing their own music, but ridiculous rap songs. 

so here's the Rockafire Explosion, doing "Pop, Lock, and Drop It" by Huey.  It probably took the guy a month to program this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyIFOi4neHw

Oh my god, that's amazing.

Brother D's "How We Gonna Make the Black Nation Rise?" is probably my favorite. It's considered by some to be the first politically-conscious rap song ever released. Great lyrics and rapping for the time.

http://youtu.be/hJSmIYVp9YU

A few from the 90's, the era of gangsta rap and hedonistic music videos.  Warning: most of these are pretty misogynistic.  It comes with the territory, part of the interesting thing is the talent is there, but slightly misguided.

Del the Funky Homosapien - MistaaDobalina

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFieSQHmQT0

Craziest sh*t I ever heard when I was a kid.  This guy was Ice Cube's cousin, made music that was a little different than what you usually heard.  I'm way to white to understand whatever he's talking about, but I always liked it.

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If you never listened to Ice Cube's early music, he was a walking contradiction.  Born in L.A., raised fairly middle class, graduated from college... then was hired to write Lyrics for Eazy E's NWA.  So he was able to create this entire image where he hated white authority, he was talking about all the poor people growing up in the ghetto even though he didn't know a THING about that.  

Here's "Alive on Arrival" from "Death Certificate".  Entire song tells the story of getting shot then trying to get somebody at the hospital in the hood to help him

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qK-Fsg3U6QQ

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Luniz - I Got 5 On It

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhhSd9q_wZk

1995, this is probably one of the best examples of the whole keyboard based hiphop that came out in the 90's.  Fantastically good for a rap song.  The video's hilarious.  I wish I was there.

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Big L - No Ends, No Skinz

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQ0u2jjXs_o

Incredibly talented rapper, shot and murdered a couple years after this for basically nothing, another example of someone with plenty of talent who got mixed up in some idiocy and paid for it with his life.   Basically his brother was in prison, pissed somebody off, they saw Big L. in a car and killed him.  This guy was probably one of the most underrated ever, lots of people have never heard of him and he was only around for a short while.  In the song he talks about beating women and celebrates that.  Another example of someone growing up with no father, had plenty of talent and could have been successful at whatever he chose but ended up misguided in practically every area of his life.  Such a shame. 

Wasn't hip hop originally all about breaks (as in breakdancing)?
Whatever... I know you gonna dig this! :=)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bk7qt2W6cwM (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bk7qt2W6cwM)