Monthly Archives: January 2024

50 Years of Hip Hop Album Review: Ego Trip, Run-D.M.C.

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Last year was the 50th anniversary of hip hop, And in honor of this anniversary, the idea bloomed in my mind that I should review the top 50 albums of that 50 years. As I crunched together a list from various sources, 50 proved to be too restrictive- many of the classics were getting squeezed out. So, to make a little more room, I opted for 100 albums, two for each of hip hop’s 50 years.

For its formative years, hip hop was a live entertainment form, with the first recorded songs not emerging until 1979, and the first albums in 1980. So my review will cover 1980-2023, with 50 posts of two albums each. The only ground rule I made for myself (besides looking for 2×50, aka 100, albums that were widely well-regarded) was that I had to have at least one from each year. As you’ll see by and by, some years get multiple albums, but since we have 100 spots for 43 years, it tends to all work out.

And with that, let’s embark on our next installment!

Kurtis Blow, Ego Trip (1984)– When I think of the first hip-hop I loved, I think of the fat metallic beats of the 808 drum machine, the hard-hitting flow, the orchestra hit, the aggressive echo and stutter of fast scratching and mixing, rock guitar samples. In other words, I think of the sound of 1984-1986, and this album is replete with that sound. There are moments certainly, like the mellow groove of “Falling Back in Love Again” and the goofy innocent glee of the sports fan anthem “Basketball”, that don’t hit quite that raw, but the main vibe of the album is heavy in a way Kurtis Blow hadn’t done previously on his own albums. And in that vein, it’s assuredly no accident that Run- D.M.C. show up as guests in the album’s opening track, the urban storytelling of “8 million stories”. Which brings us to…

Run-D.M.C, Run-D.M.C (1984)- I mentioned in last week’s post that there was a “class of 1984”. In 1980-1982 there were only eight hip hop albums in total. 1983 opened things up a lot, with twelve in just that year. But 1984 was really when the genre broke out- thirteen albums came out, including several classic releases. And it was also the year that introduced the hard-hitting “hardcore” sound I mentioned above to the general public. Run-D.M.C., both the group and the album, was crucial to all of this. This was the first rap record to go gold, and the album that brought hip hop to MTV. Even today, it sounds palpably powerful, and there isn’t a single track that lags. And frankly, if “Rock Box” wasn’t one of the hardest rocking songs of 1984 then I don’t even know!

If you’re curious about the sources I used to compile my list, you can check them out here:

And if you want to catch up on the previous installments, here they are!

  1. Sugarhill Gang (1980)/Kurtis Blow (1980)
  2. 8th Wonder (1981)/The Message (1982)
  3. Wild Style Original Soundtrack (1983)/Fat Boys (1984)

50 Years of Hip Hop Album Review: Wild Style Original Soundtrack, Fat Boys

4 Replies

Last year was the 50th anniversary of hip hop, And in honor of this anniversary, the idea bloomed in my mind that I should review the top 50 albums of that 50 years. As I crunched together a list from various sources, 50 proved to be too restrictive- many of the classics were getting squeezed out. So, to make a little more room, I opted for 100 albums, two for each of hip hop’s 50 years.

For its formative years, hip hop was a live entertainment form, with the first recorded songs not emerging until 1979, and the first albums in 1980. So my review will cover 1980-2023, with 50 posts of two albums each. The only ground rule I made for myself (besides looking for 2×50, aka 100, albums that were widely well-regarded) was that I had to have at least one from each year. As you’ll see by and by, some years get multiple albums, but since we have 100 spots for 43 years, it tends to all work out.

And with that, let’s embark on our next installment!

Various Artists, Wild Style Original Soundtrack (1983)– This is the soundtrack of Wild Style, a groundbreaking film from/in celebration of the New York hip hop culture of the early 80s. If the film is considered seminal, the album is even more so. It features a variety of styles, often harder-hitting than the “feel good party music” side of hip hop that had mostly appeared on albums up until then, is replete with the sounds of early turntabilism, and has contributions from a host of artists who were key figures in early hip hop but didn’t release their own albums in that era (including production work from Fab Five Freddy). It’s also a bit of a difficult album to lay your (virtual) hands on- there’s the original 1983 version, but what you’ll mostly find on streaming is a 1997 re-issue that drops a few tracks and adds a few more, or the 25th anniversary two volume edition that has almost but not quite the original as disc one and then a bunch of additional material and alternate tracks as disc two. Whichever way you end up going, though, it’s well worth the listen!

The Fat Boys, Fat Boys (1984)- If you remember mid-80s hip-hop from the mid-80s, you perhaps remember that it was often, for want of a better word, goofy. The Fat Boys as a general phenomenon, and this album in particular are an exhibit par excellence of that principle. Which is not by any means to say it is bad- it’s 1984 after all, so are we any goofier here than Huey Lewis? And in fact, this album has a lot to recommend it- it’s maybe the first album to introduce the beatboxing sound, is loaded with clever and playful sound production, and even manages some genuinely subversive coded messaging in the opening track about ending up in jail due to eating too much. The excellence is no accident- in addition to the native charm and talent of the Brooklyn trio, the album brings Kurtis Blow on board as producer and enlists pioneering drum machine and bass producers Larry Smith and Davy DMX (who also worked with Run-D.M.C.) in creating the sound. It’s also one of the first albums, along with several other members of the class of 1984 (more on this coming up next time) to shake the genre’s early insecurity and put out an all rap album from start to finish.

If you’re curious about the sources I used to compile my list, you can check them out here:

And if you want to catch up on the previous installments, here they are!

  1. Sugarhill Gang (1980)/Kurtis Blow (1980)
  2. 8th Wonder (1981)/The Message (1982)

50 Years of Hip Hop Album Review: 8th Wonder, The Message

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Last year was the 50th anniversary of hip hop, And in honor of this anniversary, the idea bloomed in my mind that I should review the top 50 albums of that 50 years. As I crunched together a list from various sources, 50 proved to be too restrictive- many of the classics were getting squeezed out. So, to make a little more room, I opted for 100 albums, two for each of hip hop’s 50 years.

For its formative years, hip hop was a live entertainment form, with the first recorded songs not emerging until 1979, and the first albums in 1980. So my review will cover 1980-2023, with 50 posts of two albums each. The only ground rule I made for myself (besides looking for 2×50, aka 100, albums that were widely well-regarded) was that I had to have at least one from each year. As you’ll see by and by, some years get multiple albums, but since we have 100 spots for 43 years, it tends to all work out.

And with that, let’s embark on our next installment!

The Sugarhill Gang, 8th Wonder (1981)– The critics were not too kind to this album. So what, you might ask, is it doing here? One thing to keep in mind is just how in its infancy the genre was at this point. In 1980-82 there were a total of eight hip hop albums released. Just eight! So we’ve actually reviewed half of all the hip hop albums then in existence in this post and the previous one. The other relevant fact is that the critics are blue meanies who can kiss my tuchus. I find the sound here to be wall to wall fun! As with their debut album which we reviewed last time, there’s a lot here that isn’t exactly hip hop. On the other hand, it’s not exactly not. The funk/soul/disco sounds here have much more sizzle compared to last time, and are freely combined with rap, instruments and mixing and drum machines blending back and forth track by track. This is the electro genre being born. And , while there are some cringy things about “Apache” from a modern cultural sensitivity point of view, sonically it’s brilliant sampling of the classic 60s instrumental, and the album contains maybe the first honest to goodness rap battle, “Showdown” which has Sugarhill facing off with Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five. All-in-all, a worthy time capsule of hip hop in its early days.

Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five, The Message (1982)- If the Sugarhill Gang was a bit of a pre-fab group, Grandmaster Flash was the real deal- he was a leading DJ, foundational in creating cutting and scratching and had his own group going before signing on to Sugarhill Records. That being said, the opening track, “She’s Fresh” has a lot in common with 8th Wonder, in the sense that it’s a song that could serve as an early 80s soul/funk number, but is also rap- once again, it’s the electro style being born. And this carries through several subsequent tracks. There is of course the masterful “The Message”, which is often considered the birth of the genre’s capacity for social realism and political consciousness. The standard story is that the group was reluctant to include it on the album because of the serious turn, but I observe that “It’s a Shame” has a social focus as well, and “You Are” does a straight-up religious theme, so they don’t seem to have been shy about tackling substance. There’s also some great sampling of “Genius of Love” and “It’s A Shame” along the way, brilliant cutting and mixing of a dozen records on “The Adventures of Grandmaster Flash on the Wheel of Steel” (from the UK version of the album) and a track that’s a touching tribute to Stevie Wonder. All the way around, this album well deserves its classic status.

If you’re curious about the sources I used to compile my list, you can check them out here:

And if you want to catch up on the previous installments, you can find them here!

  1. Sugarhill Gang (1980)/Kurtis Blow (1980)

50 Years of Hip Hop Album Review: Sugarhill Gang, Kurtis Blow

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While still plugging along on rounding up the 23 best albums of 2023, I’m beginning a new review this year. Last year was the 50th anniversary of hip hop! The legend goes that on August 11, 1973 DJ Kool Herc was DJing a party for his sister at a rented community room in an apartment block in the Bronx. He tried out a new style he’d been working on, where he would use multiple turntables to extend and mix the drum breaks of songs, with he and his fellow DJ Coke La Rock talking over the beats.

In honor of this anniversary, the idea bloomed in my mind that I should review the top 50 albums of that 50 years. As I crunched together a list from various sources, 50 proved to be too restrictive- many of the classics were getting squeezed out. So, to make a little more room, I opted for 100 albums, two for each of hip hop’s 50 years.

For its formative years, hip hop was a live entertainment form, with the first recorded songs not emerging until 1979, and the first albums in 1980. So my review will cover 1980-2023, with 50 posts of two albums each. The only ground rule I made for myself (besides looking for 2×50, aka 100, albums that were widely well-regarded) was that I had to have at least one from each year. As you’ll see by and by, some years get multiple albums, but since we have 100 spots for 43 years, it tends to all work out.

And with that, let’s embark!

The Sugarhill Gang, Sugarhill Gang (1980)– I’ll open by noting that this album didn’t make many “best” lists. But I’ve included it here for the simple reason that when it came out in February 1980 it was the first hip hop album ever. Sort of. The “sort of” being that while the Sugarhill Gang released one of the first commercial rap recordings with “Rapper’s Delight” in 1979 (and scored the first top 40 song for the genre), this album is only half hip-hop. Sugar Hill records founder and hip hop recording pioneer Sylvia Robinson wasn’t sure the market would support an entirely rap album, so three of the tracks are competent, albeit not historically significant, soul/disco outings. Still, this was hip-hop’s first foray, and the three tracks that are on the album- “Rapper’s Delight” with it’s classic “Good Times” sample from Chic (it even starts with the first recorded use of the name that the genre would bear: “Hip-hop, hippie to the hippie, to the hip-hip-hop and you don’t stop”), “Rapper’s Reprise” (which, mysteriously, is the first track despite the title), and the dynamic “Sugarhill Groove”- are delightful. While the group was assembled by Robinson for the express purpose of recording hip hop and founding her record label, there’s no denying the founding importance of Wonder Mike, Big Bank Hank, and Master Gee.

Kurtis Blow, Kurtis Blow (1980)- This album did make many lists. And is also not purely a hip hop album! There’s the yearning and simple soul song “All I Want in the World (Is to Find That Girl)”, and a somewhat out of place but rocking and fun cover of Bachman-Turner Overdrive’s “Taking Care of Business”. But the balance is shifted from Sugarhill Gang‘s 3:3 to 5:2, so hip hop is winning! This also represents the first major label recording for the genre, as it was released by Mercury Records. It wasn’t really a huge stretch for them, as they had a large soul, funk, and disco roster, but still worth noting. Kurtis Blow himself hailed from Harlem, and was only 20 when his breakout single “The Breaks” was released in 1980. That’s worth keeping in mind, because even at that young age he was influential- listening to the five hip hop tracks here, I was struck by just how sampled and lyric-checked they were by the Def Jam crew later in the 80s.