Ready to Die - 20th anniversary

"Who the fuck is this paging me at 5:46 in the morning crack of dawning now, I'm yawning..."

Ladies and gentleman that's easily one of the most iconic lines in hip-hop history. From one of many great songs on the classic debut album - Ready to Die - by the Notorious B.I.G aka Biggie Smalls. Yesterday marked the 20th anniversary of the album, which is now considered a masterpiece (and rightly so too).

Ready to Die presented to the world the rap phenomenon that is Biggie Smalls - debuting at a time when hip-hop was at it's artistic peak - especially when you look at the releases of that year. 20 years on we can now look at the album as one of the greatest contributions to music and here's why...

Looking at the landscape at the time of it's release - the West Coast was completely dominating hip-hip. The likes of Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Warren G and Dogg Pound were controlling the radio, completely nullifying the East Coast sound. Nonetheless, a 22-year-old from Bed-Stuy Brooklyn was soon going to change that. Many may argue that there was a resurgence brewing in New York, as 1994 saw some notable releases including:  Redman's Dare Iz a Darkside and Jeru the Damanja's The Sun Rises in the East and of course Nas' glorified Illmatic as well Method Man's Tical. However, with Biggie he was the chosen one, the Neo if you like. To put it in basketball terms, Biggie was the franchise player in the "East Coast team" - he was the man who was going to bring back the East Coast sound to the mass.  

Ready to Die redefinined hip-hop for two core reasons. One confounding reason that many avoid to admit or fail to understand was the engine that was Bad Boy Records. It goes without saying that Biggie's lyricism, his flow, his ability to tell stories is what made us love the album and the emcee himself. But, Diddy/Bad Boy need their credit here. Diddy's ability to pick beats and samples were the nucleus and foundation to the album's  success. While Biggie provided the hardcore and brash lyrics, Puff added the necessary sheen that allowed the album to be radio friendly and attract the average listeners ear. Both factors collided to produce the now greatness that we hear today. 

With that in mind, looking at the album as a composition - it is actually the perfect example of hardcore and radio-friendly. Which to my knowledge hasn't been rivalled (except for his sophomore album of course). You had songs like Everyday Struggle, Things Done Changed, Warning and Gimme the Loot for the hardcore rap fans while Biggie also catered for the soft listeners with Big Poppa, One More Chance remix and Juicy. With no fans being disappointed with either side of the spectrum. It was this dualism that can be put down to the album's success - Biggies awesome talent as well as having the machine that was Bad Boy Boy/ Puffy to push him to new realms.

I think it's worth discussing briefly about the magnitude of Juicy. In my very humble opinion it's actually hip-hop's greatest and most influential song to date. To my knowledge it's the only song where every single line is a quotable. The song perfectly captures and embodies the ideals of what hip-hop is; the whole rags to riches semantic that we often hear. Juicy is easily the purest hip-hop composition with relatable but clever lyrics , matched with a sound that is friendly to all but still has its roots to the hip-hop sound. 

Ready to Die is a masterpiece in all aspects, the only way I can describe it is "Raw". The production was gritty, uncleasned and unmastered for the right reason, perfectly complementing Biggie's lyrics. The production sonically presented the hardships of New York or more specifically Brooklyn. Especially with Easy Mo Bee's production who really provided the perfect assist to Biggie's lyrics. I could go so much deeper into Biggie's lyricism on this album but I think I've done that far too often with past blogs. But what I will say, is that what Ready to Die presented - was a raw 22-year-old who was completely unrefined and hungry - and this was reflected within his lyrics. Whereas with his later works such as Life After Death he was refined, had bravado and whit, which he should of as he was now at a better point in his life during that creation of that album.

It's weird to think that Biggie was the same age as I am now when he released Ready to Die and yet my life is half as cinematic as his was at that age (that's kind of a good thing... I guess). I just hope in the next 20 years my children will appreciate this album as much as I have. 

Gezza 

20th anniversary of Illmatic - the best hip-hop album ever!

Today marks the 20th anniversary of Nas' debut album, Illmatic. I'm really not going to delve too deep with this post cause honestly there's so much that can be said about this album. I titled this post as Illmatic being the best hip-hop album ever and rightly so I can't imagine many disputing that - while Illmatic isn't my favourite hip-hop album - it is still indisputably the greatest hip-hop album ever. 

It's both a gift and a curse that I get to review or should I say shed my thoughts on the album, twenty years on. As now I'm plagued by the curse of it already being mentioned as a masterpiece and it now having a GOAT status. But it's too a gift, as had I had the opportunity to review it when it first dropped (I was like 1 and half years when it was released) I would of probably been scared to say how good it is. We're all aware the cruelty of hip-hop as its such a nostalgic genre of music when you heap praise to something new its often greeted with much displeasure, especially if you say an album is the best of all time or within a shout of being the best.

The key things to note about the album - that it was pretty revolutionary in terms of its structure. We're talking about a time where the production of an album was handled by one person it was solely produced in-house, artists rarely sought the help of other producers. However, with Nas he was blessed with a super group of produces - easily the best producers in New York at the time -  DJ Premier, Pete Rock, the Large Professor, Q-Tip and L.E.S. I mean what a team, usually working with so many gifted produces tends to effect the cohesiveness in both constructing the album and the output - but in this case it worked beautifully.

Another feat that's not often mentioned enough is the album is relatively short, especially for a hip-hop album - just 10 songs-long. I think the often said quality not quantity can be used here, as no song falls short, they're all near perfect their own way, perhaps more of the same would have become monotonous and probably would have dampened the album's overall quality. Hey, let's not forget the best-selling album in music history only had 9 songs (that's MJ's Thriller, if you're a moron), so yeah, that says something.

Looking at the album itself, its a perfect blend of what a hip-hop album should sound like. Nas' lyrical ability on the album is of course the album's strength, he had/has this ability to be so deep but not too abstract, finding the exact right medium with his lyrics. While we are all aware Nas is arguably the best lyricist, it's best exhibited here - he's conscious without trying to change your opinion like a conscious rapper would, his ultimate aim is quite literally to show you what the "New York State of Mind" is. I mean I'm 21, from Croydon in South London, but when I listen to Illmatic, I'm instantly teleported to Queensbridge, New York. And, it is his ability to detail his surrounding through a matter of  just rhyming words that does that, you can just feel what life must of been like in Queensbridge in the late 80's/90's. 

 It's the simplicity but depth to his lyrics that I love, like - “It drops deep as it does in my breath/I never sleep, 'cause sleep is the cousin of death/Beyond the walls of intelligence, life is defined/I think of crime when I’m in a New York state of mind”. He mirrors the city that never sleeps but not for joy that we're often presented, but a city that is rife with crime so you can't afford to sleep otherwise you'll ultimately die. The satire of his New York life being a city of crime as opposed to what it's often known for of being the city of opportunity, is seriously brilliant. Then, you just have clever whitty lyrics - "You couldn't catch me in the streets without a ton of reefer/That's like Malcolm X catching the Jungle Fever". That doesn't need explaining it's just really clever to be honest. Lets not forget - I switched the motto/instead of saying fuck tomorrow/that buck that bought a bottle/could a struck the lotto. I think this line best explains my thoughts on Nas' lyrical ability and his resonance in hip-hop today - while he's philosophising, he does it in a way that everyone can relate to, I mean despite any background you reside from you can all relate to this line - the lotto is a metaphor for good fortune in the future - something we can all relate to, just love it. 

Nas' is lyrics are perfectly laced with the production he was benefited with. The samples used, the beats, the loops were all perfectly chosen and created to provide a sonic presentation of New York. The Chords on "The World is Yours" by Pete Rock to portray the darkness of Queensbridge, the hypnotic bounce on "Represent" by Premier, the ever so jazzy crescendo on "One Love" by Q- Tip and the rawness of "Half-Time" by Large Professor. The production just creates a myriad of sounds that complement the picture that Nas' is trying to make of New York.

With that being said - Illmatic is now the blueprint of what not only a great hip-hop album should sound like but how a great album should sound like, ultimately. It completely changed hip-hop, to the point where you look at hip-hop as pre-Illmatic and post Illmatic. I think the legacy it's brought to hip-hop is un-measurable, it's the album that people who don't like hip-hop actually like, it's so good that's genreless it's just a great compostion of music.

Happy 20th birthday Illmatic!

The College Dropout - 10-year-anniversary

Today marks the 10-year-anniversary of the modern classic album - The College Dropout. The debut album of the then relatively unknown Kanye West. The impact the album has left on music and popular culture as a whole cannot be measured or compared - an album that totally redefined hip-hop and our understanding of its culture.

From a personal point of view this album resonates with me a lot, as around that time was when I actually began listening to hip-hop with more purpose and a certain level of understanding. College Dropout offered listeners something completely new, a message and audience that hip-hop had never really addressed. Okay, let’s set the scene here...a year prior to the release of The College Dropout, an absolute colossal of an album dropped that shook hip-hop and the music industry as a whole. That of course being 50 Cent's - Get Rich or Die Tryin' - which completely annihilated every other album that was released that year and defined 2003 as a whole. With it brought back gangsta hip-hop to the mainstream market, similar to the way Snoop Dogg did ten years prior. College Dropout on the other-hand was completely left-field, not only to Get Rich or Die Tryin' but different to anything that was being played at the time or anything that came before it. 

It's weird to think of a music world where Kanye West was relatively unheard of (at a mass scale anyway) - back then he was the producer that no-one thought could rap. Wearing pink polos and a backpack - unlike the present day pop-magnet, drunk at award-shows and fighting paparazzi Kanye we're now used to. Nonetheless, one thing that has always remained the same is his huge ego, Yeezy always knew and believed he'd be a star. And, it was this album that got him to this preeminent pop icon status he has today.

As an album College Dropout transformed hip-hop, it provided a new sound and a new type of listener. The concepts that Kanye was discussing was stuff we've never really heard of from a rapper before - the whole underdog who's trying to succeed narrative spoke volumes and resonated with us. A progressive album that didn't lend itself to its forefathers before it, the whole "conscious rap" - yes it is conscious, but not in the sense of being afro-centric and race-driven, but conscious in the sense of one finding themselves despite their sociological restraints. As I get older I begin to relate more with the album, especially now being a recent graduate the skits and Kanye's experience's at University (College) resonate with me even more. The whole rhetoric's of  trying to make it in the real world after the protective bubble that education creates, the issue of self-consciousness and the obstacles of society. Are all issues that people of that generation and this current generation are going through.

The more obvious point - the production, sampling soul classics that were sped-up, a trend that later characterised hip-hop in the years to come - notably being the "Kanye sound". The key to the album's success is its singles - breakthrough songs like 'Through the Wire', 'Jesus Walks' and 'All Falls Down', all of which deal with concepts that present a persona that listeners can relate to. Other likable and fun singles like 'Slowjamz' and 'The New Workout Plan' added the necessary charming sheen to the album. Not forgetting the now cult classics - 'Spaceship', 'We Don't Care' and 'Family Business' working as the compound that made the album so popular among listeners. As West commented on the album - "My persona is that I'm the regular person. Just think about whatever you've been through in the past week, and I have a song about that on my album".

Looking at it 10 years on, I feel as though I now understand his vision of what he was trying to achieve and is still achieving. I'd go as far as saying he's certainly the greatest artist of this generation, cause really and truly he's the only artist that we or in this respect, myself, has seen from the beginning and witnessed their growth as an artist - with the College Droput being the blueprint of his success. While it isn't my favourite Kanye album, it certainly is a classic album that revolutionised and reinvigorated hip-hop. 

Happy tenth birthday College Dropout!

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