The Blueprint may be Jay Z's most captivating record since Reasonable Doubt, but its predictably detached mood reflects the master hustler's superior ability to trick out lacklustre subject matter with lyrical complexity and brief flashes of manufactured introspection. The Blueprint, a solid mix of pre-programmed radio hits ("Izzo", "Girls, Girls, Girls") and ...
Manufacturer: Mercury Records Ltd (London)
Manufacturer: Polydor Group
If a case can be made for gangsta rap, Cypress Hill is the act to make it. The trio of L.A. Latinos has the commercial clout and its raps are mercifully free of the misogyny, homophobia, and anti-Asian, anti-Jewish racism that so often mars the genre. Member/producer D.J. Muggs creates an eerily lean soundscape of whining sirens, off-kilter funk rhythms, metallic percussion, nasal taunts, and ...
Manufacturer: Columbia
Manufacturer: Atlantic
With two solid albums already under his belt - Time To Grow and Dedicated - as well as two Brits, two Mobos and over 1.5 million album sales, UK vocalist Lemar has already earned his place as one of the UK's most adroit soul singers. Yet The Truth About Love, Lemar's third album, is even more of an accomplished work than its predecessors. Taking an old-school production ...
Manufacturer: SonyBMG
Manufacturer: Parlophone
Manufacturer: Dcypha Alliance
Nasir Jones made this debut album at the age of 20, already armed with the calm perceptiveness and been-there-done-that attitude of a much older ghetto vet, though sometimes his inner callow youth shows itself. Illmatic is a look back at a life spent in the culture of the projects, acknowledging joy as much as pain and taking note of violence as a fact of his environment rather than a focus ...
Manufacturer: 2point9/jayded
De La's debut represented a new path for hip-hop, a reaction to conventions that had turned into clichés. It was friendly and playful enough to cross over to a pop audience (thanks to Prince Paul's production, which found the funk hiding inside Steely Dan and "Schoolhouse Rock"), but complicated and tough enough to be hugely influential in the hip-hop world. Cryptic but ecstatic, and sometimes ...
Manufacturer: Rhino
