I'm sure I'm going to get the usual answers of Dre, Pac, and Cube but the 93 Til Infinity post had me thinking of how the less celebrated albums from the West are for the most part better than the classics in my opinion.

I don't think the same can be said for other regions. But I'll leave it at that.

So what are your top 5 from the West?

And I'm sure this post has been done before but fuck it...

Death Certificate
Bizarre Ride II The Pharcyde
93 'til Infinity
IV Life
Coast II Coast

Amerikkka's most wanted Ice cube

the chronic Dr.Dre

doggystyle Snoop Dogg

safe+Sound Dj Quik

get in where you fit in Too Short / Street Gospel Sugga Free

,

Others, I don't know. Will have to think about it. . .


``i know you are fake. . . 'cause man, i'm the same.``
"untitled 4." http://bit.ly/1772QTW
"doctor who nursery rhyme." http://bit.ly/18oC1gH
"1.5.2.0" http://bit.ly/18UMv7A
"for vini." http://bit.ly/19HQbtF
"one year later." http://bit.ly/1eQNPwI

Music to Driveby
Black Mafia Life
Doggystyle
Get In Where You Fit In
187 He Wrote

AmeriKKKa's Most Wanted
Death Certificate
Cypress Hill
The Chronic
Bizarre Ride to the Pharcyde

I almost included No One Can Do it Better before remembering that the D.O.C. is from Texas. Sure feels like a West Coast album though.

WC and the MAAD Circle - Aint a Damn Thang Changed
Ray Luv - Forever Hustlin
CMW - Str8 Checkin Em
Daz Dillinger - RR&G
DJ Quik - Way 2 Fonky

The Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory


I loved others, but these I listened to more than any other west coast
album

-----------------------------
http://www.shenzhenphotos.com

labcabincalifornia, 93, konnectid, the shadiest one and gettin it were five of my favorites that spring to mind. 3030 and the first hiero record were great. obviously there is other quik stuff that could contend.

1. Ice Cube - AmeriKKKa's Most Wanted: 9.40
(n/a? Exile - Radio: 9.15)
2. Kendrick Lamar - good kid, mAAd city: 8.95
3. Kendrick Lamar - Section.80: 8.94
4. Ice Cube - Death Certificate: 8.88
5. The Pharcyde - Labcabincalifornia: 8.84


~~~~~~~~~
"This is the streets, and I am the trap." © Jay Bilas
http://www.popmatters.com/pm/archive/contributor/517
Hip Hop Handbook: http://tinyurl.com/ll4kzz

can you rate albums to a hundredth of a point?

-----------------------------
http://www.shenzhenphotos.com

or, short version: individual song scores out of five plus overall album score out of five equals overall score out of ten. just nerdy elementary calculator stuff.



~~~~~~~~~
"This is the streets, and I am the trap." © Jay Bilas
http://www.popmatters.com/pm/archive/contributor/517
Hip Hop Handbook: http://tinyurl.com/ll4kzz

1. The Pharcyde - Labcabincalifornia
2. Snoop Dogg - Doggystyle
3. Blu & Exile - Below The Heavens
4. Souls Of Mischief - '93 til Infinity
5. Foesum - Perfection ( HEAVILY SLEPT ON )

Ice Cube - Death Certificate
Souls of Mischief - 93 Till Infinity
Pharcyde - Bizare Ride II tha Pharcyde
Quasimoto - The Unseen
Above the Law - Uncle Sam's Curse

Above The Law - Uncle Sams Curse

E40 - In a Major Way

CMW - Music 2 Drive By

Cube - Death Certificate

Straight Outta Compton, The Chronic, Cypress Hill, Doggystyle, either of Cube's first two solos.

Those were all monumental, crucial in making the genre a commercial force & turning the landscape from r&b/rock to rap bleeding into those genres plus being bigger than any of them outside country/assembly-line-pop by the late 90s.

if you lived back east during the late 80s/early-90s, these were the records that were getting the attention almost to the exclusion of many other good more regionally-based acts.

You had to either be watching a ton of Video Music Box & to a lesser degree Yo! to see any of those acts.

In some cases you probably had to be out here & listening to KDAY.

******************************* Anecdotal Sidebar ************************************

I saw the Eazy-Duz-It Tour (NWA, Eazy, PE, Kid N' Play, Too Short, Kwame, JJ Fadd, Salt N' Pepa) at age 12 and they booed Too Short off the damn stage at the Philadelphia Spectrum.

That motherfucka was platinum at the time, I was too young to be aware of those kind of odd divisions.

Oh & Short's show did suck that night as well.

Philly was used to that Fresh Fest/Run-DMC/Kane/PE/Moe Dee/Heavy D & Da Boyz level of showmanship with sets, dances, call-and-response.

Short came out pacing back and forth with shitty sound, clutching his dick & then almost flaming out on purpose by around the eight-minute mark until he was booed off stage so loudly I couldn't hear the words in the 300 level.

***************************************************************************************

You also had the blockbuster crossover hits now seen more as novelty records like Bust A Move, Wild Thing, You Can't Touch This, Baby Got Back, Humpty Dance, Passin Me By, Regulate, I Got Five On It, etc.

I don't have any data on deck to back it up but the West Coast for being virtually dormant nationally up until maybe '87 but more like '88 in earnest I'm guessing produced more hits that made their way into Top 40 & sold more albums than New York from then up through maybe '94/95 with less acts in terms of sheer numbers.

So what you're left with is songs that once they crossed into the mainstream have been played so incessantly you don't care if you hear them again or albums that were such landmarks of their era that we might have worn them out then and/or they feel rooted in that time.

I can't recall the last time I played Cypress Hill's first album.

I also can't say there was an album that we played more in 1991.

It might even still sound good but it's been locked & loaded in the mental rolodex since age 14 so if I'm ever just sitting in silence I can probably conjure it up in my head.

Not to mention, Cypress' falloff was awkward to me, almost as awkward as PE's even though they weren't as important to me on the whole.

In both cases on the surface it was for different reasons but ultimately stained by the same thing (they became accepted as rock and roll, which at first seemed cool but ultimately ruined both.......'How I Can Just Kill A Man' rocks harder than 'Rock/Rap Superstar' or whatever that trash was, 'Public Enemy #1' is far harder ripping than Scott Ian stumbling through a pointless 'Bring The Noise' remake).

That's an entirely different post however.

In regards to your observation me nowadays will be reaching for Uncle Sam's Curse, Coast II Coast, Likwidation, Quik's 3rd & 4th, CMW's first three, Don't Fight The Feelin, Fear Itself, In A Major Way, Konnectid, Who Got The Gravy, loads of random TDE shit, Streetz Iz A Mutha, Born To Mack & others before I bother playing Straight Outta Compton outside 'If It Ain't Ruff' (check that remaster in some headphones, that envelope bass tickles inside your ear......Dre is a genius no matter what some of y'all say).

But I can't in good conscience tell you that most if not ANY are better than any of those 'classics' if you were starting from scratch.

My middle school teachers were not up on Illmatic & wringing their hands over its messages.

The cute blonde who had the purple tape in her car just called it 'The Wu' & didn't connect it to Liquid Swords.

I don't remember the video for My Melody.

Express Yourself was on literally every goddamn day with them busting through the white banner in the black hats & Eazy ducking shots at the parade.

That's a long way to go to not really fully commit to a legitimate final answer to five West Coast albums but c'mon, the question you asked is a complex one for the reasons I tried to lay out above but we had fun, right?

**************************************Anecdotal Headphone Postscript**********************

Not sure who it was the last time Straight Outta Compton was discussed, maybe mrhood but whoever was horrified as I was telling them that 'Quiet On The Set' is just *aight*, my bad, I was tripping.

Home trying to fight off this food poisoning that's been tearing me up since Friday AM, had me hurling in the bathroom of Standard Station Pub in El Segundo during lunch yesterday then cold-sweating at my desk for a half hour before peacing-out for the week shortly thereafter.

This post inspired me to throw Straight Outta Compton & this cherry lemonade with Vodka along with 'Quiet On The Set' is saving me right now.

I swear, I might even be able to go out tonight if all the sudden I like 'Somethin 2 Dance 2'.

Oh wait, hell naw.....that shit just came on now. Still goofy as shit. I think you had to grow up out here & spend weekends on Crenshaw in the mid-80s to appreciate Arabian Prince or Rodney O & Joe Cooley.

This song is dripping activator juice into my earholes & my stomach is knotting up again.

>Straight Outta Compton, The Chronic, Cypress Hill,
>Doggystyle, either of Cube's first two solos.
>
>Those were all monumental, crucial in making the genre a
>commercial force & turning the landscape from r&b/rock to rap
>bleeding into those genres plus being bigger than any of them
>outside country/assembly-line-pop by the late 90s.
>
>if you lived back east during the late 80s/early-90s, these
>were the records that were getting the attention almost to the
>exclusion of many other good more regionally-based acts.
>

I agree with that. The Chronic was probably the first album I bought back in the day when I started listening to Hip-Hop heavy.

>You had to either be watching a ton of Video Music Box & to a
>lesser degree Yo! to see any of those acts.
>
>In some cases you probably had to be out here & listening to
>KDAY.
>
>******************************* Anecdotal Sidebar
>************************************
>
>I saw the Eazy-Duz-It Tour (NWA, Eazy, PE, Kid N' Play, Too
>Short, Kwame, JJ Fadd, Salt N' Pepa) at age 12 and they booed
>Too Short off the damn stage at the Philadelphia Spectrum.
>
>That motherfucka was platinum at the time, I was too young to
>be aware of those kind of odd divisions.
>
>Oh & Short's show did suck that night as well.
>
>Philly was used to that Fresh Fest/Run-DMC/Kane/PE/Moe
>Dee/Heavy D & Da Boyz level of showmanship with sets, dances,
>call-and-response.
>
>Short came out pacing back and forth with shitty sound,
>clutching his dick & then almost flaming out on purpose by
>around the eight-minute mark until he was booed off stage so
>loudly I couldn't hear the words in the 300 level.
>
>***************************************************************************************
>

Cool story.

>You also had the blockbuster crossover hits now seen more as
>novelty records like Bust A Move, Wild Thing, You Can't Touch
>This, Baby Got Back, Humpty Dance, Passin Me By, Regulate, I
>Got Five On It, etc.
>

I remember all of those joints and minus the last three, they were seen as a joke or a novelty. I'd say the same can be said for Regulate today.

>I don't have any data on deck to back it up but the West Coast
>for being virtually dormant nationally up until maybe '87 but
>more like '88 in earnest I'm guessing produced more hits that
>made their way into Top 40 & sold more albums than New York
>from then up through maybe '94/95 with less acts in terms of
>sheer numbers.
>

I'd agree with that without seeing the numbers.

>So what you're left with is songs that once they crossed into
>the mainstream have been played so incessantly you don't care
>if you hear them again or albums that were such landmarks of
>their era that we might have worn them out then and/or they
>feel rooted in that time.
>

This is the interesting part. I do think his play into my initial observation which makes it hard to separate. Like I said, The Chronic, Black Sunday, Doggystyle, The Predator...I just don't listen to those albums ever despite growing up on them. However, I do recall growing up on Illmatic, Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik, Cuban Linx, The Infamous just the same and I listen to those albums still to this day. And while they didnt get the same commercial burn, I played them even more back then than I did the West Coast albums that I listed.

>I can't recall the last time I played Cypress Hill's first
>album.
>
>I also can't say there was an album that we played more in
>1991.
>
>It might even still sound good but it's been locked & loaded
>in the mental rolodex since age 14 so if I'm ever just sitting
>in silence I can probably conjure it up in my head.
>

I never listen to that joint...granted I got Black Sunday first and then went back and copped it.

>Not to mention, Cypress' falloff was awkward to me, almost as
>awkward as PE's even though they weren't as important to me on
>the whole.
>
>In both cases on the surface it was for different reasons but
>ultimately stained by the same thing (they became accepted as
>rock and roll, which at first seemed cool but ultimately
>ruined both.......'How I Can Just Kill A Man' rocks harder
>than 'Rock/Rap Superstar' or whatever that trash was, 'Public
>Enemy #1' is far harder ripping than Scott Ian stumbling
>through a pointless 'Bring The Noise' remake).
>
>That's an entirely different post however.
>

Agreed...you should make that post.

>In regards to your observation me nowadays will be reaching
>for Uncle Sam's Curse, Coast II Coast, Likwidation, Quik's 3rd
>& 4th, CMW's first three, Don't Fight The Feelin, Fear Itself,
>In A Major Way, Konnectid, Who Got The Gravy, loads of random
>TDE shit, Streetz Iz A Mutha, Born To Mack & others before I
>bother playing Straight Outta Compton outside 'If It Ain't
>Ruff' (check that remaster in some headphones, that envelope
>bass tickles inside your ear......Dre is a genius no matter
>what some of y'all say).
>
>But I can't in good conscience tell you that most if not ANY
>are better than any of those 'classics' if you were starting
>from scratch.
>

I'm not sure if I agree. Death Certificate is great. Other than that...there are a lot of holes in those classics in my opinion.

>My middle school teachers were not up on Illmatic & wringing
>their hands over its messages.
>
>The cute blonde who had the purple tape in her car just called
>it 'The Wu' & didn't connect it to Liquid Swords.
>
>I don't remember the video for My Melody.
>

Not sure how much of that is important to our conversation. I'm looking at these albums in retrospect so whatever was going on at the time is whatever. When I look back to Cuban Linx...I play every track and am reminded of the greatness. When I listen to The Chronic I'm kind of reminder that outside of its impact, it's really a spotty album.

>Express Yourself was on literally every goddamn day with them
>busting through the white banner in the black hats & Eazy
>ducking shots at the parade.
>
>That's a long way to go to not really fully commit to a
>legitimate final answer to five West Coast albums but c'mon,
>the question you asked is a complex one for the reasons I
>tried to lay out above but we had fun, right?
>

You're right, it is a complex answer which is why I asked. This is good music discussion though Bomb. If I wasn't watching the little one I would have gone in a little more.


>**************************************Anecdotal Headphone
>Postscript**********************
>
>Not sure who it was the last time Straight Outta Compton was
>discussed, maybe mrhood but whoever was horrified as I was
>telling them that 'Quiet On The Set' is just *aight*, my bad,
>I was tripping.
>
>Home trying to fight off this food poisoning that's been
>tearing me up since Friday AM, had me hurling in the bathroom
>of Standard Station Pub in El Segundo during lunch yesterday
>then cold-sweating at my desk for a half hour before
>peacing-out for the week shortly thereafter.
>
>This post inspired me to throw Straight Outta Compton & this
>cherry lemonade with Vodka along with 'Quiet On The Set' is
>saving me right now.
>
>I swear, I might even be able to go out tonight if all the
>sudden I like 'Somethin 2 Dance 2'.
>
>Oh wait, hell naw.....that shit just came on now. Still goofy
>as shit. I think you had to grow up out here & spend weekends
>on Crenshaw in the mid-80s to appreciate Arabian Prince or
>Rodney O & Joe Cooley.
>
>This song is dripping activator juice into my earholes & my
>stomach is knotting up again.

http://cdn.lastangryfan.com/wp-content/uploads/citizen-kane-clapping.gif

>So what you're left with is songs that once they crossed into
>the mainstream have been played so incessantly you don't care
>if you hear them again or albums that were such landmarks of
>their era that we might have worn them out then and/or they
>feel rooted in that time.
>
>I can't recall the last time I played Cypress Hill's first
>album.
>
>I also can't say there was an album that we played more in
>1991.
>
.
.
.
>In regards to your observation me nowadays will be reaching
>for Uncle Sam's Curse, Coast II Coast, Likwidation, Quik's 3rd
>& 4th, CMW's first three, Don't Fight The Feelin, Fear Itself,
>In A Major Way, Konnectid, Who Got The Gravy, loads of random
>TDE shit, Streetz Iz A Mutha, Born To Mack & others before I
>bother playing Straight Outta Compton outside 'If It Ain't
>Ruff' (check that remaster in some headphones, that envelope
>bass tickles inside your ear......Dre is a genius no matter
>what some of y'all say).
>
>But I can't in good conscience tell you that most if not ANY
>are better than any of those 'classics' if you were starting
>from scratch.


However, you could also argue that once the big songs/"hits" have been separated from the specific context of the album and instead enetered a sort of mass-consciousness *and* the initial "impact" has diminished, it's easier to evaluate the album on its own terms. Basically, how does the *whole* stack up separated from its original context, including the songs beyond the three-four or so "hits" you never need to hear again?

To me, that's where the likes of "Straight outta compton", "the Chronic" and, yes, even Cypress debut kind of fails (for the record, that's where "PAid in full" kind of fails too).

By comparison, Ice Cube's first two works MUCH better as albums to me; you could argue that it's because there are less overplayed songs but I don't think so; I think those two are genuinely strong front-to-back...

Overall, these are complex issues and I don't want to sound like a parody of myself and bring up fucking Black Sabbath but shit, why not?

Their most classic album "Paranoid" has three songs I *never* need to hear again (="Iron man", title-track and "War pigs"; actually, the last still works for me when I hear it because it's one hell of a jam even if I won't put it on voluntarily but the other two? WAY too overplayed ,at least here).

Remove those songs as well as "Planet Caravan" and "Rat salad" (the former is great but more of a side-dish than the main course, the latter is filler to the core) and there's three songs left; I love those songs but three dope songs can not exactly compete with "Master of reality" or "Vol. 4".

As such, I would never call it *my* favorite because a good chunk of it I never listen to.

At the same time, when I was like 9-10, I thought "Iron man" was the coolest shit ever and played it over and over and I loved the title-track too; it *was* my favorite Sabbath-record. SO:should I go back almost 30 years in order to evaluate the record properly or should I go with how I feel today? I think the latter is more honest even if it's not fair.

Also, I think it depends on the audience; like, "everyone" knows "nuthin but a G thang" and "Let me ride" inside-out. How does the rest stack up? That's really what I think is important because shit like impact, influence and blah-blah are things that disappear over time; it really doesn't matter too much 20 years down the line; it's a purely intellectual-as opposed to emotional-measurement of quality...

93 til
below the heavens
good kid maad city
3rd eye vision
labcabincalifornia

death certificate/the chronic right below

edit: also, i never realized labcabin got so much love. i thought it was generally regarded as much weaker than bizzare ride...

BizarreRide
No Need for..
93til
Amerikkka's Most
Straight Outta

is pretty much right on point about it.

All of our biggest hits get overexposed, to where it makes some of us forget how good it was when it first dropped. Dre is good for that...even with "In da club" it's crazy to think of how amazing it was when it first dropped.

Now what I do feel is that true West Coast fans, mainly L.A natives, will always have different taste from the East Coast and even the South when it comes to our own music...which is a reason why we prefer albums that aren't in that Top 5-10 cannon as much. Being at college in Florida reaaally made me realize how wild it was. It's a combination of them just not hearing music to like it, meaning they won't like it when you play it unless it really grabs them...and them just having different taste.

I felt it WEIRD that in the South, they LOVED "Wrong idea"...yet didn't care for "I luv it" "G'd up" "Let's get high" or "Y u bullshittin" which all got more love in L.A. Wrong idea is classic, but it was like "this still sounds West Coast...how you love this but don't like the others?" So maybe the other tracks were just too West for them to feel? Or their radio just didn't pick them up bc they weren't Snoop singles?

So this makes a difference as well. I guarantee that at least a third of L.A. natives who were in High School or under 30 in 1999-2000 would even tell you they like Kurupt "Streetz is a mutha" better than "2001." And most will pick Street Gospel and Rhythmalism over EVERY Snoop album after Doggystyle.

It's the overall fact that for the most part...the music that was catered most to a West Coast fan will hit us way harder, but isn't gonna reach everybody else the same. This is even why a Lesson head will pick Souls of Mischief/Hiero, Tha Liks, Blackalicious, Murs, and Digable over the Suga Free, Eastsidaz, Mac Dre, Keak type music.

>I felt it WEIRD that in the South, they LOVED "Wrong
>idea"...yet didn't care for "I luv it" "G'd up" "Let's get
>high" or "Y u bullshittin" which all got more love in L.A.
>Wrong idea is classic, but it was like "this still sounds West
>Coast...how you love this but don't like the others?" So maybe
>the other tracks were just too West for them to feel? Or their
>radio just didn't pick them up bc they weren't Snoop singles?
>

Living on the West i would've imagined the other songs mentioned were bigger than Wrong Idea. I heard that shit maybe handful of times and poof it was gone. G'd Up stayed on the radio through winter.

Just copped it but haven't listened yet.

as far as I'm concerned their first 2 are classics while Music to Driveby is a great album.

With honorable mention to Below the Heavens.

(edited because I'm an idiot).

Mines:

Death Certificate
Bizarre Ride II The Pharcyde
Below the Heavens
Coast II Coast
The Unseen

CHECK OUT AND DOWNLOAD MY FREE BEATS @ WWW.SOUNDCLICK.COM/SYLANA
~i dont deal with colors letters or any morse codes or beams~
"and suddenly the ghetto didnt seem so tough u thought u had it rough we always had enough"~tupac

Xzibit's first two albums too

i think there is a side of west coast rap that gets extremely under discussed and appreciated tho. most of the none critical/popular earthquake classic albums in here ARE STILL GANGSTER RAP, and i know why that is, but these albums need love/discussion:

Freestyle Fellowships first two lps
Myka and Aceys for 2-3 joints
Digital Underground's Sex Packets
Xzibits first two
Dilated's The platform
Lootpack's Soundpieces (even w/ Wildchild's WACK EMCEES, lol)
The Unseen
Defari's Focused Daily
Self-Scientific's The Self-Science
and a couple of others i'm forgetting

but these albums stretch from 88-2000 and carve out the strong reality to an alternative voice that ran parallel (NOT IN OPPOSITION) to the gangster and pimp shit of Short, Dre, Snoop and Quik. the west coast has always had many style and voices, but because the "hegemonic" history is NWA to _____ insert name(s) this gets lost.

it's always funny when current writers are flabbergasted that OFWGKTA, TDE, Dom Kennedy, Blu, Madlib (Stones Throw), Gangrene ect all come form the same region

>i think there is a side of west coast rap that gets extremely
>under discussed and appreciated tho. most of the none
>critical/popular earthquake classic albums in here ARE STILL
>GANGSTER RAP, and i know why that is, but these albums need
>love/discussion:

Because none of those albums "blew up". I personally hate segregating Hip Hop into "gangsta" or "backpack". I listed what I thought were the best West Coast Hip Hop albums period. I mean where do Xzibit's first 2 albums fit? To me they are a little bit of both like a lot of stuff. Same with King T or Cypress Hill.
>
>Freestyle Fellowships first two lps
>Myka and Aceys for 2-3 joints
>Digital Underground's Sex Packets
>Xzibits first two
>Dilated's The platform
>Lootpack's Soundpieces (even w/ Wildchild's WACK EMCEES, lol)
>The Unseen
>Defari's Focused Daily
>Self-Scientific's The Self-Science
>and a couple of others i'm forgetting
>
>but these albums stretch from 88-2000 and carve out the strong
>reality to an alternative voice that ran parallel (NOT IN
>OPPOSITION) to the gangster and pimp shit of Short, Dre, Snoop
>and Quik. the west coast has always had many style and voices,
>but because the "hegemonic" history is NWA to _____ insert
>name(s) this gets lost.
>
>it's always funny when current writers are flabbergasted that
>OFWGKTA, TDE, Dom Kennedy, Blu, Madlib (Stones Throw),
>Gangrene ect all come form the same region

That speaks to their own ignorance about Hip Hop and or Black folks in general. I made this point in a another post that people act as if there is like a planet gangster and a planet backpack or conscious and that these artists don't all come from the same place.

like seriously who gives a flying fuck. rap was never "suppose" to blow up and some aspects of it did, doesn't negate the way various folks who worked within the "genre" to explore musical, experiential and emotional boundaries

i wrote parallel and not in opposition, and you over hear trying to say gangster/backpack division.

the point is some of those other gangster rap records didn't blow up either and it adds to the mystique that the real west coast shit is the gangster shit

>like seriously who gives a flying fuck. rap was never
>"suppose" to blow up and some aspects of it did, doesn't
>negate the way various folks who worked within the "genre" to
>explore musical, experiential and emotional boundaries

I never said it negated anything. Obviously it matters to fans which is part of the reason that some of the more under appreciated albums tend to not get mentioned immediately. When ever someone mentions the top 5 of anything most people are going to name the albums that had the most influence and had the most replay value over time.
>
>i wrote parallel and not in opposition, and you over hear
>trying to say gangster/backpack division.
>
>the point is some of those other gangster rap records didn't
>blow up either and it adds to the mystique that the real west
>coast shit is the gangster shit

Most of what people in this thread and in general are listing are albums that were huge and that's just a fact. Nobody is naming Low Profile "We're In This Together" even though it's one of my favorite albums partially because not as many people have heard that record and it's not constantly referenced by artist from the next generation. Simple as that.

but Defari destroyed every beat on that album as well...

classic shit

1. Death Certificate- Perfect mix of street knowledge, shit talking and story telling. One of the 10 greatest Hip Hop albums of all time regardless of region.

2. Amerikkka's Most Wanted-This is like the first album that got East Coast heads to acknowledge that the West Coast had skills and that Cube wasn't just a shock rapper only getting by on controversy. Perfect marriage of West and East with the Bomb Squad and Sir Jinx handling the production.

3. The Chronic-Dre's masterpiece of production. Sonically that album is perfect and Snoop, Kurupt, RBX, etc all brought a new flavor and style to West Coast MC'ing.

4. No One Can Do It Better-I'm counting this as a West Coast album since Dre produced it and at the time DOC was so entrenched in LA culture and the whole Ruthless Records crew were hanging and touring together. Big influence on future lyricists like Snoop, Ras Kass & Xzibit.

5. I Wish My Brother George Was Here-A lot of people would pick No Need For Alarm and for some reason there is this resistance from the "underground" west coast scene to give this album the props it deserves. I think because there is such a funk influence and Cube is on it and they want to separate Del from anything "Gangsta". A great mix of fun, lyricism, story telling and brought a whole new, fresh perspective to what was going on in the West.

I banged The Devil Made Me DO It and Sleeping With The Enemy for a while. Even being on the East, that was some high power shit.

Cube's first 2 and DoggyStyle are easy picks, but you can't fuck with them

Always been a King T fan, so I'd roll with Tha Triflin' Album

2nd II None - Sefl Titled. So many bangers, top notch Quik production and guest appearances from their crew. More Than a Player, Let the Rhythm take you, Ain't Nothin Wrong, True to Yourself all personal classics.

No One Can Do It Better - Top notch lyrics and beats. Inclides possibly my top posse cut of all time "The Grand Finale". Breath control lessons given all over this record.

Quik is the Name - Quik brought west coast production to the forefront with this, new style, instrumentals (quiks groove), faster rhyming. Made typical songs about smoking/drinking that sounded different than all the others out anywhere.

Kev

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“Floyd Mayweather should be taking fights up to 157 or 160 pounds...His frame can hold the weight..it's not even a lot of weight....Go to the gym and lift weights man..lol.”-- Warren Coolidge

1 ice cube death certificate
2 ice cube amerikkas most wanted
3 digital underground-sex packets
4 SOM -93 til infinty
5 the pharcyde - bizarre ride/snoop dogg- doggystyle

Streets Iz A Mutha
Death Certificate
Me Against The World
The Chronic
DoggyStyle

The Coup-Kill My Landlord
Genocide & Juice
Paris-Sleeping With the Enemy
Guerrilla Funk
Rass Kass-Soul On Ice

These kids are raise on rap music
that's why they
autone it

-Blitz the Ambassador

i be feeling some Game though
and i mos def jammed to some ice cube
and pharcyde

thas about it


CHECK OUT AND DOWNLOAD MY FREE BEATS @ WWW.SOUNDCLICK.COM/SYLANA
~i dont deal with colors letters or any morse codes or beams~
"and suddenly the ghetto didnt seem so tough u thought u had it rough we always had enough"~tupac