Hip Hop History discussion - 2001
Hmm...
2001...
Bought the 95. Kelli left Greensboro in mid-May, I sulked from then til November, barely pausing to notice 9/11, as I had bigger fish to fry.
Went back to school, age 21/22 this year and settling into a bit of this strip club habit, with some influence from a newly-18-years-old someone whose mother and sister can actually read this, so names are not given.
Met one of my best friends -- who is subscribed to this blog -- this year as well... Factoring all into this, 2001 was not a BAD year, and the music I can remember based upon what I type before cracking open Google, Wikipedia and Amazon to work on this piece serves to that, even if I don't list a fucking TON of albums here.
Noteworthy as well is that I was PARTIALLY sloshed this year too. Not as bad as 2002 before this blog, but very much intoxificated, a state I have surely been in a constant state of since age 19...
Damn, no extra lining here, time for battle.
January
What. The. FUCK?!!?
Daz Dillinger and JT The Bigga Figga release From Long Beach To Fillmoe and I couldn't be any more pissed with the first released album of any blog I have written to current.
It was so bad that no one else bothered to try to fix the situation for the balance of the month.
February
Spice 1 drops The Hits, vol. 2: Ganked & Gaffled and I am thinking of giving my mother an abortion of only one twin, 30 years after we were born.
March
Bizzy Bone's The Gift came out, then L-Burna (P.K.A. Layzie Bone)'s Thug By Nature and Trick Daddy's Thugs Are Us released on the same day... Gorillaz' Gorillaz came out a week later, as did Big Pun's Endangered Species, Jadakiss' Kiss Tha Game Goodbye, 2Pac's Til The End of Time and KRS-One's Sneak Attack.
No one cares about any album released this month except a guy named Lawrence Parker, even though no one bought anything released by Bone Thugs-N-Harmony members either.
Damn, 2 out of 8, WOW!!!
April
Cappadonna's The Yin and the Yang and Run DMC's Crown Royal are it for this month, unless you count Angie Martinez' Up Close and Personal, and Ego G released The Truth Hurts, both of which I do not. In such, this month SUCKED!!!
May
Buju Banton's Ultimate Collection and Pete Rock's Petestrumentals on one day made me extra happy. Deltron 3030 releasing Deltron 3030: The Instrumentals the same day as Hi-Tek's Hi-Teknology a week later also made me happy. Missy Elliott's Miss E... So Addictive, though? Not so much. Cannibal Ox released The Cold Vein, Sticky Fingaz made Black Trash: The Autobiography of Kirk Jones, and then fittingly celebrated it's success by getting his ass kicked on MTV. Kardinall Offishall's Quest for Fire: Firestarter vol 1 came out the same day as Lil Jon & The Eastside Boyz' Put Yo Hood Up and Redman's Malpractice.
On the whole, with the exception of Sticky Fingaz, Lil Jon and Missy, this was NOT a bad month at all.
June
Confession time... Foxy Brown's Broken Silence was the best album she ever made, and I am not joking when I say that I can still listen to it. Fellow Firm member AZ also released one of my favorites of his catalog this month as well in 9 lives.The Intelligent Hoodlum Tragedy Khadafi released Against All Odds, then there was D12's regrettable debut Devil's Night the same day as an equally forgettable Digital Underground compilation, No Nose Job: The Legend of Digital Underground, and June was now over.
July
Tha Liks released X.O. Experience the same day as Lil Romeo's Lil Romeo, a week before Akinyele's Anakonda, Killah Priest's Priesthood, Kurupt's Gangsta Boogie: A Smoke Odyssey and Z-Ro's King of the Ghetto. A Dogg Pound compilation, 2002 released the same day as Tha Eastsidaz' Deuces N Trayz: The Old Fashioned Way and Cormega's The Realness, and it is no small wonder I remember NOTHING about my 22nd birth month.
August
Juvenile released Project English and Three 6 Mafia gave us Choices: The Album, then Krazie Bone gave us Thug on the Line and RZA released Digital Bullet.
You know what? Fuck all that, did y'all realize that Human League released an album this month too?
September
Oh wow, is it time for this month?
I was in an electrical class when the first plane hit. Another instructor came in white as a fucking sheet and we turned on the TV just in time to catch the second. We were immediately sent on a break.
We came back and the towers fell after about an hour and a half and we were sent to lunch early, instructed to come back at the normal time.
I stopped by the job to see what the impact of the day would be on work and whether or not I would need to show up for my overtime, I was advised that communications were NUTS at the times of impact and yaddayaddayadda and to come on in when I was ready. I stopped by Target on my way to the house to kill the remainder of a 2-hour lunch from class and picked up Jay-Z's The Blueprint and Fabolous' Ghetto Fabolous. Also released that day was Damian Marley's Halfway Tree, but I would not realize that until over 4 years after that fact.
Also released this month was Bubba Sparxxx' Dark Days, Bright Nights, Immortal Technique's Revolutionary Vol. 1 NERD's classic In Search Of... and Ol' Dirty Bastard's The Dirty Story: The Best of Ol Dirty Bastard.
Historically, this is one of the worst months in US history... Musically, though? Not bad.
October
A Busta Rhymes compilation (damn, I have been saying that a lot in these!), Total Devastation: The Best Of, dropped the same day as Jermaine Dupri's Instructions and Ja Rule's Pain is Love... That is not a good occurrence.
Kottonmouth Kings released Hidden Stash II: The Kream of the Krop the same day as TI's debut I'm Serious.
Later in the month, we get Mr. Cheeks' inexplicably named John P. Kelly and Masta Ace's Disposable Arts, then DMX with the ironically named (knowing what we know now) The Great Depression, Grand Puba's Understand This and Dilated Peoples' Expansion Team and CunningLingusts' Will Rap for Food.
Save for TI and Dilated Peoples, this month did nothing to clear our minds of the one before it.
November
Ludacris dropped his best album to date, Word of Mouf.
*pause button, I gotta story to tell*
Leading into the release of that album, Luda and his folks were on a bus painted with the album logo plastered about the side of it. A friend of mine had copped the album on the internets and burned me a copy of it... I traded cars with my brother that night, and his system at the time was a LIITTTTLE better than mine. I went to meet some friends at the bowling alley, bumping the SHIT outta that CD.
I happen to know that the DTP people had been handing out sampler tapes of the album as I had seen them doing it in the mall that day, but they were snippets and edited. I approach the bowling alley, "It's Cold Outside" ON. FUCKING. SMASH!!! and I look up to see that damned bus with 3 large negroes looking at me with the stank eye.
Went in the alley without getting my ass kicked, it was Wil, Steve, Irv, Bobby and myself. Irv worked there part time, so we bowled free. We look over, Ludacris is on the lane 2 down to our left with no security around him. Real cool cat.
... until he stepped over the line you don't cross on a bowling alley and BUSTED HIS ASS on that wax. Laughed with everyone, finished their game and bounced, my brother's car was not smashed to shit when I got back outside.
The Coup released Party Music and Petey Pablo released Diary of a Sinner -- much to the detriment of NC hip hop fans -- on the same day.
Later in the month, Canibus released C True Hollywood Stories on the same day Ghostface Bulletproof Wallets, Swollen Members' Bad Dreams, and UGK's Dirty Money. For some odd reason, someone compiled Cappadonna's Cappadonna Hits for release on the same day asSting's ... All This Time and Timbaland & Magoo's Indecent Proposal. Chino XL made I Told You So, then Busta Rhymes closed out the month Genesis.
December
Cypress Hill gave us Stoned Raiders while De La Soul furthered a series with Art Official Intelligence: Bionix, Fat Joe gave Jealous Ones Still Envy (J.O.S.E.) (which I only bought because it featured Buju Banton on a song and he was apparently trying to go in on Jay-Z), Mack 10 dropped Bang or Ball [pause...] and Outkast put out Dre and Big Boi Present... Outkast ALL ON THE SAME DAY!
Warren G released Return of the Regulator a week later, followed one week more by Lil Bow Wow's Doggypile Bag, Insane Clown Posse's Forgotten Freshness Vol 3, Jay-Z's MTV Unplugged, Master P's Game Fucked Face, Nas' Stillmatic and Wu Tang Clan's Iron Flag...
Not a bad way to end the year, I guess, when you look at the LEVEL of good we got in comparison to the bad.
Time to do some math here, and as I type that at 11:50am, preparing to break 30 minutes for food, I am not sure how this will turn out. I see some certifiable CLASSICS in this list, but there again, I see some shit I would not waste my bandwidth on trying to listen to...
A robust 83 releases, with an acquisition rate of 35 for a score of 42.16%. No modifiers to offer this time. I would be embarrassed to admit to owning some of the things I do own from this year, and we'll leave that right there.
With specific events tied to so much that happened this year, it is so much easier to remember the "where I was/what I was doing" aspect of it all, which made the scribe of this year's releases quite fun, even though quite long.
2001 was a year of tragedy for many, with a sprinkling of good times. I paraphrase Buju Banton when I quote him as having said Music is what the people turn to in a time of peril in a Vibe Magazine Boom Shots interview. [I told y'all, I drank a WHOLE lot in the early part of this decade]. Between personal shit, tragedy on a national scale and all else, it would surely suffice to say that we NEEDED music to get through this one... This year was not as bad as the numbers suggest, and it is not often you will hear me cop to that.
See y'all tonight in 2003.
2001...
Bought the 95. Kelli left Greensboro in mid-May, I sulked from then til November, barely pausing to notice 9/11, as I had bigger fish to fry.
Went back to school, age 21/22 this year and settling into a bit of this strip club habit, with some influence from a newly-18-years-old someone whose mother and sister can actually read this, so names are not given.
Met one of my best friends -- who is subscribed to this blog -- this year as well... Factoring all into this, 2001 was not a BAD year, and the music I can remember based upon what I type before cracking open Google, Wikipedia and Amazon to work on this piece serves to that, even if I don't list a fucking TON of albums here.
Noteworthy as well is that I was PARTIALLY sloshed this year too. Not as bad as 2002 before this blog, but very much intoxificated, a state I have surely been in a constant state of since age 19...
Damn, no extra lining here, time for battle.
January
What. The. FUCK?!!?
Daz Dillinger and JT The Bigga Figga release From Long Beach To Fillmoe and I couldn't be any more pissed with the first released album of any blog I have written to current.
It was so bad that no one else bothered to try to fix the situation for the balance of the month.
February
Spice 1 drops The Hits, vol. 2: Ganked & Gaffled and I am thinking of giving my mother an abortion of only one twin, 30 years after we were born.
March
Bizzy Bone's The Gift came out, then L-Burna (P.K.A. Layzie Bone)'s Thug By Nature and Trick Daddy's Thugs Are Us released on the same day... Gorillaz' Gorillaz came out a week later, as did Big Pun's Endangered Species, Jadakiss' Kiss Tha Game Goodbye, 2Pac's Til The End of Time and KRS-One's Sneak Attack.
No one cares about any album released this month except a guy named Lawrence Parker, even though no one bought anything released by Bone Thugs-N-Harmony members either.
Damn, 2 out of 8, WOW!!!
April
Cappadonna's The Yin and the Yang and Run DMC's Crown Royal are it for this month, unless you count Angie Martinez' Up Close and Personal, and Ego G released The Truth Hurts, both of which I do not. In such, this month SUCKED!!!
May
Buju Banton's Ultimate Collection and Pete Rock's Petestrumentals on one day made me extra happy. Deltron 3030 releasing Deltron 3030: The Instrumentals the same day as Hi-Tek's Hi-Teknology a week later also made me happy. Missy Elliott's Miss E... So Addictive, though? Not so much. Cannibal Ox released The Cold Vein, Sticky Fingaz made Black Trash: The Autobiography of Kirk Jones, and then fittingly celebrated it's success by getting his ass kicked on MTV. Kardinall Offishall's Quest for Fire: Firestarter vol 1 came out the same day as Lil Jon & The Eastside Boyz' Put Yo Hood Up and Redman's Malpractice.
On the whole, with the exception of Sticky Fingaz, Lil Jon and Missy, this was NOT a bad month at all.
June
Confession time... Foxy Brown's Broken Silence was the best album she ever made, and I am not joking when I say that I can still listen to it. Fellow Firm member AZ also released one of my favorites of his catalog this month as well in 9 lives.
July
Tha Liks released X.O. Experience the same day as Lil Romeo's Lil Romeo, a week before Akinyele's Anakonda, Killah Priest's Priesthood, Kurupt's Gangsta Boogie: A Smoke Odyssey and Z-Ro's King of the Ghetto. A Dogg Pound compilation, 2002 released the same day as Tha Eastsidaz' Deuces N Trayz: The Old Fashioned Way and Cormega's The Realness, and it is no small wonder I remember NOTHING about my 22nd birth month.
August
Juvenile released Project English and Three 6 Mafia gave us Choices: The Album, then Krazie Bone gave us Thug on the Line and RZA released Digital Bullet.
You know what? Fuck all that, did y'all realize that Human League released an album this month too?
September
Oh wow, is it time for this month?
I was in an electrical class when the first plane hit. Another instructor came in white as a fucking sheet and we turned on the TV just in time to catch the second. We were immediately sent on a break.
We came back and the towers fell after about an hour and a half and we were sent to lunch early, instructed to come back at the normal time.
I stopped by the job to see what the impact of the day would be on work and whether or not I would need to show up for my overtime, I was advised that communications were NUTS at the times of impact and yaddayaddayadda and to come on in when I was ready. I stopped by Target on my way to the house to kill the remainder of a 2-hour lunch from class and picked up Jay-Z's The Blueprint and Fabolous' Ghetto Fabolous. Also released that day was Damian Marley's Halfway Tree, but I would not realize that until over 4 years after that fact.
Also released this month was Bubba Sparxxx' Dark Days, Bright Nights, Immortal Technique's Revolutionary Vol. 1 NERD's classic In Search Of... and Ol' Dirty Bastard's The Dirty Story: The Best of Ol Dirty Bastard.
Historically, this is one of the worst months in US history... Musically, though? Not bad.
October
A Busta Rhymes compilation (damn, I have been saying that a lot in these!), Total Devastation: The Best Of, dropped the same day as Jermaine Dupri's Instructions and Ja Rule's Pain is Love... That is not a good occurrence.
Kottonmouth Kings released Hidden Stash II: The Kream of the Krop the same day as TI's debut I'm Serious.
Later in the month, we get Mr. Cheeks' inexplicably named John P. Kelly and Masta Ace's Disposable Arts, then DMX with the ironically named (knowing what we know now) The Great Depression, Grand Puba's Understand This and Dilated Peoples' Expansion Team and CunningLingusts' Will Rap for Food.
Save for TI and Dilated Peoples, this month did nothing to clear our minds of the one before it.
November
Ludacris dropped his best album to date, Word of Mouf.
*pause button, I gotta story to tell*
I happen to know that the DTP people had been handing out sampler tapes of the album as I had seen them doing it in the mall that day, but they were snippets and edited. I approach the bowling alley, "It's Cold Outside" ON. FUCKING. SMASH!!! and I look up to see that damned bus with 3 large negroes looking at me with the stank eye.
Went in the alley without getting my ass kicked, it was Wil, Steve, Irv, Bobby and myself. Irv worked there part time, so we bowled free. We look over, Ludacris is on the lane 2 down to our left with no security around him. Real cool cat.
... until he stepped over the line you don't cross on a bowling alley and BUSTED HIS ASS on that wax. Laughed with everyone, finished their game and bounced, my brother's car was not smashed to shit when I got back outside.
*resume blog*
[Phlip note - I DID buy the album as well, in fact I have bought another copy since]The Coup released Party Music and Petey Pablo released Diary of a Sinner -- much to the detriment of NC hip hop fans -- on the same day.
Later in the month, Canibus released C True Hollywood Stories on the same day Ghostface Bulletproof Wallets, Swollen Members' Bad Dreams, and UGK's Dirty Money. For some odd reason, someone compiled Cappadonna's Cappadonna Hits for release on the same day as
December
Cypress Hill gave us Stoned Raiders while De La Soul furthered a series with Art Official Intelligence: Bionix, Fat Joe gave Jealous Ones Still Envy (J.O.S.E.) (which I only bought because it featured Buju Banton on a song and he was apparently trying to go in on Jay-Z), Mack 10 dropped Bang or Ball [pause...] and Outkast put out Dre and Big Boi Present... Outkast ALL ON THE SAME DAY!
Warren G released Return of the Regulator a week later, followed one week more by Lil Bow Wow's Doggy
Not a bad way to end the year, I guess, when you look at the LEVEL of good we got in comparison to the bad.
Time to do some math here, and as I type that at 11:50am, preparing to break 30 minutes for food, I am not sure how this will turn out. I see some certifiable CLASSICS in this list, but there again, I see some shit I would not waste my bandwidth on trying to listen to...
A robust 83 releases, with an acquisition rate of 35 for a score of 42.16%. No modifiers to offer this time. I would be embarrassed to admit to owning some of the things I do own from this year, and we'll leave that right there.
With specific events tied to so much that happened this year, it is so much easier to remember the "where I was/what I was doing" aspect of it all, which made the scribe of this year's releases quite fun, even though quite long.
2001 was a year of tragedy for many, with a sprinkling of good times. I paraphrase Buju Banton when I quote him as having said Music is what the people turn to in a time of peril in a Vibe Magazine Boom Shots interview. [I told y'all, I drank a WHOLE lot in the early part of this decade]. Between personal shit, tragedy on a national scale and all else, it would surely suffice to say that we NEEDED music to get through this one... This year was not as bad as the numbers suggest, and it is not often you will hear me cop to that.
See y'all tonight in 2003.
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