The musings of a madman...

Apparently, through a few comments and direct comments, my "Wayback" series of blogs have been a decent hit with both of my readers... I make no specific claims to remember all that I am naming off the top of my head, but I DO remember why they matter to me and speak to such in my commentary. We can thank Google, Amazon and Wikipedia for reminding me of the albums, and further we can thank my parents for their situation, which drove me to my love of music, specifically hip hop. At the end of it all, the hip hop I listened to and grew to like spoke to situations I was in, had been in, would come to be in (now that I look back) or had seen others through. It was something that was for me. We never had much coming up, but through cutting yards for extra cash starting at like age 11 or 12, and working on W9 (read: legal) jobs promptly from age 16, I have built a collection WELL in excess of 800 CD's, most of them hip hop... What is contained in my computer is even bigger, wha

You should both be familiar with my 1998 , 1996 and 1997 editions, and perhaps have noted that I will likely be doing one of these whenever the inclination hits me... I will not promise to keep them in order, as I have not to this point, only posting them whenever I feel like it. I will also not commit to how many or what years I will do here, as it is very much possible that I could be fully entrenched in WANTING to write something on a specific year, but left with nothing of special interest to write about in any particular depth. With the promises out of the way, let's look at 1999 in hip hop. January gave us only weak albums from Keith Murray and Foxy Brown, "It's a Beautiful Thing" and "Chyna Doll" respectively... This year is not off to a promising start to say the very least. February had me WIDE open, though... Robin at work (Lim's Menswear) was from Detroit and apparently knew something about the cats that came through Maurice Malone's Hi

I'm sure that both of you have seen where I not-so-famously discussed some years in hip hop past... I started with 1998 and more recently dropped one about 1996 . I have since decided "Hey, Phlip, perhaps it would be a good idea to continue discussion about the years that formed your love of hip hop?" I promptly thanked myself and started typing on this post that the both of you are reading right now... Today, we'll talk about 1997, the first half of which I spent busting ass and escaping Grimsley Senior High School. January gave us Camp Lo's "Uptown Saturday Night," which shared ONLY the 'Blaxplotation' element with the movie from which they cribbed the title. This album was HUGE down here in Greensboro, largely because Ski Beatz (who also did a fuck ton of beats for Jay-Z and later The Sporty Thievz) is from down here in the 336... Or 919 as it was at the time, lol. Only hip hop released that month, and it was a STELLAR kickoff to the year, I

The year? That would be 1996... I will carry this from the beginning of the year until the end, so this will include the second half of Junior year in high school and the first half of Senior year. The year started slowly, with the first hip hop release being Kris Kross' third album "Young, Rich and Dangerous," which thankfully ushered them out of the consciousness of those among the 4 million plus of us who actually BOUGHT "Totally Krossed Out" just 4 years prior. That was January . February (a word in which the R is not silent in) only saw the release of 2 hip hop albums, one of which was not all the way hip hop -- Tupac's Death Row debut and game-changer "All Eyez on Me" and The Fugees' "The Score," both CLASSIC albums, ironically released on the same day. I was not a 'pac Stan like so many people in my high school were, so it would be months later before I would let myself buy his album, but I had The Fugees quickfast, I stil

Dude, LOOK at 1998 in hip hop: January 13: The Lox - "Money, Power & Respect" February 25: Scarface - "My Homies" March 19: DMX - "It's Dark And Hell Is Hot" March 24: Cappadonna - "The Pillage" Hussein Fatal - "In the Line of Fire" (who? One of 2Pac's Outlawz, decent album no less) M.O.P. - "First Family For Life" March 31: Gangstarr - "Moment of Truth" April 7: Goodie Mob - "Still Standing" AZ - "Pieces of a Man" April 28: Big Pun - "Capital Punishment" May 5: Various - "Lyricist's Lounge vol. 1" (the kickoff to a STELLAR line of compilations, I still listen to this today) June 2: Lord Tariq and Peter Gunz - "Make it Reign" June 9: Juvenile - "400 Degreez" June 16: Devin - "The Dude" (yes, his original rap name was just "Devin," but this album caused the second part to be assumed) June 30: Def Squad - "El Nino&quo

Down here in NC, we had a couple of the smaller mom-and-pops record stores in my city, both like 2 miles apart, named School Kids and The Record Exchange... I went to high school right in between them, and would go to one every Tuesday after school, which one depended on whether I had to go to work or home. Soon after high school ended, School Kids moved about 3 blocks down, Record Exchange moved to their place. Within 18ish months, School Kids was closed (there is a bar on one side and an H&R Block on the other where they were now)... The Record Exchange, living in School Kids' old spot, would stick it out for about 5-6ish more years, but there is now a Walgreens situated where that building and the aforementioned H&R Block were known for having been. Now, as someone who has lived and gone to school in the city that he was born in all his life, I have seen plenty of the world outside of my home city/state/country, but it had not at the time dawned on me that those were not