EPMD - Business Never Personal 2xLP

Def Jam (2005, Reissue)

Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo! MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for thirty plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

It's kind of funny to me that I've never written about EPMD's fourth album before.  It's mostly because the original single LP version has been in my record collection for a really, really long time and it's just now that I have a new version to write about.  I can't even tell you how much I love this record.  I have been listening to it kind of nonstop since it originally came out back in 1992.  It was the video for the song "Crossover" on Yo! MTV Raps! that first hooked me.  With its robot funk hook, hard beat and lyrics about not selling out and crossing over, it was tailor made for what I wanted to hear as a 15 year old.  I think some people forgot or just weren't around to see just how crazy the anti-sellout thing was in both rap and rock back then.  But it struck a chord with a lot of people and I was definitely one of them when it came to hip hop.

And as much as I was drawn in by "Crossover," a truly stellar song, I'm not even sure I would rank that one in the top half of great songs on this record.  It's one of those records that is flawless from start to finish.  The production on this thing is so amazing.  It's rugged, with big bass lines and a fullness that is tough to compare anything else to.  I don't know of too many records that sound like this, and if I'm missing something, please let me know.  In some ways I've spent the last 32 years trying to chase down another record like this one.

Lyrically, I think Erick and Parrish shine brighter than they ever did on Business Never Personal.  You'll never hear me say a bad word about the first three EPMD records.  They are all wonderful in their own way.  For me, this album is their peak.  Their vocals pack more punch than anything they'd done previously and the way they flow over the beats is just a joy to hear.  

The only possible criticism I could ever levy at this album is that an uncensored version doesn't exist.  They only ever released a version with the bad words scratched out in the wake of the Parental Advisory nonsense in the early 90s.  I still hold out hope that some day we'll get the ultimate reissue that finally uncorks the full, unedited album.  For now, this double LP reissue from 2005 will have to do.  It was a UK only release and tends to be tough to find and sell for more than I'd like to pay most of the time.  Luckily I was finally able to find a deal.

Having this as a double LP makes the songs sound the best they ever had on vinyl.  That makes it worth it for me as the art isn't anything special.  Especially irritating is the hype 'splotch' that they dumped on the cover art.  Give me a remastered double LP pressing (with the "Brothers from L.I." B-side as a bonus track), uncensored in a gatefold cover and I'll be the happiest person going.  Until then, this is the best version that there is.

EPMD - Business Never Personal:
https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_lFTq20kYiq_JyLVJrG8qsHl5gV5HEN6Iw

Prime Minister Pete Nice & Daddy Rich - Dust To Dust LP

Def Jam (1993)

Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo! MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Age' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for twenty-five plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

I really liked 3rd Bass when I was a teenager and I feel like their albums have held up pretty well over the years, even if the Cactus. Al/Bum is probably about twenty minutes longer than it really needs to be.  When the group broke up, I purchased the MC Serch solo record, Return of The Product.  I never heard from Prime Minister Pete Nice once 3rd Bass was done.

I don't understand how, but I had no idea this album even existed back then.  I should have, I was recently reading an old issue of The Source that I know I had as a kid and there was a gigantic ad for it.  But for whatever reason I forgot or it just never registered.  I definitely don't remember ever seeing a video on Yo! MTV Raps, but I saw one for MC Serch's "Here It Comes."  That's probably the biggest reason I bought Serch and didn't know about Pete.

And that's a shame, because the sinister Prime Minister was always my favorite of the two.  His gravelly voiced, laid back delivery always seemed elevated and mature, especially next to MC Serch being kind of a clown (a lovable clown, but a clown nonetheless).  This album is just chock full of Pete.  It's a strong record with production that reminds me a lot of the second 3rd Bass album, Derelicts of Dialect. As a whole, it is better than Return of The Product, I think.  But MC Serch has higher highs and there isn't any one song on Dust to Dust that is as good as "Here It Comes" or "Back to the Grill."  

I think I also would have liked this more if I had heard it back in 1993.  While I have discovered lots of great albums from that era later in my life, the ones that always stick with me the most are the ones I listened back when they originally came out.

Prime Minister Pete Nice & Daddy Rich - Dust To Dust:

https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_ks4SM_kczBqxrWCzskM3r2ZST1N5jbK7A

Public Enemy - Greatest Misses 2xLP

Def Jam (1992)

Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo! MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for twenty-five plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

This album came out at the very height of my obsession with Public Enemy.  After buying Apocalypse '91 at the K-mart by my dad's house, I was pretty convinced PE could do no wrong.  After I picked up Greatest Misses, I figured that I was wrong.  I think this record might have been my first experience with a band I loved putting out a record that didn't connect with me.  At the very least, it's the first one that I can remember.

I was really angry about this one at the time.  I wrote a review of it in my high school newspaper and while I don't really remember what I said, I'm pretty sure it was quite negative.  And that was the last Public Enemy record I ever bought.  I didn't hear 1994's Muse Sick-N-Hour Mess Age until many, many years later.  Listening to the record today, I'm not sure what turned me off so strongly.

Is it as good as any of the four Public Enemy records that came out before it?  No, not even close.  It's a distant fifth place, but it's not really that bad.  It's a weak Public Enemy record, but it's still a reasonably solid hip hop record overall.  Sure, "Get Off MyBack" is pretty bad, but "Hazy Shade of Criminal" is kind of great and I don't think would have been out of place on Apocalypse '91.  

The rest of the of the new songs (six in total) are fine for the most part.  Solid beats and great rhyming by Chuck D.  The other six songs are remixes.  Half are just fine, half are OK.  Nothing unmissable, but certainly nothing worth getting angry over in 1992.  The big miss is not including the Pete Rock remix of "Shut 'Em Down."  It's not on the vinyl version at all and on the CD there's just a live version of it that's pretty questionable, sound quality-wise.  Had they included that, I think it would have beefed up an album that isn't exactly essential is still a pretty fun listen.

Public Enemy - Greatest Misses:
https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_kZSE7auY0GqJ2v1Wx4zbb-9H3Chsut6fk

Onyx - Bacdafucup LP

Def Jam / JMJ / Respect The Classics (2013, Reissue)

Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo! MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for twenty-five plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

Bacdafucup is one of those CDs that I had when I was in high school that made certain family members wonder what the hell I was getting into.  Not that any of them listened to it, but just the fact that it was called what it was raised a few eyebrows.  I can't say that Onyx was one of my favorites when it came out in 1993.  I liked "Slam" from when I heard it on Yo! and I think I got the CD from BMG or Columbia House during one of those ten CDs for a penny gimmicks.  But listening to it again in the last few years, I appreciate it more now than I did then.

What makes it stand out, like so many albums of that era, is how great the beats are.  I love this era of hip hop and how the snare just cracks along with rumbling bass lines.  Lyrically, Onyx isn't anything special.  They're a group of gravely voiced MCs that stand out for sure as being unique, but the vocals can be a bit much from time to time.

Bacdafucup probably isn't one of those records I'd be prone to put on all that often, but there are moments where it is kind of the perfect album to listen to, for reasons I'm not really able to articulate.  Plus this is one of the albums i had as a kid and I am still working through my goal of picking up everything I had back then on vinyl.  One more down.

Onyx - Bacdafucup:
https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_m2P0AWCX11B6gQwzcRAKAR9lx3YKNYuRA

3rd Bass - Derelicts of Dialect 2xLP

Def Jam / Columbia (1991)

Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo! MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for twenty-five plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

Derelicts of Dialect came out during the summer of 1991, the summer between 8th grade and my freshman year of high school.  I first became really and truly interest in hip hop when I was in 7th grade and Mama Said Knock You Out came out.  I loved that song and credit it immensely with pushing me towards finding more hip hop that I liked.  Even though I never ended up being that big of an LL Cool J fan, that one song is responsible for shifting the way I looked at music immeasurably.

Back to the summer of 1991.  I was aware of 3rd Bass from "Gas Face" being played on Yo! MTV Raps, though I didn't pick up The Cactus Al/Bum until after I had gotten Derelicts.  "Pop Goes The Weasel" was the first single from this new album and it got a lot of play on Yo! and eventually was in regular rotation on MTV.  This was a long time ago and I may have the timing wrong, but I'm pretty sure that summer was when MTV was playing blocks of videos all the same genre.  I remember sitting through trash waiting for more rap videos and 3rd Bass being a frequent part of them.  That prompted me to buy the CD.

I don't know why, but I have an unusually clear memory of buying this CD when I was a kid.  We went to this record store that was in a strip mall up where I grew up in Sussex County, NJ.  It wasn't a cool or hip shop, it was just an independently owned record store that pretty much sold the same stuff you'd get at Sam Goody.  It wasn't there long and I think this was the only thing I ever bought there.  Anyway, I remember picking up the long box CD from a rack and being excited they were actually carrying it.  Why is that memory so vivid? No clue. Nothing interesting happened, but that's when I bought this as a kid.

On to the vinyl. Derelicts of Dialect hasn't been reissued on LP since 1991, so I had to hunt down an older copy.  I picked this one up on Discogs at a reasonable price and am psyched to have it in my collection.  I think it holds up really well, though like a lot of albums of that era, it's probably a little too long and would benefit from a shorter, tighter tracklist.  That happened a ton on early 90s hip hop albums with everyone testing the capacity of CDs.  

In particular the title track, "Pop Goes The Weasel,"No Static At All" and "Ace In The Hole" are jstill really great.  Thirty years later and I'm here nodding my head along with the bass.  Crazy.  Also crazy is how young the 3rd Bass guys look in all of the pictures and videos.  When I was in 8th grade, they seemed like grown up rappers.  Seeing them now, I realize they were kids too.  Wild times.

3rd Bass - Derelicts of Dialect:

https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nIZPSqZeRagDH2T9z4pyY80w_HOkrRphY

3rd Bass - The Cactus Al/Bum LP

Def Jam (2014, Reissue)

Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for twenty-five plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

I don't think I heard 3rd Bass right when this album originally came out in 1989, but I definitely saw the "Gas Face" video before their 1991 follow up Derelicts of Dialect came out (you know, the 'Pop Goes The Weasel' one).  I bought derelicts pretty much the moment it came out and was a little surprised to see so much airplay for that single.  While I still think that is a pretty solid record, I always thought The Cactus Al/Bum was the better of the two.  Primarily because of the song "Gas Face."

I'm not positive that when I first heard it, I initially made the connection that it was built off of a sample from "Think" by Aretha Franklin (her version in Blues Brothers being a particularly influential song to me when I was growing up).  Regardless if I picked up on the source, there was no denying how that piano riff meshed in with the drum track they created to become something pretty special.  From the moment Prime Minister Pete Nice (still one of my favorite hip hop names) starts up the first verse, it's pretty apparent these guys know how to create a great record.  It was years and years and years later that I put together that the guest MC on the last verse, Zev Love X from the amazing KMD was also MF Doom.  I never dug the Doom records as much as KMD and man did he shine on this track.

The rest of the album is good, if not a little inconsistent.  There are highs like "Sons of 3rd Bass,"Brooklyn-Queens"and "Steppin to the A.M."  But, there are probably too many skits, some of which feel like they go on forever and when the beats get slower on tracks like "Monte Hall" or "Triple Stage Darkness" I don't think the back and forth flow between Pete Nice and M.C. Search is done any favors.  Still, it's a fun record all these years later and one that I think is probably overlooked when discussing the pantheon of incredible albums that came out in the late 80s hip hop scene.

3rd Bass - The Cactus Al/Bum (YouTube Music full album stream):
https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nHAZh4VPksh1NjCgvM7FeaDVgf4jJc0T0

Erick Sermon - No Pressure LP

Def Jam (1993)

Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for twenty-five plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

I've said on more than a few occasions that Business Never Personal by EPMD is one of my absolute favorite hip hop records.  I really think it was the peak of EPMD and the fact that they acrimoniously split up after that album is a real bummer and one of the bigger 'what ifs' that I can think of.  I can only imagine what they would have come up with for their next album.  Though, I guess we can see pieces of that with the respective Erick Sermon and Parish Smith solo records.

No Pressure was Erick Sermon's foray into single life in 1993. I'm not sure how exactly, but I completely missed this album in 1993.  I never heard a second of it and it wasn't until much later that I listened to it for the first time.  I've tried out some other Erick Sermon solo records, but this is the only one that ever stuck with me.  It's pretty much the only one that feels rugged and has production that sounds like EPMD.  I feel like the R&B influences were far too prevalent by the time he got to his sophomore release Double Or Nothing, but No Pressure still hits pretty hard.

Parish Smith is definitely missed on this album.  E holds his own on the mic and is pretty masterful when it comes to production, but asking him to essentially carry the entire record is probably too much.  The back and forth that was such a huge part of EPMD is obviously not part of No Pressure, and its absence is really noticeable.  But if you take this album at face value and don't try to compare it to EPMD (which is quite difficult), it's a solid early 90s hip hop record.  It might not hit the highs of Erick's work with EPMD, but it is miles better than Parish Smith's PMD solo record that came out the following year.

Erick Sermon - No Pressure (YouTube music album link):
https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_lYitgUO98oO1KmW-fiftlXMhJ3BUM6TSY

EPMD - Business As Usual LP

Def Jam (2000, Reissue)

Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for twenty-five plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

For me, EMPD's 1992 album, Business Never Personal, will always stand out as one of the best hip hop albums of all time.  It's always been my favorite by EPMD and was also the first record that I had ever owned of theirs.  As the years went by, I did eventually grab all of their first four records and am in the process of replacing CDs with the vinyl.

I grabbed this album off of Discogs a couple of months ago and while the condition isn't spotless, I did get it for a good price.  I'll probably need to upgrade it at some point. Perhaps as we get close to its thirtieth anniversary we'll get a reissue.  But for now, I'm happy to sit back and absorb the rhymes of Erick Sermon and Parish Smith.

Business as Usual features incredible production, maybe not quite as rough and ready as what's featured on Business Never Personal, but the beats still hit hard.  It's one of those albums that has a head nodding rhythm and Erick and Parish make the most of the atmosphere, handing the mic back and forth and putting down some of their trademark self aggrandizing lyrics.  Add in some guest spots from a young Redman and a not quite past-his-prime LL Cool J and you've got a pretty solid 1990s hip hop album.  Maybe not the cornerstone of a collection, but an album that deserves more accolades than I think it typically receives.

EPMD - Business As Usual (Youtube full album playlist):
https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nwd2HEFvabhnHO7x2TMheYPeyJ1wMyKAc