What's the deal folks?! It's been a few weeks since I've done any twentieth anniversary salutes, but now's as good of a time as any to bring the momentum back for albums that have influenced generations and have catapulted artists into higher lime lights or greater recognition. One such album involves arguably the most enduring group in all of hip-hop who are no strangers to crafting some of the most timeless and creative hip-hop ever heard and are unsung heroes.
Three long Island emcees known as Trugoy, Posdnous and Maseo came onto he scene in '88 known as De La Soul. They emerged with a fresh new style that was unlike anything quite out at that time (you know when hip-hop was actually original and more fulfilling consistently). These bruthas put out the ever funky "Me, Myself, and I", and the rest was history. The Parliament-sampled hit still stands as their most recognizable cut and the album that followed, 3 Feet High & Rising, became one of the most unique and innovative hip-hop ever had the joy of experiencing. A Certified and undisputed classic, they had the nerve to follow that up with ANOTHER classic release, the ahead-of-its-time De La Soul Is Dead (which actually is celebrating its twenty-fourth birthday this year). This particular album was far from the happy-go-lucky, hippy-themed debut we experienced three years earlier. This album was a tad darker, and definitely more focused on them as emcees. If the cuts alone weren't magnificent, as they were pointing out and calling out those who were saturating the game with the wrong ideals of gangstas, guns, sex, and money. Yeah people like Naughty By Nature took offense at this time. Still under the direction of Prince Paul, who guided them with 3 Feet High and Rising, many felt this album was more stripped down and more the core of what De La represented. It didn't end there, as their next album, Buhloone Mindstate, was practically every bit as stellar as the prior two, as we continued to see a growth and maturity of De La, lyrically and musically.
In comes '96, where they would drop their fourth album, Stakes Is High. There were many that ruled this as the best album of '96. Although I personally it wasn't THE best of the year, only a fool wouldn't put in the top three or five. It had been a couple years since we had heard LI's finest, but it was completely worth the wait. We were first buzzed by the street single featuring Common, "Tha Bizness". This cut was as funky of a De La cut as you would hear from them, but by no means did it stop there. many thought they would fall off by not working with Prince Paul anymore, but nothing could've been further from the truth. This was evidenced with the excellent title track, crafted by the legendary Dilla. Sounding refreshed and reinvigorated, De La had a passion about them that we hadn't heard, maybe ever. With the prior three albums, they had a point to prove very vehemently. While it resulted in the best music of their careers, this sounded like there was more of a carefree, let loose mindstate while still being very lyrical and keeping it purely hip-hop with no gimmicks. The third single "Itzsoweezee" was fantastic standout that had Trugoy going for dolo on the track. Among other highlights include the breezy "Long Island Degrees" (which easily could've belonged on Buhloone Mindstate), the superb collab with Mos Def "Big Brother Beat", "Brakes", and "Sunshine", all of which showed their importance in the game, dropping jewels of wisdom and introspection, yet showing these cats they're not all any chumps simply because they don't boast about guns, drugs, and sex, at least not without a concept or a point.
Later albums like Art Official Intelligence: Mosaic Thump, AOI: Bionix, and the most recent The Grind Date all show why they're among the most respected groups in all of hip-hop, but Stakes Is High stands as one of their most cohesive and fluid albums within their entire discography. These elder statesmen, while in their fifties, are still putting out material, as their And The Anonymous Nobody, is slated for this August, and is promised to be among the best albums of the year. With Stakes Is High, they finally relaxed, and were just emceeing without any necessary point to prove except that they were and still are one of the game's most revered groups.
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