Hip Hop — Recently Added

The classic batch of instrumentals from J Dilla – one that strongly transcends the hip hop genre – and perhaps his rawest, and most adventurous listening experience ever! The loopy soul samples, rich synth/electro shine, and thumping bass and soul beats that Dilla largely made his name ... LP, Vinyl record album

LA underground mic hero Blu sounding as fresh and furiously-paced brilliant as he has in years – and teaming up with SoCal production favorite Oh No on this gem for Nature Sounds! Kicks off after the intro with the masterful "Lost Angels Anthem", setting bar pretty high with with ... LP, Vinyl record album

Heavily funky sci fi weirdness from the Metal Face archives! If you dig Doom beats – and why wouldn't ya?! – this is pretty prime stuff. They come nice and heavy, with all the rolling soul sample loops, peppered with odball dialog snippets from horror and sci fi flicks here and there. ... LP, Vinyl record album

The classic first solo album by Big L – with bedrock DITC production by Buckwild, Showbiz and Lord Finesse – perfectly framing the rhymes by Harlem's finest. Big L didn't leave a huge wealth of recordings before he was taking away from the world, but he started out strong, and this ... CD

Classic era Bad Boy hip hop pairing tracks by Craig Mack & Biggie – both gone but never to be forgotten – originally issued as a promo-only sampler in 1994 and reissued here for the first time ever as a LP & cassette combo! The Craig Mack side includes the classic single "Fl ... LP, Vinyl record album

A live set by Wu Tang – one that documents a good portion of their earlier work, plus solo material as well – from a show recorded in Cali in 2004. Titles include "Ice Cream", "Ghost Deini", "CREAM", "Clan In Da Front", "Da Mystery Of ... LP, Vinyl record album

NERD sees sounds all right – and those sounds are far looser and more free associative than the precise hitmaking formula that main NERDs Pharell Williams and Chad Hugo spun as superstar production team The Neptunes! The sounds to see, feel, and hear, include jittery synthesizer beatcraft, ... LP, Vinyl record album

A milestone for Pete Rock – stepping out on his own after the split of his legendary duo with CL Smooth for one of the finest producer headlined hip hop records of the late 90s! An all star lineup is on the mic – including Inspectah Deck, Kurupt, Method Man, OC, Raekwon, Ghostface, ... LP, Vinyl record album

A modern classic hip hop soundtrack to Black Panther that should make T'Challa proud! It was pretty clear early on that Black Panther might be one of the greatest modern super hero movies – and an important one for the political and cultural climate of the late teens – so the pressure ... LP, Vinyl record album

DAMN!, indeed – Kendrick has yet to take even a small step down from the creative peak he's been riding for years – and takes another daring step forward with this strong, strident, no-mess-taking classic in the making! The surprise-announced DAMN! finds him taking on timely concerns ... LP, Vinyl record album

Ed OG's nice debut, with a slightly jazzy touch on the production and literate, intelligent lyrics. We really couldn't get with "Bug A Boo", but besides that, this first LP's solid from start to finish, from the days when that wasn't so uncommon. Drop the needle on this and head back in ... LP, Vinyl record album

The somewhat slept on second album by Das Efx – and in hindsight, it's just as solid as Dead Serious – maybe even more consistently strong than the breakout debut! Dray and Skoob keep up the loco syllabic tempo and tongue tripping rhymes on this one – over the head nodding Solid ... LP, Vinyl record album

Supreme prime era boom bap from the mighty DJ Spinna! It's stunning how rich and relevant these instrumentals sound after all these years. Straight from the original DAT, he humbly describes this as simply "a batch of beats", but Spinna is a producer who always took things one step deeper ... LP, Vinyl record album

The classic first LP from Kurtis Mantronik & MC Tee – early hip hop and funky electro at its mid 80s finest – richly expanded with a wealth of bonus material! We'll never tire of style here – electronic funky beats, synthesizers and vocoder vocal effects, and those benchmark ... LP, Vinyl record album

The long, long, LONG awaited return of Fatlip – armed with self-deprecating wit, an occasional heart-on-the-sleeve confessional, and beats by 45 King and J-Swift. The quality is a bit erratic, but the best tracks here are pretty great – and certainly a lot stronger than recent Pharcyde. ... LP, Vinyl record album

Dibia$e takes on 8-bit video game era samples – putting together a fun, funky blast of a hip hop instrumentals set that pairs retro futuristic synth tones, bleeps and bits from classic video game franchises with more straightforward timeless beatcraft! It's wonderful stuff that for sure ... LP, Vinyl record album

Producer House Shoes and rhymer Big Tone team up as Big Shoes – one of the most fitting 2 man supergroups in independent hip hop of the late teens for sure – with a solid roster of guests including Demark Vessey, Quelle Chris, Jimetta Rose, Blu, MoSel, Ta'Raach and more! There's a ... LP, Vinyl record album

Jedi Mind Tricks at pretty near peak level, with gruff and gritty Vinny Paz rhymes and production that pairs up hard hitting beats and oddly effective moodier production touches by Stoupe. Guests include Killah Priest and GZA on a couple of tracks, Sean Price and Des Devious. Tracks include "Th ... LP, Vinyl record album

A practice tool LP for DJs or turntablists looking to learn the tools of the trade or sharpen their skills – produced by turntable icons The World Famous Beat Junkies! Made specifically by this legendary crew to help you take your mixing, scratching and beat arranging prowess to higher ... LP, Vinyl record album

The long awaited return of Choosey – celebrating his Afro-Chicano roots on this one, and doing so with top notch Exhile production. Titles include "I Did", "Black Beans", "You Got It" with Jimetta Rose", "Satisfied" with Deshawn, "Ain't ... LP, Vinyl record album

The follow up to the classic first LP! Listening to Kurtis Mantronik productions all of these years later is a definite educational experience, given the huge influence the crisp synth sounds had on the future of hip hop – not only as a matter of necessity, given the cost of sample clearance ... CD

NERD sees sounds all right – and those sounds are far looser and more free associative than the precise hitmaking formula that main NERDs Pharell Williams and Chad Hugo spun as superstar production team The Neptunes! The sounds to see, feel, and hear, include jittery synthesizer beatcraft, ... LP, Vinyl record album

The debut full length from Pete Rock & CL Smooth – and a bonafide hip hop classic if there ever was one – one of the best ever! Pete Rock's trademark mix of heavy soul, jazz & funk beatcraft pretty much set the bar to a level that's been impossible to top ever sense. On top of ... LP, Vinyl record album

Jazzy hip hop from German producer FloFilz – and by describing it as jazzy hip hop, we mean that for real, it's genuinely inspired by classic and contemporary UK club and soul jazz while still being pretty firmly rooted timeless, latenight vibe hip hop. Hypnotic beats and loping atmosphere ... LP, Vinyl record album

The Roots make kind of a return to their own roots with Tipping Point – a loose, funky, hip hop soul opus from the legendary Philly crew! The record's got a much more streamlined and focused ambition than Phrenology or Things Fall Apart – and it's a brilliant extenuation of their ... LP, Vinyl record album

The first full-length from Mos Def and Talib Kweli together as Black Star – a benchmark moment in hip hop history, and one of the finest duo vocal hip hip records of the 90s – and one of the best ever on Rawkus! In hindsight, it's all the more rewarding given Talib Kweli's longevity in ... LP, Vinyl record album

Del Tha Funkee Homosapien, Kid Koala, and Dan The Automator pool their skills for this dawn of the 2000s classic – the masterful Deltron 3030 – pared down the sci-fi hip hop funk essentials on the Automator and Koala instrumentals! One of the benchmark albums in the leftfield ... LP, Vinyl record album

Hip hop's reigning kings of longevity The Roots deliver another great album with Undun – we'd have to think it's entirely uncompromising and they're doing exactly what they want to do on this one – so if you thought their day (eh, latenight) job would would bring their album work into ... LP, Vinyl record album

The first full length by underground favorite J-Live! The Best Part had legendarily long gestation period, but for all the time it took to see a proper release – begun as early as '97 and finally seeing release at the dawn of the new millennium – but for all the stops and starts behind ... LP, Vinyl record album

The third album from Eric B & Rakim – absolute classic MC/DJ duo hip hop and maybe their most solid from beginning end, as impossible as that should've been after high bars they set with Paid In Full & Follow The Leader! By this point, Rakim was firmly established as one of hip hop's ... LP, Vinyl record album