It’s coming a little late, but finally, the best and worst of 1996! In the next few weeks, I’ll begin diving into a handful of housekeeping items before jumping into 1997. In the meantime, enjoy the read, and then celebrate hip-hop’s 50th birthday by listening to your favorite hip-hop album.

Worst Moniker: Cockni O’Dire (featured throughout House Of Pain’s Truth Crushed To Earth Shall Rise Again) – The Irish styled name in itself sounds amusing, but the fact that the alias is donned by a Black reggae artist makes it hi-larious. The first Black leprechaun.

Honorable Mentions:

D.V. Alias Khrist (Sometimes spelled “Khryst,” but it sounds equally as bad).

Tangg Da Juice (The All Mighty RSO – Doomsday: Forever RSO).

Nutta Butta (Wreckx-N-Effect – Raps New Generation).

Poon-Skoon (Dr. Dre Presents….The Aftermath).

Worst Posse Record: “All Star Freestyle” (The Conscious Daughters – Gamers) – TCD invites a slew of their Bay Area friends (Saafir, Mac Mall, Mystic, and Money B, just to name a few) to spit subpar freestyle rhymes over a horrible instrumental, resulting in a cringe-worthy seven-minute cipher session.

Honorable Mentions:

“Bouncin’ Down The Strezeet” (Ice-T –VI: Return Of The Real) – The Tinker Bell production combined with a laughable performance from Ice-T and his friends (which includes an embarrassingly bad hook that finds Mr. Wesside rhyming “streezeet” with “beazeet” and “heazeet” with “seazeet”) makes this a close runner up to “All Star Freestyle.”

“Da Ill Out” (Redman – Muddy Waters) – Def Squad is notorious for bad posse records and this one goes up there as one of their worst.

Worst Album Title: Str8 Off Tha Streetz Of Muthaphukkin Compton – The title to Eazy-E’s first posthumous release is way too long and has way too much Ebonics and incorrect spelling going on.

Honorable Mentions:

(Ice-T) VI: The Return Of The Real – The Roman numerals are cool, but “Return Of The Real” sounds like something a washed-up rapper would say.

(A+) The Latch-Key Child – It just sounds stupid. No one says “latchkey child,” it’s “kid,” and kid would have worked much better since it was a popular term of endearment in East Coast hip-hop during the nineties.

Worst Album Artwork: (Wise Intelligent) Killin’ U… For Fun – There are two different album covers for Wise Intelligent’s debut solo album. One is a chilling image of a bunch of white men casually gathered around to watch a Black body burn at the stake like their watching a football game on a Sunday afternoon. The alternate cover (which is the cover for the CD copy that I own) features a low-quality, poorly angled pic of Wise looking angry in a wife beater with unkempt locks and nappy edges, accompanied by generic lettering of his name and the album title, making this an easy selection for this award.

Honorable Mentions:

(Dynamic Twins) Above The Ground – The artwork reminds me of those yellow generic brand cereal boxes from back in the day. A very close runner-up to Killin’ U… For Fun.

(Poor Righteous Teachers) New World Order – The generic image of the trio placed in the middle of the reverse side of the Great Seal of the United States with “Novus Ordo Seclorum” translated to English, makes for terrible Photoshop.

Worst Album: (Dynamic Twins) Above The Ground – Thanks to poor mixing and mediocre emceeing, the fourth release from the god-fearing identical twins makes for a goddamn hard listen.

Honorable Mentions:

(Eazy-E) Str8 Off Tha Streetz Of Muthaphukkin Compton – A perfect example of why ninety-nine percent of posthumous hip-hop albums suck.

(Ice-T) VI: The Return Of The Real – The result of a legendary rapper overstaying his welcome.

(Originoo Gunn Clappaz) Da Storm – Calmly disappointing.

(Snoop Dogg) Tha Doggfather – Snoop’s lack of focus and the good doctor’s absence results in a severely troubled sophomore effort.

Best Moniker: Fuckamon (The Almighty RSO – Doomsday: Forever RSO) – Who or what can fuck with this badass alias? Pun intended.

Honorable Mentions:

Rubbabandz (Shyheim – The Lost Generation)

Pop “The Brown Hornet (Shyheim – The Lost Generation)

Best Album Artwork: Muddy Waters – The amusing and colorful artwork (which includes a green screen television, and a wood table donning a beautiful sunflower, while Redman relaxes in a chair with one leg folded up, muddied from skully to Timberland with dark shades on) is a great reflection of Red’s personality and the music contained on the album.

Honorable Mentions:

(Fugees) The Score – The album cover is a clever homage to the theatrical release posters for Martin Scorsese’s classic movies, Goodfellas and Casino. Thankfully, the music follows the films’ standard of excellence.

(O.G.C.) Da Storm – I’ll always be a sucker for dope animated artwork.

(2pac) The Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory – Insert previous note about Da Storm. Plus, Pac’s untimely demise adds a mystique to the artwork that only grows over time.

(OutKast) ATLiens – Dungeon Family member and resident spoken word poet, Big Rube, is responsible for the dope comic book illustration that paints the Atlanta duo as superheroes, Bin-Hahmin and Dad-Efat-Sax (which serves as the cover to an elaborate twenty-six-page CD booklet with an in-depth storyline that finds OutKast battling Nosamulli and his Dark Horde, who are out to control and destroy all of music).

(Kool Keith) Dr. Octagonecologyst – The dark cartoon image of Kool Keith’s skeleton-framed death and pussy obsessed alter-ego (one of his many alter-egos) decked out in a black doctor’s coat and stethoscope does a great job of piquing one’s interest in the album and luring them in for a listen.

(Lil Kim) Hard Core – The pic of Queen B (pre-plastic surgery and MJ skin bleaching) on all fours looking just as sexy as beautiful in her modest lingerie will always make for classic eye candy.

Best Album Title: (A Tribe Called Quest) Beats, Rhymes & Life – While many felt Tribe’s fourth album was a dud (for the record, I strongly disagree), the simple yet profound title made a strong statement.

Honorable Mentions:

(Nas) It Was Written – Nas poetically flips a biblical term into a fitting album title for one of the greatest writers to ever grace a pen and pad.

(Lost Boyz) Legal Drug Money – Oxymoronic phrase (well, kind of) that makes for a witty album title.

(Keith Murray) Enigma – Great word.

Sleeper Album: (DJ Shadow) Endtroducing… – With the absence of the emcee, Shadow teaches an eclectic master class on the art of drum programming and sampling. Easily one of the greatest instrumental hip-hop albums of all time that I completely slept on for some twenty-something-odd years.

Honorable Mentions:

(Wise Intelligent) Killin U… For Fun – You can’t always judge a book by its cover.

(Kool Keith) Dr. Octagonecologyst – Kool Keith’s kooky alter ego collides with Dan the Automator’s abstract production, merging into an intriguing combination that grows more interesting with each listen.

(The Conscious Daughters) Gamers – The Oakland duo sell their gangster persona well over a consistently solid batch of G-funk instrumentals, without an ounce of consciousness detected.

(Eminem) Infinite – Em’s independent debut may not be backed by the Interscope machine and Dr. Dre’s pristine production, but something about pre-Slim Shady Eminem rhyming over a pallet of raw boom-bap beats makes for an entertaining listen, and pound for pound, might be his best album.

Best Album: (Fugees) The Score – The Fugees make amends for their dismal debut album with this undisputed masterpiece. Dope skits, monster singles, deep album cuts, and at least five records are nuclear bombs.

Honorable Mentions:

(OutKast) ATLiens – Organized Noize’s production continues to blossom, and 3 Stacks’ Martian antennas begin to sprout.

(Ghostface Killah) Ironman – Only Built 4 Cuban Linx on steroids. Yeah, I said it.

(Jay-Z) Reasonable Doubt – The bar for “drug dealer turned rapper” albums.

Best Posse Record: “Iron Maiden” (Ghostface Killah – Ironman) – The opening track to GFK’s debut solo album (and I use the term “solo” loosely) matches the host with his Wu-Tang bredrin, Raekwon and Cappadonna (who shuts shit down with a razor-sharp closing verse), as the threesome take your eardrums on an exhilarating ride over Rza’s clever Blaxploitation flick samples and a soulfully cinematic backdrop that is guaranteed to get your adrenaline pumping.

Honorable Mentions:

“Affirmative Action” (Nas – It Was Written) – A great introduction to The Firm that showcases a potential they collectively never lived up to.

“Got My Mind Made Up” (2pac – All Eyez On Me) – At the height of the East/West Coast beef, 2pac boldly invites a couple of East Coast All-Stars (Red and Meth) to join him and his Death Row inmates, resulting in a fire coastal unbiased cipher session.

“Bring It On” (Jay-Z – Reasonable Doubt) – Jay and friends (Jaz-O and Sauce Money) vividly paint Premo’s elegant and emotional boom-bap with raw drug dealer strokes. The menacing Fat Joe vocal snippet used on the hook is impactful enough to make The Bronx emcee worthy of a feature credit.

“Winter Warz” (Ghostface Killah – Ironman) – Much like “Iron Maiden,” Cappa steals the show with an amazing closing verse. I have to start collecting this man’s solo catalog.

Cameo Whore: This is a new award that will go to the artist that made the most cameo appearances on the albums I reviewed for said year. I thought it would go to Sadat X, who seemed to appear on everything in 1996, but after crunching the numbers, to my surprise, it was not Sadat (although he did finish in a four-way tie for second with four cameos, along with Common, Havoc, and D.V. Alias Khrist). The first annual cameo whore award was a four-way tie, each with five appearances, between:

Method Man, Redman, Q-Tip, and Prodigy.

Congratulations to all these microphone promiscuous emcees!

That concludes my best and worst list of 1996. Feel free to hit me in the comments with your thoughts. I’ll catch you all in 1997!

-Deedub

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