A retrospective of the first fifty years of my life, picking fifty items that resonate with me. This one is about Hip Hop Tracks. No need to be worrying about songs before 1970, there was nothing on vinyl until the end of the decade.
This took a lot of whittling down; I was jotting down songs and had more than fifty by the time I’d reached 1990. Not a surprise when I’m an old school devotee who thinks that it all started to go downhill from then. But I persevered and have some more modern ones in. And the thing I keep needing to remind myself about these lists is, they are my personal favourites, not a definitive greatest list.
I’ll start with the one that kicked it all off, and the second one is my all-time favourite Hip Hop track, the rest are shoehorned in as best as can be.
- Sugarhill Gang – Rapper’s Delight
- Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock – It Takes Two
- 2Pac & Dr Dre featuring Roger Troutmann – California Love
- Eric B. & Rakim – Follow The Leader
- Eric B. & Rakim – I Know You Got Soul
- Tarrie B – Murder She Wrote
- Afrika Bambaataa – Bambaataa’s Theme (Assault on Precinct 13)
- Beastie Boys – Sabotage
- Big Daddy Kane – Wrath Of Kane
- Blapps Posse – Don’t Hold Back
- Gary Byrd – The Crown
- Cypress Hill – Can’t Get The Best Of Me
- Heavy D & The Boyz – Now That We’ve Found Love
- De La Soul – Ring Ring Ring
- The DOC – Portrait Of A Masterpiece
- Missy Elliott – Get Ur Freak On
- EPMD – Strictly Business
- Doug E. Fresh & The Get Fresh Crew – The Show
- Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five – The Message
- Hijack – Doomsday Of Rap
- House Of Pain – Jump Around
- Ice cube – Check Yo Self
- Ice T – The Hunted Child
- Jay-Z – 99 Problems
- Jungle Brothers – Because I Got It Like That
- Jungle Brothers, A Tribe Called Quest & Monie Love – Doing Our Own Dang
- Jurassic 5 – Jayou
- Kid Rock – Cowboy
- Kris Kross – Jump
- Mark “The 45” King – The 900 Number
- Monie Love – I Can Do This
- MC Lyte – Cold Rock A Party
- Mekon & Roxanne Shante – What’s Going On?
- Melle Mel – World War III
- Mr Thing & Yungun – Dancing Shoes
- Musto & Bones – Dangerous On The Dancefloor
- Nas – Hip Hop Is Dead
- Naughty By Nature – OPP
- Notorious BIG, Puff Daddy and Ma$e – Mo Money, Mo Problems
- ODB – Got Your Money
- Outkast – Ms. Jackson
- Plan B – Stay Too Long
- Public Enemy – Bring The Noise
- Queen Latifah & De La Soul – Mama Gave Birth To The Soul Children
- Run DMC – King Of Rock
- Salt ‘n’ Pepa – Push It
- Sir Mix-a-lot – Baby Got Back
- Ultramagnetic MC’s – Funky
- Wu-Tang Clan – Gravel Pit
- Young MC – Know How
This list got changed a lot, both in the notebook and when typing it up, changing song on an artist as I’m typing on a couple of occasions. I could easily have carried on adding to the list.