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The Best Rapper Alive, Every Year Since 1979 PART 3

The Best Rapper Alive, Every Year Since 1979

The rapper who stole each year, from the first year of recorded hip-hop until now.

BY INSANUL AHMED,DAVID DRAKE,NOAH CALLAHAN-BEVER,CHRISTINE WERTHMAN,ERNEST BAKER,ROB KENNER,FRAZIER THARPE,DAMIEN SCOTT,BRENDAN KLINKENBERG,ROSS SCARANO

1991: Q-TIP

CREDENTIALS: The Low End Theory, "Groove Is in the Heart," "Don't Curse," "A Roller Skating Jam Named 'Saturdays,'" "Come on Down"

It had been clear from his first verses on the Jungle Brothers debut in 1988 that Q-Tip had a remarkable, unique voice, and important things to say. But two years later, on A Tribe Called Quest's admittedly awesome debut, People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm, the outfit's offbeat attire and quirky ("I Left My Wallet in El Segundo") to occasionally goofy ("Ham and Eggs") subject matter obscured the acknowledgement of Tip's lyrical prowess.

That all changed in 1991, though. Stripped of the costumes, ATCQ's sober (in sound, if not in creation) sophomore effort, The Low End Theory, thrust Q-Tip to the epicenter of hip-hop. He slowed down the BPMs and introduced the jazz, funk, and soul loops that would define East Coast hip-hop until the Puffy era. He complemented these more delicate grooves with clean, loud, and exquisitely differentiated engineering courtesy of Bob Power that turned even Dr. Dre's head, who admitted years later that he competitively studied the sonics of TLET while crafting The Chronic. A-B test TLET against De La Soul Is Dead, or any other contemporary release, at the same volume to hear the difference.

But far and away, the most impressive part of The Low End Theory was Q-Tip's rapping. Where he had swung in the pocket, moving with the music on the first album, Tip now made strong declarative statements ("Back in the days when I was a teenager / Before I had status and before I had a pager...") to create competing, complementary rhythms. And he did it while conjuring thoughtful word pictures ("You could find the Abstract listening to hip-hop / My pops used to say, it reminded him of be-bop / I said, 'well daddy don't you know that things go in cycles / The way that Bobby Brown is just ampin like Michael'"), using subtle, poetic strokes, that articulated his life and point of view as a 21-year-old emerging star.

The ground he broke lyrically—with timeless phrases like "Industry Rule #4080"—and rhythmically—with the introduction of the mislabeled "the Big Sean 'Supa Dupa' flow ("Minds get flooded, ejaculation")—has inspired everyone from Nas to Kanye West to Drake. Neither a tough guy nor a sucker, Q-Tip's confident delivery, genuine sentiment, and undeniable musicianship could not be denied by intellectuals or gangstas, leading to countless guest appearances and beat placements. And this appeal was not lost on him, either, as he broke it down quite simply on "Verses From The Abstract:" "Women dig the voice, brothers dig the lyrics / Quest the people's choice, we driving for the spirit." Universal adulation in hip-hop is practically an oxymoron, but in 1991 Q-Tip enjoyed an embrace that almost no other rapper has, before or since.

HONORABLE MENTIONS: Scarface, Treach, Dres
The Geto Boys had been Southern flag bearers for years, but in 1991 Scarface thrust himself to the front of the conversation, releasing both the GB's classic We Can't Be Stopped and his solo debut, Mr. Scarface. Songs like WCBS's defining masterpiece "Mind Playing Tricks on Me" and Mr. Scarface's title track made it abundantly clear that 'Face had more than just tough talk and gangsta tales to offer: He had concepts and stories. But yeah, he'd punch you in the fucking mouth, too.

Meanwhile, in New Jersey, Treach set trends with Naughty by Nature's debut. The braided MC flipped syllables at rapid-fire pace and put pop polish on the jibberish Jaz-O and Jay Z had been spitting. A style icon, Treach also set aesthetic trends, and weaned hip-hop off of Kane's snappy suits to more utilitarian work wear and jerseys.

And though his acclaim would be short-lived, Astoria, Queens, rapper Dres demonstrated able lyricism and a hilarious sense of humor on Black Sheep's October '91 debut, A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing. Coming from an everyman perspective, not unlike his fellow Native Tongue-er Q-Tip, Dres made up for his lack of hardcore credentials with nimble rapping and gut-busting jokes about his (apparently) legendary swordsman status. —Noah Callahan-Bever

1992: REDMAN

CREDENTIALS: Whut? Thee Album, "Headbanger"

Ready to rock rough rhymes, renegade rapper Redman ripped when it was rhyme time. And it was with addictive alliteration like that, on EPMD's foreboding 1990 classic "Hardcore," that the always frowny-faced Newark MC spectacularly announced his arrival on the scene. However, even before his first recorded appearance, reigning kings like Biz Markie took the young MC around to parties to show off his gift of gab, immortalized in this Queens nightclub recording.

Two years later, the then 22-year-old Reggie Noble released his debut LP, Whut? Thee Album, and made it clear there was much more to Redman than repetitive wordplay, punchlines, and skull hats. The album, with its loose narrative structure, aggressive funk tracks, vicious battle raps, and hilarious stories, gave listeners a uniquely rugged ride through the Bricks.

As a lyricist Red built on the lineage of Slick Rick's narrative styles and the split personality concept introduced on "Mona Lisa," combined with the multi-syllabic word flipping of Kool G Rap. But he also added a monstrous grit, courtesy of dirty Jerz, that was entirely new. He was precise, and even delicate at times, as he bluntedly, and bluntly, stomped a mudhole in that ass. In many ways Red was a pivotal MC, bridging the gap between the rhyming innovation of '87 and '88, and rap's emerging hardcore, gangsta aesthetic. He demonstrated that elite lyricists could be complicated and complex, and ruff, rugged, and raw, too.

Echoes of his style can be clearly heard in the work of everyone from Wu-Tang a year later, to Eminem at the turn of the century, to Danny Brown today. Red remains a remarkable talent, but in the year of the Phillie blunt, hip-hop turned on his dime. And everyone pressed rewind, but not because he hadn't blown their mind.

HONORABLE MENTIONS: Treach, Snoop Doggy Dogg, Q-Tip
A fair argument could be made for Treach as the dominant MC of 1992. Naughty by Nature was at the top of the charts, and everything from the East Orange MC's iggity-biggity, Big Daddy Kane-inspired tongue flipping to his bike lock accessories and hockey jerseys were being bitten East to West. But the aforementioned fads faded fast and with it Treach's claim.

Meanwhile, off the April release of "Deep Cover" and the December release of The Chronic, Long Beach newcomer Snoop Doggy Dogg was making it clear that the West had something to say. And that they were going to say it with cooler-than-a-cucumber style. But Snoop was not quite ready to assume the mantle. He barely made eye contact during interviews, despite rap fans' unquenchable thirst for his flow.

Q-Tip had come into his own in the final months of 1991, with the release of The Low End Theory. Thanks to his excellent rapping and in-demand production he had vaulted himself quietly into the center of hip-hop, appearing in '92 on posse cuts and producing for everyone from Apache to the Fu-Shnickens. With A Tribe Called Quest he also dropped the much sweated"Scenario" remix and "Hot Sex" on the Boomerang soundtrack. —Noah Callahan-Bever

1993: SNOOP DOGGY DOGG

CREDENTIALS: The Chronic, Doggystyle

Kool Moe Dee revolutionized the art of MCing from skibbity-bee-bop party rhymes to the battle raps upon which Run's House was built. And there, in the future reverend's place of worship, a generation of rappers prayed at the altar of wordplay. That is until Snoop Doggy Dogg came through and crushed the building.

Quite out of the blue, at a time when East Coast rappers were committing alphabetic slaughter via infinite iggity-biggities and manic multi-syllable matching, an unassuming 21-year-old Long Beach native turned the paradigm on its head, putting rhythm and melody over content and complexity. Snoop cruised over beats with soft intonation and self-assured ease.

His simple, almost old school-esque rhymes were instantly memorable ("One, two, three and to the four, Snoop Doggy Dogg and Dr. Dre is a...), and his ability to fluidly navigate negative space provided a much appreciated relief from the frenzied spitting that was in vogue on the East Coast. Fans could not get enough of it.

Riding his numerous appearances on Dr. Dre's The Chronic—which had been released in December 1992—through damn near three quarters of the following year, as single after single topped the charts, the appetite for Snoop's flow was unending. The thirst was real. The release of his much anticipated debut, Doggystyle, broke new artist first week sales records—to the tune of 800K—that would not be matched for a decade (until a future Dr. Dre protege, 50 Cent, would outdo him).

Musically even more polished, and more pop than The Chronic, Doggystyle was a cultural watershed. But Snoop's lyrics remained uncompromising, and the album propelled gangsta rap further into the mainstream consciousness than it ever had been. Songs like "Gin & Juice" and"What's My Name" juxtaposed supple melodies with meandering G talk, while records like"Pump Pump" and "For My Niggaz & Bitches" barreled through listeners' ears, with Snoop, even uptempo, still in nonchalant repose. The total package was easy listening, until you wrapped your mind around what exactly the gang-banging Crip was saying.

That blueprint would influence both carbon copy artists like Da Brat and Domino and even subtly affect the music of the Notorious B.I.G. and Jay Z (the future East Coast titans, who had rapped like Mr. Funkee of LOTUG and the Fu-Schnickens, respectively, noticeably decompressed their flows, letting words and lines breathe, in the wake of Doggystyle), among other East Coast artists. But in 1993, as his album cover crudely (but awesomely) illustrated, no one could catch the Dogg.

HONORABLE MENTIONS: Method Man, Treach, Q-Tip
Riding the lesson of Snoop's ascent that how you say things can trump what you're saying, Method Man, Wu-Tang's first breakout star, employed melody to an equally addictive result. While every member of the Clan impressed on "Protect Ya Neck," it was Meth's hummable flows on the track's b-side, "Method Man," that propelled the ensemble onto the radio and off the shelves. However, like Snoop on The Chronic, Meth had to share the spotlight on 36 Chambers, piquing interest but holding him back from the throne.

In the first half of 1993, Treach and Naughty would position themselves as the uniters of hip-hop with the gimmicky anthem "Hip Hop Hooray" (which admittedly had awesomely all-star cameos in the video), but in the Death Row era Treach's vision of gangsta became quickly dated.

Q-Tip continued to be a major musical force in '93, remaining relevant even as tastes changed with ATCQ's perfect movement, Midnight Marauders. That said, as the scene put increasing value on tough talk and gangster posturing, Tip's brand of everyman rap slid slowly to the fringe. —Noah Callahan-Bever

1994: NAS

CREDENTIALS: Illmatic

Nas, Nas, Nas was not the king of disco, despite what the "It Ain't Hard to Tell" remix would have you believe. But he was a king, the king of rap. In 1994, at the age of 19, Nasty Nasir Jones would ascend the throne with the April release of Illmatic, his debut LP. A raw talent, one of the first to make a name on guest appearances, Nas' shocking, borderline horrorcore (before horrorcore existed) raps of the early '90s created an enormous buzz for the Queensbridge MC.

But those wicked raps only scratched the surface of what was to come. Dense yet melodic, wrought yet nonchalant, the rhymes on Illmatic represented the confluence of the last seven years of rap innovation. He was a child of '88. From Rakim's aloof thoughtfulness to Kane's multi-syllabic juggling to Kool G Rap's corner-drug-dealing realism to the educated militancy of Chuck D, even the gripping narrative skills of Slick Rick—Nas had it all. And he had it all quietly. Nothing about Illmatic was labored.

Brief but effective, the LP showcased this range efficiently, with nary a heavy-handed or telegraphed moment. Songs like "N.Y. State of Mind" and "Life's a Bitch" demonstrated his ability to string the almost rambling moments of his internal monologue into ornate tapestries of reflection. On other tracks, like "Memory Lane" and "One Love," he explored more linear storytelling but with a degree of nuance and subtext that had not been achieved in hip-hop previously. And he married both on songs like "One Time 4 Your Mind" and "Represent," slipping effortlessly from first-person narrative to meandering thoughts.

Having said all of that, though, one cannot discount the importance of The Source on Nas' ascendancy. A handful of other albums had earned the distinction of 5 Mics previously, but at a time when the magazine was still growing. Illmatic's anointment as a "classic" came as the mag reached maturity as an editorial product and ubiquity as a publication.

As a result, like when Lil Wayne declared himself better than Jay Z, that perfect rating (especially in the face of, say, The Chronic receiving only 4.5 Mics) sparked a national debate around Nas' excellence. But as time passed, and the album's layers were pulled apart, absorbed, and appreciated, the young king's legitimacy was cemented. Accolades aside, in 1994, if you wielded a mic, Nas was indeed the musician, inflicting composition.

HONORABLE MENTIONS: The Notorious B.I.G., Scarface, Redman
It would be a lie to say that by the end of 1994, Biggie's meteoric success didn't take a lot of the wind out of Nas' sails. And sales. But Big's burn was a slow one that didn't reach a fever pitch until Q4. He rode into '94 on a string of guest spots with the likes of Mary J. Blige and Supercat, but things changed during that summer.

With Nas conspicuously quiet on the radio, Big filled the void with jam after jam ("Flava in Ya Ear" remix followed by "Unbelievable" followed by "Juicy" followed by "Da B Side" with Da Brat). Still, when Ready to Die dropped, despite its unimpeachable quality and ability to connect far beyond Illmatic's Tri-state acclaim, it did not catapult Big, lyrically, to the front of the pack. But it did position him to jockey for the top spot the following year.

1994 was a huge year for Scarface because The Diary proved not only his staying power, but also his ability to transition from the uptempo East Coast-ish production of the early '90s to the slow, whiny G-Funk era. And that he could do it gracefully, telling the same kinds of dark stories (see: "Hand on the Dead Body," "Jesse James") as in the Geto Boys' glory days.

Also slowing things down, and daring to tread on the dark side, was Redman, who stomped ruggedly through 1994 making it abundantly clear that his blunted funk still made sense in a post-Chronic, post-36 Chambers world. —Noah Callahan-Bever

1995: THE NOTORIOUS B.I.G.

CREDENTIALS: 1994's Ready to Die, DJ Clue? Presents Bad Boy Vol. 1, Junior Mafia's Conspiracy,“One More Chance (Remix)" and "Who Shot Ya?," and Total's "Can't You See"

When KRS-One dropped his ’95 fan favorite, “Rappers R N Dainja,” neither he, nor the rappers mentioned, nor the even fans knew exactly how right he was. Rappers were in danger. But not from Kris’ bars—the times, they were a changin’. And they were changing because of the Notorious B.I.G. (and Puff Daddy). Big had received universal adulation for his debut, which dropped in the fall of ’94, and as the year began he rode in high off the stream of hits that the LP would yield. But, for all its refinement, Ready to Die was still was very much a product of hip-hop’s silver age. It was in the following year, 1995, that Biggie remixed and refined his sound. He took the humor and lyrical precision of East Coast rapping, but, no doubt inspired by Snoop and Dre on the West, he let his raps breathe. As a result his lyrical threats hung in the air longer, his jokes hit harder, and generally his turns of phrase became even that much more memorable (and recitable). Add to that the thematic element of aspiration, and Big had drafted the blueprint for hip-hop’s burgeoning Platinum Era.

The one-two knockout of the silky smooth Debarge sampled “One More Chance” / “Stay With Me (Remix)” backed with the menacing b-side, “Who Shot Ya?” a record that separated the boys from men (and the weak from the obsolete), raised the bar. On the latter, which was a redux of both rhymes and beat from a freestyle with Keith Murray on DJ Clue’s Bad Boy Vol. 1 mixtape (Keith’s portion would actually appear excerpted as an interlude on Mary J. Blige’s My World), Big coldly dissected his opponents, “Fuck all that bickering beef, I can hear sweat trickling down your cheek/Your heartbeat sound like Sasquatch feet—thundering, shaking the concrete.”

Elevating the record’s vicious raps, 2Pac would claim Big’s detached subliminals were aimed at him, and evidence of Biggie's collusion in ’Pac’s shooting at Quad Studios. One cannot understate the importance of this feud in both rappers' success (and ultimate undoing). But Big’s true subliminal shot that year was not at ’Pac but at Death Row’s dominance, and it was packaged as a nod.

On the same Clue tape, Biggie used a patchwork of classic Dr. Dre beats to tell one his most incredible, winding narratives on “Real Niggaz Do Real Thingz.” As Napoleon had taken the crown from the hands of Pope Pius VII, coronating himself, with that one freestyle Big demonstrated the ability to best his competitors lyrically and stylistically on their own tracks, and in doing so subtly announced his ascension. The Source concurred, crowning him “King of New York” in their July issue. He shored his position over the summer with standout verses on R&B hits by Total and 112 as well as a starring role on Junior Mafia’s two classic singles, “Player’s Anthem” and “Get Money.”

But nothing hammered home Biggie’s place at the top of rap like his live performance video of“Me And My Bitch” from The Show soundtrack, replete in a pin-striped suit and bowler. By the end of 1995 the distance between him and every other rapper was dramatic and evident, as contenders like 2Pac and Nas reinvented themselves as ridahs and dons in reaction. But there is only one Frank White, and in 1995, the world was his, unchallenged.

HONORABLE MENTIONS: Raekwon, Prodigy, 2Pac
Although, during 1995, Big certainly embodied hip-hop’s future, the supremacy of Raekwon and Prodigy’s rapping during that year cannot be overlooked. East Coast thuggery had been refined, polished, and perfected, and Only Built 4 Cuban Linx... and Mobb Deep’s The Infamous represented the genre’s creative climax. No reaches for radio play, the two albums were unflinching, dark, and cinematic.

And the LPs’ two lead rappers, both of whom had been considered marginal MCs since their respective debuts in 1993, emerged that year as top tier talent with truly unique voices. Members of Kool G Rap’s lyrical bloodline, both took his gritty style and subject matter, abstracting it, moving off the beat, and even occasionally out of rhyme, to tell their stories in obtuse, noir fragments. Unfortunately their figurative flows may have also limited their audience.

Meanwhile, 2Pac released what many consider his best album, Me Against the World, featuring production from Easy Moe Bee. But 'Pac would spend most of the year in jail on a rape charge, so despite his obvious artistic growth, he was largely sidelined from any conversation about being the best. That said, his October '95 signing to Death Row would put things in motion for him to come guns blazing the following year. —Noah Callahan-Bever

1996: 2PAC

CREDENTIALS: All Eyez on Me, The Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory, drops epic diss track "Hit 'Em Up"

2Pac’s tireless work ethic and prolific output made him a legend, and 1996 saw both of those habits at their highest efficiency. For most of the previous year, he was incarcerated, after being found guilty on three counts of molestation. 2Pac was released from Clinton Correctional Facility in October 1995, Suge Knight successfully recruited him to Knight’s infamous, powerful record label, Death Row, and the rapper launched into the next year with unprecedented resilience.

2Pac’s historical tear through 1996 began with the release of All Eyez on Me in February. By then, he had become a mainstream fixture—an icon larger than rap—and it was evident in the album’s reception. It debuted at No. 1 on the pop charts and moved 566,000 units in its opening week, achieving 5X platinum certification by April. But 2Pac’s appeal that year goes much deeper than sales statistics.

Commercial and creative peaks don’t always correspond, but they did for 2Pac. When his Top 40 presence reached its pinnacle, so did his rapping. Consider the urgent tenacity that embellishes All Eyez on Me’s opening lines: “So many battlefield scars while driven in plush cars/This life as a rap star is nothing without heart.” For the first time, 2Pac brought all of the lyrical dexterity of his East Coast peers, without sacrificing the emotional delivery for which he’d become known. He was a master of what he said and how he said it.

The masses recognized this, and that summer, the singles “How Do U Want It” and “California Love” reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. They were the first rap songs not bathed in pop-slanting crossover tactics to hold claim to such a feat, and proved that, for this very specific moment in time, Tupac Shakur was absolutely unstoppable, in every field. You could finally say that 2Pac’s potential was fully realized. His voice resonated with the public as much as it did with those on the block, a fact of which he was fully aware: “My lyrics motivate the planet/It’s similar to Rhythm Nation, but thugged out, forgive me Janet.”

This run appeared as if it might end when 2Pac was shot on Sept. 7, 1996, but he continued to rule the year, even from the grave. Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory, released two months after his death, was more successful upon its release than any of 2Pac’s preceding albums, selling 664,000 in its first week. He wasn’t floating on meticulous instrumentals with Redman and Method Man on this album, either.

2Pac’s work as Makaveli was more about bombast and calculated rhetoric. That approach gave way to some of the sharpest rhymes of his career. “Bomb First (My Second Reply)” and “Hail Mary” played like battle cries. Rhymes like, “I take this war shit deeply/Done seen to many real playas fall to let you bitch niggas beat me,” channeled his anger into commodity, with an artful consistency.

1996 is a case study for every aspect of why 2Pac is so celebrated. He was a viable, competent artist in multiple arenas, and he had the discipline to incorporate his varied and conflicted missions into a single mantra. That savvy paid off in this year more than any other. It’s a shame that 2Pac’s ride had to end early, and on someone else’s terms, but the dedication to his craft that was on such full display in 1996 is why he’ll live forever.

HONORABLE MENTIONS: The Notorious B.I.G., Nas, Jay Z
After what was, at that point, the best year of his career, Biggie remained a formidable competitor in 1996. He didn’t have much to offer in the way of new solo material, but his flawless streak of guest appearances was awe-inspiring. His verses on works like 112’s “Only You” remix and Lil’ Kim’s Hard Core kept him in the conversation.

New to that conversation was then-rookie Jay Z, whom Biggie had also given a feature for his fellow Brooklyn MC’s classic debut, Reasonable Doubt. It took some time for appreciation of the album to set in, but looking back, it’s clearly a remarkable project. The same can be said for Jay Z’s eventual foe, Nas, who released his sophomore album, It Was Written, the same year.

While the album was more commercially successful than Illmatic, it was met with a tepid response from hip-hop fans looking for a rehash of Nasir’s debut. But it was only a total disappointment to the hypercritical. Jay Z rapped, “Who’s the best MC—Biggie, Jay Z, or Nas?” the following year for a reason. —Ernest Baker

1997: THE NOTORIOUS B.I.G.

CREDENTIALS: Life After Death, back to back No. 1 hits with "Hypnotize" and "Mo Money Mo Problems," guest spots on "Been Around the World," "It's All About the Benjamins," and"Victory"

Christopher Wallace was only alive for 67 days in 1997, but with a talent so immense, that’s all it took for him to be the most dominant rapper of the year. In the months after Biggie’s March 9 death, it’s almost as if his stock rose. The untimely loss of someone so young, with so much heft in the language of hip-hop, was like a call to reflection. Infatuation with his wit, wordplay, and delivery soared, and 1997, in spite of tragedy, was Biggie’s biggest year.

Life After Death was released just over two weeks after Biggie passed and peaked at No. 1 on the Billboard 200. The album was an ambitious two-disc set with a tracklist comprised of every type of song imaginable. While the diverse styles and subject matter—his daughter’s college plan, kinky sex, hotel heists, a fully-sung ballad—were an organic product of Biggie’s incomparable range, the strategy of Life After Death’s sequencing has become the de facto approach for rap albums in the years since. It’s an incredibly influential project, before you even press play.

When Life After Death does start spinning, the true brilliance of Biggie’s persona and way with words comes into frame. The man was an expert at rapping, and he could wow from any angle.“Somebody’s Gotta Die” was a storytelling track with the complexities of an Alfred Hitchcock movie. “Notorious Thugs” had Biggie rhyming in a then-shocking double-time flow and besting Bone Thugs-n-Harmony at their own game. “Ten Crack Commandments” saw him detailing the rules of drug dealing in a manner so languid that you forget it’s a song and not a conversation. Mentioning three tracks doesn’t feel sufficient; literally every single record on Life After Death brings a different skill set of Biggie’s to the forefront.

It’s that aptitude and reach that keeps the Notorious B.I.G. in Greatest of All Time conversations, even with his limited amount of material. He dropped intricately arranged rhymes like, “Got the new Hummer in the summer when/I was a new comer then/Drugs and Mac-10s/Hugs from fake friends/Make ends, they hate you/Be broke, girls won't date you,” with an alarming composure. All of Biggie’s lyrics were presented in an unorthodox pattern that nonchalantly challenged the conventions of rap delivery with every line.

Though Biggie’s songwriting and performance on those songs was at its most admirable in 1997, his untimely death sparked a wave of massive posthumous wins for the rest of the year, with singles “Hypnotize” and “Mo Money Mo Problems” both reaching No. 1 on the Hot 100.

The success of his mentor Puff Daddy’s solo venture, No Way Out, also kept Biggie in the spotlight, thanks to his star turns on “Victory” and the “It’s All About the Benjamins” remix. The way he takes the reins on both of those tracks, molding the instrumental to accommodate his prowess, commands a level of respect that’s difficult to dole out to less-deserving MCs in his wake.

Biggie was the most unavoidable voice in hip-hop that year, and for good reason. Every verse of his came equipped with a unique sense of charm, and proficiency, that couldn’t be found anywhere else. Biggie was the most entertaining rapper to listen to in 1997, from an everyman standpoint—think about how fun it is to spell out B-I-G-P-O-P-P-A at the beginning of his verse on "Mo Money Mo Problems"—and he was also the best, from a purist's perch. That’s a rare circumstance, but Biggie was never ordinary.

HONORABLE MENTIONS: Busta Rhymes, Jay Z, Twista
While there's no question that, even in death, Biggie owned 1997, his passing did open the door for other hip-hop acts to emerge. Busta Rhymes had been patiently waiting to make it since his "Scenario" verse five years prior, and the success of "Woo Hah!! Got You All in Check" in 1996 set him up nicely for the career explosion that occurred in 1997. Busta's style remained avant garde, but his increased sense of speed and control—peep how he holds the same rhyme through every verse on "Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Could See"—earned him points on the technical end. Twista was another MC with a knack for lightning fast flows, and the fact the Adrenaline Rush rapper hailed from a city other than NYC made his leap to national consciousness even more notable.

Jay Z's Das EFX-like doubletime days were behind him by 1997, but with his friend and collaborator Biggie gone, Hov's talents became more noticeable. Not many people would take 1997's In My Lifetime, Vol. 1 over the previous year's Reasonable Doubt, but most will acknowledge that tracks like "Where I'm From" and "A Million and One Questions" are home to some of the best rhymes of Jay's career. For Hov, it was the beginning of an unprecedented reign. —Ernest Baker

1998: DMX

CREDENTIALS: It's Dark and Hell Is Hot, Flesh of My Flesh, Blood of My Blood, guest spots on"Money, Cash, Hoes" and "Money, Power, Respect"

As history tells it, Kurt Cobain and Nirvana saved rock from the death grips of hair metal in the early ’90s. After the glitz and glamour of hip-hop’s shiny suit Jiggy era, the emergence of Yonkers badass DMX was celebrated in the same way.

His debut single, “Get at Me Dog,” had no overwrought ’80s pop sample, and its accompanying visual was a gritty black-and-white account of a night at legendary hip-hop nightclub the Tunnel, rather than an ostentatious display of wealth. The rap community welcomed this long-missed hardcore approach to the music with open arms, but DMX was more than a contrarian alternative to the popular hip-hop of time. He was, in his own right, an excellent rapper.

In subverting the mainstream, DMX became the mainstream. It’s Dark and Hell Is Hot debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 and achieved multi-platinum sales. Timing plays a role in this success, but really, so much credit is owed to the fact that DMX was rapping with a truly original, at times jarring, audaciousness. His style was rooted in the wizardry of East Coast lyricism, but tracks like“Ruff Ryders’ Anthem” branched beyond that foundation, also incorporating a no-nonsense precision that had been relegated to acts from other regions—Juvenile, Trick Daddy—who were gaining attention at the time.

DMX made history in December 1998 when he released his sophomore album, Flesh of My Flesh, Blood of My Blood, and it too debuted at No. 1, making DMX one of the few artists in any genre to drop two chart-dropping LPs in one year. “Slippin” was the album’s only single, and though it didn’t perform well commercially, the album still went triple platinum.

By then, DMX’s triumphs weren’t a surprise. He was a movie star (Hype Williams’ feature-length debut, Belly, released in 1998), but his way of rhyming made everyone feel like a close friend. His energy, honesty, and vulnerability—“Didn’t keep a haircut or give a fuck how I dressed”—looped America into his narrative, and X has been impossible to ignore ever since. Jay Z won the Best Rap Album Grammy the following year and boycotted the ceremony because DMX wasn't nominated. What does that tell you?

HONORABLE MENTIONS: Jay Z, Big Pun, Lauryn Hill
DMX's record-setting run places him at the front of the pack, but 1998 saw several other hip-hop artists soar to equally dizzying heights as well. It was the year that Jay Z became a pop star, selling five million copies of Vol. 2... Hard Knock Life on the back of his massive Annie-sampling title track single. It was the year that Lauryn Hill stepped out as a solo force, selling eight million copies of The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, the album that earned her a historical five Grammys in early 1999. It was the year that Big Pun finally saw the potential of his buzz fulfilled and dropped his critically acclaimed platinum debut, Capital Punishment. The accolades and mind-numbing sales figures of each artist were well-deserved, with Jay, Lauryn, and Pun all serving as model examples of the benefits an artist can reap as a result of settling in an uncompromising creative zone. —Ernest Baker