Quote:
Originally Posted by nik-
because as an overall listening experience it's better than 36 chambers
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Highly anticipated and completely overrated. 36 Chambers changed the New York rap game when it came out - MC-wise AND production.
Again - Death Row was running hip-hop and Doggystyle was about to drop. "What's My Name" was the biggest song out at the time - Every hip-hop club and station was killing the track, every DJ was scrambling to find doubles of the 12" and the West was rolling over (sales-wise) the critically acclaimed, yet classic albums from KRS-1 and De La.
36 Chambers... drops and New York was back with a vengeance. I had never seen an album take the crown for hip-hop standard, EVER. All the stations and DJs were playing 3, 4, 5 (Chessboxin', Bring The Ruckus and M.E.T.H.O.D. Man) singles off the album any chance they could. This was even before C.R.E.A.M. dropped.
We're talking "essential" hip-hop albums? Quote every skit on it and people who were there will answer back every line, every single time... in unison. No one does that with Forever. There is 1 song people remember. 25-or songs, sub-par rapping from EVERYONE, (Even Ghost and GZA) useless throwaways, (Black Shampoo, Older Godz) and there you have one of the biggest disappointments in hip-hop. And this was during a time when garbage was slowly seeping it's way on to the racks and mixtapes. 1997 & 1998 were some of the worst years for albums and this just happened to be one of the better ones for the time.