In 1994, Notorious BIG lifted up the East Coast, put it on his back and changed hip hop forever. Ready To Die, his true gift to music, is stacked with radio hits and gets better as the album goes on. Mostly produced by Sean “Puff Daddy” Combs and Eazy Mo Bee, the beats go through old funk records and 80s hip hop samples.

Almost 15 years later, you can put the first single, “Juicy”, on in any club in America and everyone will know the words. Many of the great rappers of the past decade bite lines from this song on the regular. “Juicy” was the lead single but the true BIG introduction was in his 2^nd single “Big Poppa”. Still one of the smoothest songs in Hip Hop history, it took BIG to the next level of national awareness. From there, the album is filled with classics from “Warning” to “The What” to “Unbelievable”. It’s rare to skip around tracks on this gem.

This album spawned “aka’s” in hip hop among other things. You would be hard pressed to find a hip hop album that had such an impact and created as many trends as Only Built 4 Cuban Linx. Raekwon’s detailed crime narratives became standard fare for any rapper after this album came out.  Released on Loud Records in 1995 this album not only featured one of the best guest verses ever, Nas on “Incarcerated Scarfaces”, but it also launched the solo career of Ghostface Killah.

Jay-Z’s debut album, Reasonable Doubt, still remains his most popular among fans and critics despite being released 12 years ago. At the time is was released on his personal upstart label, Roc-A-Fella Records with cohorts Damon Dash and Kareem “Biggs” Burke, Jay was the only artist. The album didn’t fare well commercially until the b side “Ain’t No N***a” featuring a then unknown Foxy Brown took off at Hot 97.  The label slowly grew into one of the biggest hip hop album of the ‘90s.

Lyrically, Jay-Z touches on the hustle and grind of the streets of New York and his time as a drug dealer.  DJ Premier, Ski Beats, and Loud.com’s own Sean C provided the sonic landscape for Jay to rap his most personal album until The Blueprint.  Reasonable Doubt is also a unique album because Jay didn’t reach his mainstream commercial success until two albums laster so Reasonable Doubt was discovered by his millions of fans years after its release.