Kanye West | Gold Digger The Hit He Never Wanted Kanye admitted he never liked Gold Digger, yet it became his biggest hit through a two-year pileup of accidents, rejections, and revisions that nobody could have planned. In 2013, Kanye West sat down with Zane Lowe on BBC Radio 1 and said something that should’ve […]
The Song Kanye Gave Away Twice and Rode to #1 Read More »
Beastie Boys | Licensed to Ill (album) The Joke Nobody Got Licensed to Ill was a satirical album everyone took at face value, an inside joke that went Diamond and outsold every rap record before it, cobbled together from borrowed parts and happy accidents. “There were tons of guys singing along to ‘Fight for Your
Licensed to Ill Was Never Supposed to Work Read More »
Fugees | The Score Slayed Everyone With a Feather In 1996, while East Coast and West Coast hip-hop waged war, three Haitian-American kids from New Jersey snuck up from behind with borrowed sounds and a basement studio budget of $135,000. “The East Coast and West Coast were in an arms race to see who could
The Fugees Built a $135K Basement Into a Monument Read More »
Kendrick Lamar | Not Like Us The Kill Shot Nobody Expected Rap’s most devastating diss track broke the genre’s own rules, it sounds like a block party, not a threat. That’s exactly what made it so dangerous. You can dance to the most devastating diss track in rap history. That fact alone tells you something
Kendrick Beat Drake With a Party Song Read More »
Eminem | Lose Yourself The Shot He Almost Missed Barbra Streisand read the winner’s name at the 75th Oscars, and the man who wrote the song was asleep at home. That detail pretty much explains how “Lose Yourself” ended up bigger than hip-hop. Barbra Streisand read the winner’s name at the 75th Academy Awards, and
One Take in a Lunch Break Changed Everything Read More »
