MC LYTE
She was in my top five at one point and time in my life. I barely remember hearing her in the 90s, but didn't start digging into her discography later and fell in love with what I found. MC Lyte was the first female artist to release a hip-hop album with Lyte As a Rock and it lead way into some of her best work. In a school project I chose Lyte's lyrics from "Poor Georgie" to perform. I remember my school having a Lyte concert a few years ago and was disappointed how few people showed up. It was like only about 25 people. I was really into at this point too. I'll never forget when I first saw her walk on that stage. I called out "I WANT TO HAVE YOUR BABY!" in the front row and she looked at me questionably. It was awesome!
Favorite lyrics:
George was clean, no drugs and such
But once in a while, he'd drink too much
Hangin' in a club where they play rockers
Him and his friend, drinkin' vodka
I was looking for him, and I found him there
With his clothes messed up and his (fucked) up hair
I told him he was messin' up, he wouldn't go far
He got mad and asked his friend for the keys to the car
I said, "Don't drive, use your head
Drive while you're drunk and you'll kill yourself dead"
We begin to argue, bad words were said
Then he got kicked out by some long-haired dread
Ran into the car as if, in a hurry
He started the car but his vision was blurry
He didn't care, he drove off into the night
Riding for miles, without his headlights
Georgie Porgie had too much on his mind
He was still young yet running out of time
Last week he took tests and the doctor told him
George had cancer in his lungs and his colon
See when he was twelve, he started smokin'
Paid no attention when he started chokin'
Thoughts flashed through his head, there they stuck
'Til Georgie Porgie crashed into a truck
I wished I woulda told him how I liked him so much
How he made me feel with the slightest touch
Now he's gone and I can't tell him nothin'
Wish he was here so I could say somethin'
The story is not to say that I'm in sorrow
Just to say no one is promised tomorrow
If you love someone you should say it often
You'll never know when they'll be layin' in a coffin
from Poor Georgie
Recommended Track:
I Go On
Recommended Album:
Ain't No Other
SUGG SAVAGE
She's one of two member of a hip-hop group known as Akoko. Their style of rapping is very different from most out there in terms of instrumentals and I'm not quite sure how to describe it. Out of the two Sugg Savage is definitely the better of the two. Her flow, lyrics, and delivery outclass her partner Sloane Amelia in every way. Funny enough, she didn't start listening to rap until 2009 while she was in Catholic School. A Tribe Called Quest was her entry into the scene and I wouldn't be able to tell, but I guess that sort of explains their unorthodox songs. It looks like she might be going solo because she released some solo songs last year.
Favorite lyrics:
I can poke your neuro
I aint making euros but I make a lot of sense though
Searching for some change to by a vagrant complacency
We claim to be
We aim to be
The saviors of the sanity
Folks they stare at me
Not cuz of what I'm wearing
But because my mind, projects the raw, they vexed
Push play, relax
As if they said no words to me
Hip hop was never dead to me
Punk rock hip hop and keds to me
from Deadly Venom
Recommended Track:
Deadly Venom
Recommended Album:
Cataraps
LAURYN HILL
What can I say? Everybody knows her well enough already. Dope from Fugees to Miseducation of Lauryn Hill. It's so cruel how she only gave us one and a half albums and Miseducation only had 3 rap songs on it. There's no hope for another one especially since she hasn't been showing up to her own concerts.
Favorite lyrics: Not necessarily my favorite, but these are always the first to come to mind.
It's silly when girls sell their souls because it's in
Look at where you be in, hair weaves like Europeans
Fake nails done by Koreans
Come again
from Doo Wop
Recommended Track:
Doo Wop (That Thing)
Recommended Album:
The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill
NITTY SCOTT MC
I discovered her through another female rapper, Rocky Rivera, a Fillipina on her track "
Daydream" which is a remake of Common's "I Used to Love H.E.R". Her verse was better than Rivera's so I looked up her shit and found "Flower Garden" which the now famous Kendrick Lamar featured in. Nitty Scott has some raw fucking talent which is why I was so disappointed when she came out with that song with negras with the bunny heads in 2015 and then started guest appearing in whack dudes videos, but not laying a verse herself. She has some strong flow and her early work reflects some of the best in old school hip-hop. Last year she joined a group with one of the dumbest names ever, No Panty. That album was okay, but she was expressing her Latino side which I can appreciate. I've been following her ever since I found her and I can't wait for
Creature to drop.
Favorite lyrics:
Recommended Track:
Bath Salt Freestyle
Recommended Album:
Boombox Diaries
LIN QUE
Originally Isis, Lin Que was a member of the pro black rap group X-Clan. She never rapped often on any of their albums, but she got her chance to shine on her solo album
Rebel Soul. Her single for it "The Power of Myself Is Moving" is one of the best singles ever and that sample of Slave's "Just a Touch of Love" is my everything! I know that whole fucking song by heart and Soul Rebel is pretty good as well, but the only thing bringing it down is Professor X putting his stamp on the whole thing, damn just let the girl rap! She only had one album and an EP decades later which was okay. A sequel in the 90s would have possibly been hotter.
Favorite lyrics: all of The Power of Myself Is Moving
Recommended Track:
The Power of Myself Is Moving
Recommended Album: Rebel Soul
SA-ROC
I was on her hard in 2014, but I just don't like her as much anymore. Nebuchadnezzar was my album of the year for 2014, but I can't listen to much of her stuff before it, especially her earliest work. Still, Nebuchadnezzar and "Hounds of Hell" are some of my favorite stuff from her. She's a very pro-black rapper and throws some space rap into it as well. I remember showing her music video for "The Who?" in my hip-hop class in college.
Favorite lyrics:
But they don't wanna hear the pain just the glory
And they don't wanna take the blame just change the gist of the story
And they'll take me as a trophy but not as MVP
Cuz they don't wanna admit it but they envy me
I'll tell u why because these hips and thighs created life in 7 days
And I can take it all away with just 1 verse spit in 7 ways
And the control u think u hold over me?
Guess what it's obsolete
I copped a beat and laid heat like burnt edges
Play me? You'll pay me
My 16s like vendettas
This rap dope but truth told I been better
Just a prelude to deluge of poetic justice
No box braids I cock aim and blow brains with all my substance
I don't need witticisms to make a hitter and I don't need sports references to make my lyrics any clearer
Eff Jordan, I'm rolling with zora, cuz my eyes been watching god since I first looked in the mirror
Recommended Track:
Valley of the Queen
Recommended Album:
Nebuchadnezzar
MC MELODEE
Honestly, she's probably the rapper I listen to the most. Her debut album Vibing High is the most chill shit for me. When I want to listen to something laid back one of her songs are always among the list. Those beats are so elegantly crafted and easy to listen to so you know I got the instrumental album as soon as I saw it. Her whole discography is strong however. As far as her rhyming goes she feels like an 80s rapper to me. Not only her in dress style, but the way she raps. It's hard for me to put in words, but if you listen to her first couple albums I think you'll see where I'm coming from. Lyrically she isn't that strong, but her flow is good and she almost always has great beats. Electronic Love is the only one where I don't like the beats as much. She is 80s an 90s rap personified. Definitely give her a listen.
Favorite lyrics:
Recommended Track:
Teribble Thing to Waste /
Disco Dip
Recommended Album:
Vibing High
RUBY IBARRA
One of the many Fillipino rappers I came across, Ruby Ibarra is a beast. I found her among the likes of Bambu, Rocky Rivera, and Klassy, but I think she beats all of them. Like Roxanne she has a rawness to her rhymes. Someone in another thread said Asian rappers are corny, but they don't know about Ibarra. She has only had one mixtape so far to her whole discography and some freestyle stuff. I'm still waiting for an album.
Favorite lyrics:
Muthafucka I'm a pandemic, starting a plague
So no more wack after today, these rappers dropping away
I call era (cholera) a time of "measly," we be lacking all the true shit
I influence a (influenza) generation fuck that "yellow fever" bullshit, so
Who be so proper? using the the bars to
Recommended Track:
Like This
Recommended Album:
Lost in Translation
THE CONSCIOUS DAUGHTERS
Just recently discovered these and found out they had a song in GTA V. I played V, but I don't remember hearing them, but I don't think I did play around with the radio stations like I did in the others. Classic west coast rap. I just listened to Ear to the Street and enjoyed it.
Recommended Track:
We Roll Deep
THE DEADLY VENOMS
I found them among YouTube. Their discography isn't all that great really, but I wrote this in the case somebody else know of them and can tell me where I can find each of the artists solo work. I only found Champ MC and N-Tyce among them. They were a group formed by RZA and the Wu-Tang Clan that never took off. There are some good rappers among them, but I just don't feel their collaborative efforts hit off maybe to due to production or something else, I'm not sure. I do enjoy N-Tyce who sounds what I think a female Redman would sound like. I also discovered she's from North Carolina like me. Fun fact: Lin Que was going to join the group before they disbanded.
Recommended Track:
Earthquake ft. Wu-Tang Clan /
Sure Ya Right (N-Tyce)
PRINCESS NOKIA
I think I might've found her through the Afropunk fest, but in whatever case she's a unique one. She's not necessarily a rapper, but she does rap in her songs sometimes. I have no clue what she is genre-wise so I'm not sure who to recommend her too, but she does have some pretty good stuff. Her music is a little weird and I think shit like "Kitana" and "Tommy Boy" is ass, but some of her bars are pretty easy to listen to. I recently heard Green Line and adore it.
Recommended Track:
Green Line
Recommended Album:
Metallic Butterfly
RAPSODY
Fuck, don't know I forgot her. One of the illest out there in my opinion. Also another NC MC. Under the wing of 9th Wonder, Rapsody became a prominent figure in the underground game and she's even been featured with Kendrick Lamar twice. Hopefully that exposure will get her mainstream attention, but I'm pessimistic and don't think so. She has wordplay, flow, voice, delivery, the whole shebang. When she jumps on the mic I pay attention. She has a strong discography from start to finish and I can't wait for the next one.
Beauty and the Beast was a spectacular album and
Crown was good.. I also have to give props for that jazzy version of "The Man" that she performed on NPR. She actually performed at my school, but this was before I knew her and by the time I realized it, she already came and left. Needless to say, I was pissed. One of the greatest examples of her talent is "ABC" in which she raps out the entire alphabet. That is some classic hip-hop type stuff.
Favorite lyrics: Hmm, not sure at the moment
Recommended Track:
ABC/Guilty
Recommended Album:
The Idea of Beautiful
Also Bahamadia still got it if y'all didn't know.
https://bahamadia.bandcamp.com/track/here