Milk Crate's Top 10 Albums: Monkzilla #10

By Monk

My homie poet was right in terms of saying we all have diffrent views,connections, and relations to our experiences with Hip Hop music. With that said the selections that are made are the greatest in all time from our individual views of music thats impacted us in our musical tastes.

10 -DE LA SOUL -STAKES IS HIGH

De La Soul, officially was my introduction into Hip Hop and for that alone it needs to have a place in my top 10. I was about 11 years old, and had snuck into my uncles room where he stashed the Reebok and Nike shoes under his bed which contained the explicit labeled cassette tapes. I always had about 20 minutes to take one cassette out a day and listen with enough time to place the cassette back into its proper slot while remaining in its same position without being noticed. Stakes Is High was the downfall of that routine and was also the reason i got caught for mischievous behavior.

Remember clear as day pulling out that cassette tape and being fascinated with the cover thinking it was kids rapping so i pop in the tape and am easily confused at the vocals but into the right direction. Songs like Stakes is high, and Sunshine definetly were the vibe that attracted me into wanting to listen to music that wasn't so "mainstream". In a way this album matured my perspective on Hip Hop as a whole eventually effecting my life till this day. I still listen to this album and realize why there approach of messaging the decline of rap music was so pivotal to its listeners in 96. The message alone can still be applied to todays music which is still declining and rising in its own way. Stakes is high was also the introduction into Mos Def's career and lead me to follow his projects later down the road.