I feel like I was born into a weird place as far as the hip hop time line goes. And with growing up in a Mexican house hold, on the west coast, that listened to nothing but Al Green and Roger Troutman kind of kept me out of the loop. I listened to what was immediately available, which isn't a bad thing. The death row and the click releases isn't a bad thing to grow up listening to. I was too young and living in the wrong place to have gotten into much east coast groups like Tribe & De La, aside from what made it to the radio out here. I didn't even get around to really delving into their catalogs until high school, around 1999 - 2000. So on one hand I've always felt that I was too young to be embedded in the movement of those guys when it was happening & also now I'm too much of an older head to really like much newer heads that are out now, aside from a few. My #6 pick is an album that came out in 1993. I hadn't heard it in its entirety, let alone owned it, until probably around 1999 - 2000. Some of the older boom bap heads may toss out every pick I make on this list because of this fact....but fuck em.
To me, I feel the fact that I hadn't owned this album til around the millennium is a testament to how good this album is. I wasn't invested into any of the Native Tongue crew at all. Yet hearing this album 6 - 7 years after it's release still was able to influence me to be hooked on it. This is the release that awoken me to all the Native Tongue releases. I went out at started buying as much shit as I could find. At the time of this, I was heavily into No Limit Records, Chronic 2001 (yes I know it didn't come out in 2001), Kurupt, & Killarmy. This album brought on a welcome change of pace for what was blasting throw my piece of shit cd player that I had with me every day of high school. I guess it's a good thing I didn't get into the movement til it was already done. That made sure I wouldn't be one of them lame fuck non black dudes dressing in African Garbs with their medallions. Either way, this album changed my direction of the music I was listening too. I still to this day love a lot of street hop (hate that term) but this opened up something in me that got me listening to more conscious releases. And with it being around 1999 - 2001, it allowed me to start checking for the Blackstars, Reflection Eternal's, & Common's. This album brought on one of the more influential changes in my taste of music. To this day, I tend to gravitate more towards the 'laid back', soulful, and chilled out music. Buhloone Mind State is the exact instance that this change occurred.
Purchase: Buhloone Mind State
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