Re: the west coast
A solid pivot point for someone coming out of Boom Bap is of course, Tupac Shakur. I’m particularly partial to 2pacalypse now, but I really love the first three albums. Don Killuminati rips too, especially since it dips into horrorcore, though much lighter than Gravediggaz.
Dre’s The Chronic is a classic, of course, and I think people really sleep on the comedy. It’s also honestly more of a Death Row album than strictly Dre. Personally I think RBX is a little weak as a lyricist, but the others are really solid. Outside of RBX, Dre might actually be the weakest lyricist on the album, but it’s never distracting.
Snoop’s Doggystyle is fucking phenomenal. Snoop is a masterful comedian and lyricist, and he nails down the west coast bounce so fucking hard too, working perfectly with Dre’s production. It also contains a cover (Lodi Dodi is a cover of Slick Rick and Dougie Fresh’s La Di Da Di), something exceedingly rare within hip-hop.
For modern west coast sound, there’s nobody I love more than Vince Staples (Kendrick notwithstanding, since he experiments with his sound so much) though Vince’s music can be pretty bleak.
Other recs include Souls of Mischeif’s ‘93 Til Infinity, and Del The Funky Homosapien’s I Wish My Brother George Was Here.
EPIC tysmmmmmmmmmm😁🫶💜💜💜 ive actually been listening to doggystyle since answering that first ask bc it feels like The gfunk album from what i know andddd ya its preddy cool! fun beats.. its so interesting how distinctly different this stuff is from everything i like already. that one thing they did in the 90s with the high pitched note glissandoing all up and down is crazy. so west coast. Cake did it as well in The distance. thats what i know it from most. also the song Smoke by Ufomammut but thats a stoner metal album, yet it came out in 2000 so very much up with tricks in its time. very interesting. i think music is gr8 👍
