Voice of hip hop

On-Line Forty-Niner

Thursday, September 10, 1998

It has been called the music of the street, the voice of the oppressed and it has been called trash. Now as hip-hop music enters suburban living rooms and gets wide mainstream appreciation, many feel that the art form is being sacrificed in lieu of the almighty Franklins.

For those lost souls who are drowning in the wretched sea of materialism, negativity and weak rappers, let me be the lighthouse that saves you.

Every week, on this day, in this spot, I will tell you what is going on in the hip-hop world. What albums are worth picking up, which ones are coming out and what shows to look for.

There is no better way to kick-off this column than with a list of my top-10 emcees. They are judged based on three things: freestyle ability, lyrical content (are the rhymes well thought out and original or are they more like, "I get goose bumps when the baseline bumps, so that people call me Professor Klump," and does this rapper have something to say? 20 percent) and delivery and style (again originality counts).

Perfected to a science, here are the elite 10: 1. Q tip 2. Phife Dawg 3. Common 4. Tash 5. KRS-ONE 6. B.I.G. 7. Guru 8. Nas 9. Lauryn Hill 10. Mos Def.

For those of you who have not heard, A Tribe Called Quest has officially disbanded. After 10 years of bringing hip-hop's most innovative sound to the people, Tip, Ali and Phife have decided to pursue solo projects. But all of you Questers out there should not fret, the band's new album, "The Love Movement," is slated to drop on Sept. 29. Peace.