 | | Party rappers from the West Coast, tha Alkaholiks entered the hip-hop field by working with King Tee on his 1993 Tha Triflin' Album; after touring with KRS-One, Ice Cube, and Too Short, they found a major-label contract with Loud/RCA. |
 | | While a member of the New York City duo Organized Konfusion, Pharoahe Monch developed a reputation as one of underground hip-hop's preeminent lyricists, crafting intricate and intelligent raps with partner Prince Poetry. |
 | | Boot Camp Clik affiliates Heltah Skeltah delivered a celebrated debut album, Nocturnal (1996), but struggled to follow through with subsequent output as their reputation simmered despite a fine follow-up, Magnum Force (1998). |
 | | Part of Brooklyn's talented Boot Camp Clik, the powerful tandem of Smif-n-Wessun got their start on Black Moon's classic debut, Enta da Stage, in 1993. |
 | | A member of Fat Joe's DITC crew, rapper Big L was born Lamont Coleman on May 30, 1974. He made his solo debut with 1995's Lifestylez Ov Da Poor & Dangerous, scoring a series of underground hits including "No Endz, No Skinz," "Street Struck" and "Da Graveyard"; Big L's best-known effort, the single "Ebonics," followed on his own Flamboyant label in the summer of 1998. |
 | | As one of the original members of the seminal '90s rap crew the Wu-Tang Clan, Ghostface Killah (aka Tony Starks) made an impact before he released his debut album, Ironman, late in 1996. |
 | | If skills sold, Talib Kweli would have been one of the most commercially successful rappers of his time. |
 | | Boot Camp Clik is a loose congregation featuring similar-minded underground hardcore rappers like Originoo Gunn Clapaz, Cocoa Brovaz, Buckshot, Heltah Skeltah, Bucktown Juveniles, Jahdan, and Illa Noyz, all of whom are concerned about keeping the music real and on a street level. |
 | | Raekwon may not have achieved the solo stardom of his fellow Wu-Tang Clan mates Method Man or Ol' Dirty Bastard, but along with Genius/GZA and frequent partner Ghostface Killah, he's done some of the most inventive, critically acclaimed work outside the confines of the group. |
 | | The Genius, aka the GZA, was the most cerebral MC in the Wu-Tang Clan, as well as perhaps the most acclaimed. |
 | | Initially regarded as one of the most promising rappers to emerge in the late '90s, Mos Def turned to acting in subsequent years as music became a secondary concern for him. |
 | | The most influential MC-and-DJ tandem of the 1990s, Gang Starr set new standards for East Coast rap with a pair of early-'90s touchstones, Step in the Arena (1991) and Daily Operation (1992), whose appeal has only grown over the decades. |
 | | Speaking out against what he saw as a decline in rap during the mid-'90s, Jeru the Damaja came to the fore as a self-proclaimed prophet and the savior of hip-hop, much as KRS-One had done almost ten years before. |
 | | As part of the golden age MC-and-DJ tandem Kool G Rap & DJ Polo, the "Kool Genius of Rap" enjoyed a successful and, above all, influential run during the late '80s and early '90s before embarking on a fitful solo career. |
 | | With just a few (mostly underground) releases, Dilated Peoples energized the rap underground in similar fashion to fellow West Coast crew Jurassic 5. |
 | | They didn't gain as much critical hype as other acts in the independent rap scene (perhaps due to a laid-back release schedule), but Black Moon has been one of its better acts. |
 | | An underground Latino crew who moved from being strictly producers to make some action on the other side of the mixing board as well, the Beatnuts first hooked up in the late '80s, with Junkyard Ju-Ju (aka JuJu, born Jerry Tineo) and Psycho Les (born Lester Fernandez) being joined by Fashion (aka Kool Fashion, born Berntony Smalls). |
 | | Though popular success has largely eluded the Roots, the Philadelphia group showed the way for live rap, building on Stetsasonic's "hip-hop band" philosophy of the mid-'80s by focusing on live instrumentation at their concerts and in the studio. |
 | | Although he never became a household name, Rakim is near-universally acknowledged as one of the greatest MCs -- perhaps the greatest -- of all time within the hip-hop community. |
 | | Lil' Fame and Billy Danzenie formed hardcore rap act M.O.P. The duo's debut single, "How About Some Hardcore," became popular and led to the release of their first album, To the Death, in the spring of 1994. |
 | | Whenever anyone mentions the name of Detroit rapper Royce da 5'9", a whole list of other names surround it. |
 | | Emerging in 1993, when Dr. Dre's G-funk had overtaken the hip-hop world, the Staten Island, New York-based Wu-Tang Clan proved to be the most revolutionary rap group of the mid-'90s -- and only partially because of their music. |
 | | In the mid-'90s, Sean Price, known then as Ruck, and partner Rock dropped their debut album, Nocturnal, as the rap outfit Heltah Skeltah during a time when East Coast hip-hop was delivering mainstream and underground classics left and right. |
 | | KRS-One (born Kris Parker) was the leader of Boogie Down Productions, one of the most influential hardcore hip-hop outfits of the '80s. |
 | | Camp Lo is a rap group from the Bronx who melds hip-hop with jazz sensibilities and funk. After having a hit single, "Coolie High," from The Great White Hype soundtrack in early 1996, they released their debut album, Uptown Saturday Night, in February 1997. |
 | | Rapper, DJ, and producer Pete Rock first emerged in 1991 as one half of a duo with C.L. Smooth, debuting with the All Souled Out EP. |
 | | One of the numerous thoughtful gangsta rappers to emerge from New York during the mid-'90s, AZ enjoyed critical success early in his career, particularly with his debut album, Doe or Die (1995), but commercial success largely eluded him over the years. |
 | | Common (originally Common Sense) was a highly influential figure in rap's underground during the '90s, keeping the sophisticated lyrical technique and flowing syncopations of jazz-rap alive in an era when commercial gangsta rap was threatening to obliterate everything in its path. |
 | | Part of the celebrated '90s underground rap group Black Moon (with producer Evil Dee and fellow MC 5Ft), Buckshot released his first solo album, The BDI Thug, in 1999 with Duckdown (which later reissued a longer version in 2003). |
 | | As golden age rap suddenly gave way to West Coast gangsta in the early '90s, an East Coast variety of hardcore rap arose in turn, with Mobb Deep initially standing tall as one of New York's hardcore figureheads on the basis of their epochal album The Infamous. |
 | | Beginning with his classic debut, Illmatic (1994), Nas stood tall for years as one of New York City's leading rap voices, outspokenly expressing a righteous, self-empowered swagger that endeared him to critics and hip-hop purists. |
 | | With an impressive resume in rap that includes membership in the legendary Juice Crew (along with Marley Marl, MC Shan, Big Daddy Kane, Biz Markie, Roxanne Shante, and Craig G) and a verse on the 1988 classic posse cut "The Symphony," Brooklyn's Masta Ace is truly an underappreciated rap veteran and underground luminary. |
 | | The East Oakland backpacker crew are members of the loose underground hip-hop consortium known as Hieroglyphics. |
 | | The Oakland-based Hieroglyphics are an underground rap collective who, at their best, combine an offbeat sensibility with a strong grounding in battle rhyming, freestyling, and other hip-hop traditions. |
 | | Hip-hop duo Lil' Dap and Melachi -- collectively known as Group Home -- surfaced in 1995 on a compilation called Guru Presents Ill Kids Records, which was released around the same time as their debut album, Livin' Proof. |
 | | As one-half of the classic-era hip-hop duo Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth, C.L. Smooth was responsible for penning some of hip-hop's timeless classics, including "The Creator," "Straighten It Out," "Take You There," and the landmark "They Reminisce Over You (T. |
 | | Rising from the rugged streets and rich musical tapestry of Detroit, Slum Village were poised to carry on the old-school, funk, and soul-filled hip-hop torch of genre pioneers A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, and the Pharcyde. |
 | | One-third of the influential L.A. hip-hop group Dilated Peoples, Evidence was born Michael Perretta in Los Angeles, relocating from Santa Monica to Venice Beach with his mother when he was six, after his parents' divorce. |
 | | An underground and critical favorite, Cormega was the rare hardcore rapper to win praise from all directions, and while he never quite crossed over like some of his New York City peers, he maintained a respectable independence over the years nonetheless, self-releasing his work on the Legal Hustle label. |
 | | Without question the most intelligent, artistic rap group during the 1990s, A Tribe Called Quest jump-started and perfected the hip-hop alternative to hardcore and gangsta rap. |
 | | Frequently and rightly placed in the same context as DJ Premier, Pete Rock, and Kanye West, J Dilla (aka Jay Dee) built and sustained a high standing as a producer's producer while maintaining a low profile. |
 | | An influential alternative rap quartet from South Central Los Angeles, the Pharcyde was formed by MCs/producers Tre "Slimkid" Hardson, Derrick "Fatlip" Stewart, Imani Wilcox, and Romye "Booty Brown" Robinson. |
 | | Never quite a superstar, Redman was nonetheless one of the most off-the-wall, beloved, and enduring rappers of the '90s and 2000s. |
 | | Growing up in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, the boy who would become producer 9th Wonder, Pat Douthit, performed in the school band and also played keyboards at home. |
 | | Part of the new millennium resurgence of alternative rap, Little Brother drew from atypical inspirations for Southern hip-hop: classic Native Tongues outfits like De La Soul and A Tribe Called Quest, as well as more recent torch-bearers like the Roots and Black Star. |
 | | Scarface quickly became the South's most admired rapper and remained so throughout the '90s after breaking away from the Geto Boys to launch his solo career in 1991. |
 | | From his 1994 breakout on Jeru the Damaja's "Mental Stamina," Afu-Ra has fused classic East Coast hardcore with the sensitive, intelligent wordplay expected from a committed Rastafarian. |
 | | One of the most beloved hip-hop crews in rap music, D.I.T.C. (an acronym for "Diggin' in the Crates") consists of veteran rappers, DJs, and producers dedicated to the true essence of rap music: original lyrics and strong beat-savvy productions. |
 | | They never had a mainstream hit of their own, but during rap's so-called golden age in the late '80s, Eric B. |
 | | A member of the Likwit Crew alongside King T, tha Alkaholiks, and Xzibit, rapper Defari was born Duane Johnson, Jr. |
