 | | Ice Cube was the first member of the seminal California rap group N.W.A. to leave, and he quickly established himself as one of hip-hop's best and most controversial artists. |
 | | Born in Los Angeles, but an Oakland resident by the age of 14, Too Short was the first West Coast rap star, recording three albums on his own before he made his major-label debut with 1988's gold album Born to Mack; his next four all went platinum. |
 | | Graced with a quick and sometimes sung delivery, along with a unique sense of melody, Bone Thugs-N-Harmony burst out of Cleveland, Ohio in the mid-'90s with a pair of massive hits ("Thuggish Ruggish Bone" and "Tha Crossroads") along with a great first album, as well as a successful follow-up, and then quickly unraveled. |
 | | As the embodiment of '90s gangsta rap, Snoop Dogg blurred the lines between reality and fiction. Introduced to the world through Dr. |
 | | 2Pac became the unlikely martyr of gangsta rap, and a tragic symbol of the toll its lifestyle exacted on urban black America. |
 | | More than any other rapper, Dr. Dre was responsible for moving away from the avant-noise and political stance of Public Enemy and Boogie Down Productions as well as the party vibes of old-school rap. |
 | | Born Warren Griffin III, Warren G exploded out of the burgeoning Long Beach rap scene in 1994 with the smash single "Regulate," a duet with longtime friend Nate Dogg, and its accompanying album, Regulate. |
 | | Whether as a member of N.W.A., a solo act, or a label head, Eazy-E was one of the most controversial figures in gangsta rap. |
 | | One of the premier West Coast gangsta rap artists of the early '90s, DJ Quik was a rapper as well as a producer whose career carried on well into the next decade, as he put his career aside and began working primarily as a beat-maker. |
 | | 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. |
 | | He was known as the soul man of G-funk, and before his first album had ever been released, Nate Dogg made appearances on several huge hits: "Regulate" with Warren G, 2Pac's All Eyez on Me, and the soundtrack to Murder Was the Case. |
 | | The rap supergroup Westside Connection came together in late 1996, comprising Ice Cube, Mack 10, and WC (of WC & the Madd Circle). |
 | | Following the deaths of Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G., DMX took over as the undisputed reigning king of hardcore rap. |
 | | N.W.A, the unapologetically violent and sexist pioneers of gangsta rap, are in many ways the most notorious group in the history of rap. |
 | | In just a few short years, the Notorious B.I.G. went from a Brooklyn street hustler to the savior of East Coast hip-hop to a tragic victim of the culture of violence he depicted so realistically on his records. |
 | | During the mid-'90s, when West Coast rap reigned supreme, Mack 10 emerged as a close associate of Ice Cube and enjoyed several years of considerable commercial success before his popularity faded toward the end of the decade. |
 | | Before becoming one of the West Coast's most illustrious MCs at the end of the 1990s, and later a TV celebrity, Xzibit was a promising underground rapper. |
 | | The most idiosyncratic personality in rap and possessor of its most recognizable delivery, a halting, ragga-inspired style with incredible complexity, inventiveness, and humor, Busta Rhymes formed Leaders of the New School in 1990 and released two albums with the group before breaking out with a 1996 solo hit single, "Woo-Hah!! Got You All in Check. |
 | | Evolving slowly but steadily over the years, Three 6 Mafia began as an exploitative, horror-themed underground hardcore rap sensation ("666 Mafia," get it?) yet went on to enjoy relatively mainstream success years later, eventually winning an Oscar and scoring some major hits. |
 | | Tha Dogg Pound was an integral part of the Death Row Records empire, which cast a tall shadow over rap music in the early to mid-'90s, and though the label only released one Dogg Pound album, Dogg Food (1995), the duo's impression remained fairly constant in the years that followed, as the two group members pursued solo careers and occasionally reunited. |
 | | Cypress Hill were notable for being the first Latino hip-hop superstars, but they became notorious for their endorsement of marijuana, which actually isn't a trivial thing. |
 | | Chicago rapper Twista made his recording debut on "Po Pimp," a platinum single by his fellow Windy City rappers Do or Die. |
 | | Method Man was the first -- and biggest -- solo star to emerge from the groundbreaking Wu-Tang Clan. |
 | | OutKast's blend of gritty Southern soul, fluid raps, and the low-slung funk of their Organized Noize production crew epitomized the Atlanta wing of hip-hop's rising force, the Dirty South, during the mid to late '90s. |
 | | Master P created a hip-hop empire without registering on any mainstream radar. For several years, he operated solely in the rap underground, eventually surfacing in the mid-'90s as a recording artist and producer who knew exactly what his audience wanted. |
 | | Luniz are a rap duo out of Oakland consisting of Yukmouth and Knumskull, two friends who have known each other since junior high. |
 | | Kurupt began his winding career with Death Row Records and rose to momentary fame alongside Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg, but struggled to establish himself as a successful solo artist. |
 | | Having come up in the Hot Boys group alongside superstar Lil Wayne, New Orleans rapper Juvenile is a Southern hip-hop veteran, and a chart-topping one as well, having climbed the U. |
 | | Though the controversial subject matter of gangsta rap wasn't much of a barrier to popular success during the '90s, the Geto Boys' recordings proved almost too extreme for widespread exposure. |
 | | 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. |
 | | Compton's own Game (aka the Game and Hurricane Game) issued his debut LP, The Documentary, in 2004 through Aftermath/G-Unit/Universal. |
 | | 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. |
 | | 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. |
 | | Naughty by Nature pulled off the neat trick of landing big, instantly catchy anthems on the pop charts while maintaining their street-level credibility among the hardcore rap faithful; one of the first groups to successfully perform such a balancing act. |
 | | Once one of the leading rappers on Master P's No Limit record label, Mystikal quickly evolved beyond the label's clichéd thug trappings and found himself one of the Dirty South's most recognized rappers, alongside the likes of Juvenile and Ludacris. |
 | | Never quite a superstar, Redman was nonetheless one of the most off-the-wall, beloved, and enduring rappers of the '90s and 2000s. |
 | | Though G-Unit became generally recognized as the brand name associated with 50 Cent, for instance serving as a catch phrase ("G-G-G-G-G-Unit!") as well as a record label (G-Unit Records), it in fact began as the name of his backing posse. |
 | | One of the most thuggish rappers ever embraced by the mainstream, Trick Daddy broke out of the South in 2001 with "I'm a Thug" and established himself as an unlikely national superstar. |
 | | While hip-hop was consumed by the hardcore, noisy political rap of Public Enemy and the gangsta rap of N. |
 | | One of the founding members of the Wu-Tang Clan, who recorded some of the most influential hip-hop of the '90s, Ol' Dirty Bastard was the loose cannon of the group, both on record and off. |
 | | The first solo Latino rapper to go platinum, Big Punisher was also yet another member of the hip-hop community to fall victim to an early death -- though in his case, it was due to health problems, not violence. |
 | | Too Short discovered rapper Spice 1, who'd been born in Texas before moving to California. His self-titled debut was as vivid and fatalistic a gangsta album as possible, and his hard-edged, angry, and pessimistic rapping style and tone only added to the despair emanating from the disc. |
 | | Wherever rapper Eminem goes, controversy and headlines are sure to follow. With so many people unsure about whether to love him or hate him, five young rappers have decided to join him on his latest project, D12. |
 | | Hip-hop is notorious for short-lived careers, but LL Cool J is the inevitable exception that proves the rule. |
 | | Though he would later struggle with the nature of his fame as well as market expectations, 50 Cent endured substantial obstacles throughout his young yet remarkably dramatic life before becoming the most discussed figure in rap, if not pop music in general, circa 2003. |
 | | When the Dirty South movement broke nationwide at the turn of the century, Ludacris rode it to immediate widespread popularity, becoming arguably the most commercially successful Southern rapper of the time. |
 | | Slick Rick foreshadowed and epitomized the pimpster attitude of many rappers during the late '80s and early '90s, with gold chains, his trademark eye-patch, and recordings that were no less misogynistic -- "Treat Her Like a Prostitute," for example, became an underground hit in 1988, though it was justly criticized for its view of women. |
 | | Coolio was one of the first rappers to balance pop accessibility with gritty, street-level subject matter and language. |
 | | Chicago's Do or Die gained a hit with their first single, Po Pimp. Released on a tiny Chicago label, the track became a local hit and sparked the group's signing by Houston's Rap-A-Lot Records. |
 | | Ice-T (born Tracy Morrow) has proven to be one of hip-hop's most articulate and intelligent stars, as well as one of its most frustrating. |
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