If You Don't Know…. is a regular feature on The Hip Hop Manifesto where we unearth hidden, forgotten, or overlooked gems from hip hop's past and bring their beauty to light. First up: De La Soul's Stakes Is High.
Stakes Is High
De La Soul
Released: June 18, 1996
Produced by: De La Soul (primarily)
Guest Artists: Common, Zhane, Mos Def, Truth Enola
Critical Reception: Positive (but Rolling Stone only gave it two stars)
Commercial Reception: peaked at #13 on the U.S. charts (their highest charting album to that point), but has only sold a little over 300,000 copies to date
Standout tracks:
Intro:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=
obYQObob4gA[/youtube]
Wonce Again Long Island:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=
yQ2767Huim0[/youtube]
Stakes Is High:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=
JYw0NnHDRzc[/youtube]
What Makes This Album Great:
I've loved Stakes Is High since the day it was first released, and that love hasn't dimmed in the 17 years since. As Beastie Boy Mike D proclaims on the fabulous Tribe Called Quest documentary,Beats, Rhymes & Life: The Travels of a Tribe Called Quest
, the Native Tongues clique made great party jams, but with a consciousness to them. That sums up Stakes Is High to a T. The first De La album not produced by the formidable Prince Paul, the album is still packed with hard-hitting beats and wonderful samples, and the boys spit venom over top of it at the current decline (in their eyes) of the hip hop world and the evils of "gangsta" rap (which made them enemies of 2 Pac and Naughty by Nature). The album also features one of the first appearances of Mos Def, which helped break him over to the mainstream.
While the album got solid reviews when it came out, and charted pretty high on the sales charts, it seems to have been overlooked in the decades since, with most of the group's praise and legacy being tied to their first two albums. But, in my eyes (and ears), Stakes Is High remains the legends' best work.
If you don't know, now you know.
Grab a copy here:
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