Leaders Of The New School – T.I.M.E. (The Inner Mind's Eye) 2xLP

Elektra (1993)

Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo! MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for twenty-five plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

I've been watching old episodes on Yo! MTV Raps on Paramount+ quite a bit lately.  It's such a great feeling seeing so many of those episodes again, though I definitely wish they weren't missing as much footage as they obviously are.  I can definitely say that they played "Me, Myself & I" by De La Soul way too much.  I never liked that song much to begin with, but I'm now at the point where I'm constantly fast forwarding through it as it's on about half of the episodes I've watched.  Another video that is getting a ton of play on these episodes is Leaders of the New School's "International Zone Coaster."  

I don't remember seeing that video much as a kid.  For me, it was "Case of the P.T.A" that caught my attention in the 90s and made me pick up the first Leaders' album.  After "Scenario" hit off of Low End Theory, I was pretty psyched on the second Leaders of the New School record being released.  T.I.M.E. came out in 1993, I immediately bought it, didn't like it and never really listened to it much at all back then.  Eventually, I got rid of the CD during one of my cullings.

But, within the past couple of years I decided to revisit the album to see if I had missed out on anything.  Turns out that I did.  T.I.M.E. is way better than I gave it credit for in high school.  In particular the beats are really great, classic golden era production.  The vocals are very strong and all three MCs stepped up their game and dropped some of the gimmicky things they were doing on their debut.  I can't figure out what I didn't like about this record back in the 90s.  I just remember thinking it wasn't as good as their debut.  

It's still probably not quite as good as A Future Without A Past, though my opinion is surely colored by nostalgia at least a little bit.  But I can say for sure that T.I.M.E. is an excellent record and one that I really wish I hadn't slept on for so many years.

Leaders Of The New School – T.I.M.E. (The Inner Mind's Eye):
https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_m5KgTjsLNFA69HQpZ97UFJ8yuzpYaFLOk