Naughty By Nature - 19 Naughty III LP

Tommy Boy / Big Life (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.

Naughty By Nature is typically remembered for "O.P.P." and, at times, "Hip Hop Hooray" to most people.There's probably a slight whiff of one hit wonder about them, but that's probably not fair to a group that has three pretty great albums if you look at them objectively.  It's easy to think about the "O.P.P." video being played incessantly everywhere in 1991, but it's also easy to forget what a great song that was.  The beat is top shelf and Trech's lyrics, while a bit goofy, are on point.

Trech probably has one of the more underrated flows in golden era hip hop, and that's likely because of how ubiquitous the Naughty By Nature hits were.  When 19 Naughty II came out, the airwaves were once again saturated with one of the groups songs.  This time it was "Hip Hop Hooray."  Like "O.P.P." this was a song that's not particularly serious or impactful.  Again, it's kind of goofy and this time the beat isn't on the same level as "O.P.P." was.  But the rest of the album is pretty great.

Full of hard hitting beats with complex lyrical stylings, I certainly didn't give this album the credit it deserved when it first came out.  I had it back in 1993, but never ended up listening to it as much as some of the other albums that came out around there.  But going back to it now, it's pretty obvious how talented this crew was.  I'm really surprised this album hasn't ever been reissued on vinyl, but luckily I was able to track down a copy in beautiful condition at a very reasonable price.

Naughty By Nature - 19 Naughty III:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLK9R8P1ev0VLmlXVYTSO1EnrziFd8ML2x