Pusha T’s favourite albums of the 1980s
Pusha T is fair age nowadays, firmly planted in his middle years. Born in 1977, the 49-year-old Push grew up in the ’80s, and his music taste reflects that fact.
The Clipse rapper chatted to Complex in 2011 about his favourite ever albums, and five of them came right from his childhood days. The ’80s is when hip-hop really started to take shape, and the young Push was around to experience it from afar.
Push was a big fan of Run-DMC as a kid, believing that hip-hop couldn’t get any “louder or more rambunctious” than them. But he changed his mind once his friend showed him Paid In Full, Eric B & Rakim’s debut album from 1987.
Push realised that Eric B & Rakim were “just as loud” as Run-DMC, but their “style was different.” He said he was “floored” when he first heard them, while admitting that his mind at that point, in 2011, still drifted to Paid In Full whenever he found himself making decisions about his own style.
Push also highlighted Eric B & Rakim’s second album, Follow the Leader, released the following year in ’88. This, too, had stood the test of time, with Push claiming “you can still discover lines” on it all these years later. It just keeps giving.
Also in 1988, Public Enemy released their second album, It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back, and it left a huge impression on Pusha. He was impressed by the positive messaging in the group’s music, the fact they had something political to say.
“Pac took on rappers,” Push said of one of Tupac Shakur, who would enter the scene with his own debut album in 1991, “but no one was taking on the US and the establishment.” He admired them so much for that.
In 1987, KRS-One’s group, Boogie Down Productions, released their debut album, Criminal Minded, and it became a classic, arguably one of the first gangsta rap albums to ever be made. One might expect Push to love this album in particular, in light of the subject matter of so many of his songs, but it’s actually Boogie Down Productions’ follow-up that Push loves most.
By All Means Necessary came out in 1988, and it marked a big change for the group. One of the founding members, Scott La Rock, had been murdered following the release of Criminal Minded, which understandably affected KRS-One deeply. He decided to change tact with the follow-up album, with By All Means Necessary taking a much more socially conscious turn.
Push admired how, instead of reacting to La Rock’s death with “angst and anarchy,” he instead produced a work of positivity. He managed to find the light in the darkness, and he sought to spread it.
Rounding off Push’s ’80s selections was Big Daddy Kane’s It’s A Big Daddy Thing, his second album that came out in 1989. Kane, he argued, was “the style maverick,” who had “the women, the style, the lyrics, [and] even had dancers.” He revealed another side of hip-hop to Push, and he loved it as a young person and he continued to as an adult.
Pusha T’s favourite albums of the 1980s:
- Eric B & Rakim – Paid In Full
- Public Enemy – It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back
- Boogie Down Productions – By All Means Necessary
- Eric B & Rakim – Follow The Leader
- Big Daddy Kane – It’s A Big Daddy Thing