Customer Reviews

Best of Enjoy

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is the best rap collection for people, who are interestedin the true roots of this genre of music. I have spent the last ten years trying to replace all my old 12" records that disappeared at a party one night. I started playing this CD and it brought back so many memories of my youth in Harlem NY. Rap started in the Bronx and Harlem in the late 70's and many of the founding fathers are on this CD. You can equate this CD to a collection of Delta Blues records from the 30's. If you really want to understand the music and the culture from which the music arose this is the CD. I would recommend this CD for many reasons, but the best is for the sheer enjoyment of hearing Spoonie Gee and the Treacherous Three (with a teenage Kool Moe Dee)in their prime. They rap about women, money and rocking the body at a party. These are the ultimate block party records from 1979 thru 1981. The music is stripped down with low production values and quite raw. This is the way rap used to be before videos and Lil Kim. Most people around the country never got a chance to hear these pioneers of the music because they got virtually no radio air play. Even in their hometown of New York City they got no air play until a DJ named Mr. Magic got a radio program on unknown station that could only be heard from 2am to 4am on Sundays, Thursdays and Saturdays. If you were in High School you would stay up late with your tape recorder to get the latest music for school the next day. The guys on this CD were the ones that were on this show. These artists used to perform their songs at legendary places like Disco Fever, The Audubon Ballroom, T-Connection and PAL on 122nd Street. They would get on the mike and battle til 4 and 5 am. Masterdon and the Death Committee bring back fond memories because they live across the street from me... During the summer months they would bring out their equipment and put on free block party shows. Their best stuff unfortunately was never recorded on vinyl, but I am sure there are people with their audio tapes that used to sell on the street for $3. Without question the greatest and most influential solo rapper is Spoonie Gee. Get this CD just to hear him talk tales of female seduction. This is when you had to have a "Love Rap" to get play with the young ladies. This CD also should put to rest that Rap Music is rooted in violence. It is instead rooted in good times, dancing and shooting the jive. This songs are to me what the Motown sound or the Beatles are to Baby Boomers. Too bad these guys didn't get paid like the current rappers.

..then you also need this.

Enjoy was like the little brother label to the more commercially successful Sugarhill. Both were disco labels that got in on the rap scene in 1979. Indeed, a few artists that went on to be Sugarill's biggest players (Grandmaster Flash & Furious Five, Treacherous 3, Spoonie Gee) originally started on Enjoy, as did beatboxing legend Doug E. Fresh who later went on to have a part in the movie Beat Street, had a huge mid 80's hit with the classic "the show"/"la di da di" 12" as well as two solid solo albums in the late eighties.

This fine compilation is not only a great documeent which captures the early years of rap, transforming from disco interpolations to original composition tracks to a more proto-electro sound to a little beatboxing, but it's also just a great compilation album that bumps from front to back.

You get the very first Grandmaster Flash & Furious single "superrappin'" (they actually had another single entitled "we rap more mellow" out under the name The Younger Generation a little before this but this was was the official debut) from '79 and while it's not as good as "the message", "white lines" or "step off" it's still a great debut. Witness Melle Mel kick the "a child is born with no state of mind" verse he later used on "the message" here first. Kicking that in '79 when most rappers were rhyming about partying..? Damn, duke was years ahead of his time.

You also get very early tracks like "feel the heart beat", "at the party" and the seminal "body rock" by Kool Moe Dee's old group Treacherous 3 which would be some of their best work, crucial Fearless Four cuts like "it's magic" plus my personal favorite the body-poppin' classic "rockin' it" and the Doug E. Fresh's debut "just having fun".

Finally, and most importantly, this is the only place you can get the 2nd 12" by the first ever solo rap artist Spoonie Gee with his 1980 classic "love rap"/"new rap lauguage" 12" (a top 3 rap single of all time as it's two classics on one 12") on cd. "Love rap" is a cautionary tale about meeting the fairer sex over a minimal, funky drum beat. The beat is so good that the instrumenal intro became a party favorite that d.j's would throw on for other m.c's to rap over back in the day. The flip side "new rap language" is one of the very first posse tracks with Spoonie and his pals Treacherous 3 all kicking tongue-twisting, complex rhymes over a very taut party rockin' beat. Pure brilliance.

Enjoy fell apart after a few years but it didn't matter as the label had done what it needed to do and given the early rap scene many a classic single. I'd recommend this cd for having the two Spoonie Gee tracks alone. That you also get the likes of "body rock", "feelin' it" and "just having fun" on here makes it absolutely essential.

Looking at this CD bring back so many childhood memories. I could remember growing up In Harlem, going to 125th Street to puchase these records as a teenager. Now, some 20+ years later, I feel that Hip Hop has lost it's touch. A lot of these rappers can learn a lesson from the Old School guys because if you listen closely, There is no profanity, no playa hating, and you don't hear of these rappers calling women out of their names. I really wished that hip-hop could have stayed pure and fun, unlike the west coast gang-banging, and the women being disrespected. Even the videos are becoming more and more annoying. Women running around half dressed, rappers having "Light Skin" women only in the videos, these rappers walking around with the "Bling-Bling". It's a shame that most of these rappers do not invest their time or money in their community!

I hope our future generation will not follow in the footsteps of our "Gansta Rap"

Old School Hip-Hop! NOW AND FOREVER!!

Theese ground breaking songs were the launch pad that rocketed Hip Hop to a multi-billion dollar industry. No hooks, no 'Hyped' up videos, no DAT machines, no gimmicks, no pretty boys, no models, no 'gangstas', no 'playas', no 'hatin', no 'playa hatin', and especially no commercials! Just pure hip hop. Can you imagine Will Smith trying to battle Spoonie Gee on a north bound No. 4 train? This album is for thoose who want to remember true hip hop before it became 'proforming arts'.

If you were a teenager with access to Black neighborhoods on the East Coast in the early 80s, then this was the soundtrack of that era. "Feel The Haertbeart" by The Treacherous 3 (featuring a young Kool Moe Dee), "Superappin" by Grand Master Flash's Furious Five, and most of the other tunes here (surprisingly excluding tunes by the Funky 4+1 More) did the do when what passed for Soul music was too pop-oriented and mushy for Black youth. These are the tunes that the rest of America sadly missed out on due to misguided radio and promotion people who dismissed it all as a fad. Get this and Kurtis Blow's "History of Rap" compliations to learn about the TRUE SCHOOL of rap.

I just purchased a sealed copy of this disc, and while the inserts appear to be professionally printed, the disc itself is a CD-R. While I don't disagree with the five-star reviews in regard to the music, I am giving this three stars due to the cheap production. Also, one of the main reasons for my purchase was to find a non-vinyl source for "Rockin' It" by Fearless Four. Unfortunately, this is yet another disc that has dubbed this song from vinyl. (It is also dubbed from a record on Tommy Boy's Hip Hop Essentials Vol. 1 and Awesome 2 Present The History Of Rap Vol. 1.)

Bobby Robinson's Enjoy Records label was an important driving force during hip-hop's early years and this excellent collection brings us some of the label's most memorable jams in their original 12" Single versions. This is NOT "Old School" but "True School" in any way imaginable. Any fan of classic hip-hop or early-1980s Urban R&B should waste no time in getting this CD.

This alone is enough to buy this disc. Classic flavor from the Treacherous Three not on Sugarhill Records. You also get classics from the Fearless Four. What's not to like here.

The beginning of "Feel the HeartBeat" is missing the opening beat the absolute drop of the song and the album art is by some other label(downloaded to i-tunes) that's not good at all,it took me a longtime to find these songs i'm going to keep the disc but i'm not satisfied

This is what classic hip-hop is all about. I remembered hearing these records when they were first released and still enjoy them today. Each song doesn't sound like the other and truly has its own flava. Bobby Robinson was a true pioneer in the early stages of recorded rap music.