Customer Reviews

Raising Hell

5 star:		(41)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Before the days of the internet, I had to fly down to New York to pick up the latest 12" singles. When the Peter Piper/My Adidas single was released, it was blowing up parties everywhere, and I can remember the anticipation waiting for the new album. By chance I was in NYC the day that Raising Hell was released, and I remember seeing it/hearing it in a record store in Manhattan, and I just flipped. Everything about it was awesome. Finally a rap group that was doing it big!!! Raising Hell was so different, so tight, and it had such a live feel to it!!!

It was comparable to when the first Run DMC album came out, and me and the crew were like "What the heck is that?" If the first album said "New school is here," this album said "we're staying!!!"

Definitely an album that no hip hopper should be without. I'm finally buying the CD because all my vinyl copies have finally worn out, and this copy is for the archives.

When "Raising Hell" was released in 1986, it literally took rap music from being an underground phenomenon to setting it on the course for mainstream success and acceptance. The first rap album to go multi-platinum, top ten on the pop chart, and helped pave the way for the Beastie Boys huge success with "Licensed To Ill" which was released just three months after this album(and Run and D co-wrote "Paul Revere" and "Slow and Low"). Most importantly, there are the songs. "Peter Piper", "My Addias", "You Be Illin'",and "Walk This Way" which was responsible for helping revive Aerosmith's flagging career. This reissue also sounds much better than the original CD pressing. You can't call yourself a real hip-hop fan if you don't own this album. One of the very best of the genre.

I had this tape 15 years ago, loved it, lost it. I finally bought the CD again recently, and it's about my favorite album again. It makes me stomp, shout, and laugh. These guys are the masters of NY rap, also great comedians and just righteous in all respects. A MUST.

In my opinion, this is easliy the best album ever. I bought it when it came out in 1986, and it is even better now. After listening to "Raising Hell" all the way through changed the way I listened to music. A perfect blend of rap and hard rock, the way rap is supposed to be. Run and DMC are the best MC's out there, and no one scratches vinyl like Jam Master Jay. You cannot call yourself a fan of rap if you have never heard this album--or if you don't like this album. Every rapper of today owes it to Run-DMC for making rap mainstream. So do yourself a favor and listen to this and I'll promise to shut up!

This album is the third multi-platinum release by the Krush Groovers from Hollis, Queens. The album transcends rap music and culture to a true art form. Aerosmith contibutes backround vocals and music for a stunning remake of Walk This Way. Other notable songs include My Adidas, which helped them develop their own line of shoes, It's Tricky, with Penn and Teller in that video, and You Be Illin', which was played in the feature film Half Baked. This release should appeal to people that normally don't listen to rap because of the rock fusion on some of the songs. Just looking at the cover reminds me of the mid 1980's and the evolvement of rap as a marketing force to be reckoned with in Billboard magazine.

And another huge step beyond their previous album. This would soon become the blueprint for all rap albums made after it. If you're a rap fan and don't own this album, you're just fronting.

This is where Run DMC reached their peak. At the University of South Carolina at the time, this album and the beastie Boys "License to Ill" were heard everywhere. Rap was still fun and rappers were still not taking themselves too seriously.

Now for the songs. I DEFY anyone to sit still while listening to "Peter Piper" or "My Adidas." "Proud To Be Black" is a bit more tounge-in-cheek than the "afrocentric" rappers of a few years later. Yes, there is "Walk This Way" (sorry, I prefer the original), but most people don't know that rappers had been sampling this beat before rap was recorded. "Perfection" is wonderful in that it has our heroes doing a relaxed rap with a live 16-year old drummer named Stix in the background, with an interesting effect.

But enough of this. Get this and Run DM's self-titled debut to hear how much fun rap was in the pre-gangsta era.

This album is the sole reason why my station name is hiphopforlife.I make it a point to listen to this album everyday. The essence of old school hip hop coming from the "second generation hip hoppers".No Limp Bizkit,Korn,Linkin Park,or any nu-metal band without Run,DMC or Jam Master Jay.

This was the first rap tape I got when I was about ten and unlike most hip hop records that go out of style in a few years, i find myself coming back to this time and time again. This album was definitely way before it's time. It was great then, it's great now and it will be bumping into the new millenium!

Run DMC is arguably the most influential group in rap, and Raising Hell was the album that made them famous back in 1986. This singles-oriented album had classics like "Peter Piper" and the timeless song "It's Tricky", and at the same time, set trends in hip-hop footwear with "My Adidas", and helped rap crossover into the mainstream with "Walk This Way", a rap-ified remake of the Aerosmith classic. Emcees Run and DMC were both capable of delivering meaningful lyrics like in the socially conscious song "Proud to be Black", but at the same time, they show they know how to have fun and rock a party with songs like "Hit it Run" and "You be Illin'". Run and DMC also gave birth to the tag-team rhyming used by other great rap groups such as the Beastie Boys and Outkast. Jam Master Jay was a genius in his own right, using a fair number of samples to perfection, not to mention his sick turntable skills.

Since this album IS singles-oriented, the filler isn't all that great, and that's where this album loses a star. The filler isn't exactly wack, but songs like "Perfection" sound underproduced, and "Dumb Girl", though humourous, is pretty dumb. It's not wack by any means, but it could have been better. Filler aside, this is one of the best rap albums of all time, it's all great music for party-goers and hip-hop heads alike.