What Three Hip-Hop Albums Mean to the Culture
A cultural reflection on new albums by JID, Little Simz, and De La Soul that shows how rap, in the hands of master emcees, continues to wrestle with faith, loss, identity, and meaning.
“Cabin in the Sky,” “Lotus” and “God Does Like Ugly” brought something to the game rarely seen before or not for a long time.
So, while I don’t like disclaimers, I am going to start with a few so when you come for me you at least get it right. What I’m about to write isn’t a definitive best of 2025 list. Furthermore, the albums that I’m about to discuss I don’t believe are the only great albums last year; in fact, as I alluded to in my hip-hop rap-up, “there were too many artists to shout out in one rap-up (I could write three or four and still not cover everything that was dope this year).” So then maybe you might ask, “Why these albums?” Well, put simply, “Cabin in the Sky,” "God Does Like Ugly" and "Lotus" by De La Soul, JID and Little Simz, respectively, symbolized what the craft of rap music sounds and reads like when undertaken by a few of the masters of it. Don’t get me wrong, The Clipse, NaS, and Doechii (technically in 2024 but she is my frontrunner to take the mantle from Kendrick as the next great emcee of the current era…) handed in amazing music. Freddie Gibbs, Your Old Droog and a few others put on barfests. Legends from Kwame to Slick Rick this year proved they still have it, and Mick Jenkins is still pushing boundaries on what a rap album can be. But the three albums I’m going to briefly touch on for slightly different reasons did something that to me put on display how emcees can still bring us to think about our existence, our reality and ourselves in powerful ways.
JID — The philosopher, the thinker and the poet
I’m going to go on the assumption that when you read this you’re already familiar with who JID is, and his contributions with EarthGang and how we got to this point. In the immediate, "God Does Like Ugly" is a project that stands out, but maybe not in a particular way that distances itself from other records that ponder God, faith and their own existence. What makes the record so interesting is the clarity and the depth JID displays. Similar to Kendrick and very early NaS (with him revisiting this part of himself in patches throughout his career), JID becomes the intrusive narrator, giving you insight into the hood and streets while at times interjecting their own personal experience. On tracks like “Community” speaking to the realities of project housing, detailing the day-to-day realities with an endearing love for the inhabitants while sharing a disdain for the circumstances that create it, and also firing warning shots at those who use that experience as a fetish and cosplay it for entertainment. As well as on “VCRs” with Vince Staples, JID’s bringing you into the daily machinations of corner boys as well as their mindset: it’s part editorial and part cautionary tale as well. It might simply be his elegance with language, but JID’s approach to the common fodder of street voyeurism feels fuller and more urgent than that of his peers or his predecessors.
Little Simz — Vulnerable, visceral and enomous
Little Simz has steadily built a catalogue that should have her far more known, at least here in the United States, than she already is. An emcee who has an ability to bring you into their interior world and make you feel as if you’re looking inside yourself instead. Doing all this with amazing lyricism and flow, she is a heavyweight who in my opinion is highly underrated. The release this year of what might have flown under the radar for casual fans and new listeners might be the core and catalyst for the "Lotus" project. In short, Little Simz had a public fallout with long-time collaborator and friend Inflo of Sault, resulting in a massive creative pivot, but also a re-examination of herself and her relationships. While this, in and of itself, may seem like enough for a verse or a song, Little Simz took this very painful and personal situation and crafted one of the rawest projects of last year. In fact, this might be the first ever diss album in hip-hop (although Marvin Gaye probably has the first diss album of any genre). The album, though, isn’t petty and, although songs such as “Thief” and “Flood” are barely veiled eviscerations of the situation between her and Inflo, the totality of the album goes beyond the vitriol and again shows Simz offering up her own innermost insecurities and trials for examination to the listener, and in doing so giving us room to investigate our own.
De La Soul — The elegy on record
“T.R.O.Y.” has been widely accepted by many in the culture as one of the greatest hip-hop tribute songs of all time. The idea of using a song as a way to memorialize a fallen comrade in the culture is a trope that has been done thoughtfully and graciously before. De La lost DAVE aka Trugoy in 2023 and the first album without De La’s third “plug,” “Cabin in the Sky,” is both an elegy and a eulogy that really has only one parallel. When Phife Dawg of a Tribe Called Quest passed in 2016, the subsequent album created with him posthumously, “Thank You 4 Your Service,” is the only other record explicitly dedicated to a fallen friend as tribute. Cabin similarly is a project in tribute, and De La takes great care to spend the full course of the record not only memorializing their friend, brother and partner but also, like a recorded eulogy, laying bare his legacy, and what he meant to them as a friend, a man and a truly gifted artist. Throughout the album, Maseo and Pos, along with the various guests, speak to the life of Trugoy but also to how their faith and love was tested and strengthened because of that loss. “Will Be,” “Sunny Storms,” “Palm of His Hand” and “Good Health” (featuring a posthumous appearance from Dave) are just a handful of the songs that reveal what Dave meant to De La, and who he was as a human walking this planet. You don’t normally call a song a classic weeks after it releases, but I will personally make an exception in this case, because it is truly exceptional.
