Roughly 84,000 rap albums have been released in Houston since 1989. We're counting down the 25 best of all time every Thursday. Got a problem with the list? Just kidding. DJ Screw 3 N' Da Mornin, Part 2 (Big Tyme Records, 1995) While researching the Countdown, we came across two very distinct opinions regarding this album; naturally, they were almost diametrically opposed to one another. People either argued that it should be placed somewhere near the No. 4 spot - this was most often the position of rappers who knew Screw personally, hip-hop heads over 30-years-old, white music intellectualists and the homers over at the, where Screw serves as the mascot. Pretty much everyone else argued that it shouldn't be included at all. As preposterous as the latter opinion initially feels, there's a certain amount of logic to it. Essentially, two requirements that must be satisfied to qualify a rap album as an actual rap album, thus qualifying it for this list. First is that it overtly revolves around one single act; this makes up about 96 percent of all albums. Jul 20, 2017 - [1996] DJ Screw – 3 'N The Mornin' (Part Two) (v0) [1999] DJ Screw. [1996] DJ Screw – Chapter 011: Headed 2 Da Classic (192) [1996] DJ. DJ Screw, 3 'N The Mornin' Pt. 1 - Chapter 108 Intro High Powered - Dr. RBX, Daz, & Rage City Streets - Spice 1 It Don't Stop - Too $hort It Was A Good Day. ![]() Second, if it does not feature one specific act - we're talking compilation albums here - it must be comprised of all original songs. This is why something like Swishahouse's The Day Hell Broke Loose would work while a similarly themed Greatest Hits album wouldn't. Those who argued against 3's inclusion, whether they realized it or not, took issue with it not meeting either of the two requirements. And technically, this is absolutely correct. It's also fatally flawed, but we'll get to that. The lyricist lineup of 3 N' Tha Mornin' includes no less than 11 separate MCs. It does not blatantly highlight any specific artist, let alone DJ Screw. There aren't even any 'We the best!' -style interruptions from him, a la DJ Khaled. For anyone not familiar with Screw's style, or more specifically, with the purpose of his style - which turns out to be way more people than you would possibly imagine - he hardly seems involved at all. This obviously isn't isolated to this album. There are more than 200 Screw tapes available for purchase, which means that thousands had to have been recorded. Percentage-wise, for all of the music DJ Screw touched, his actual voice is barely ever even heard. Qubool hai rington. He's like Keyser Soze in The Usual Suspects before you found it was really Kevin Spacey the whole time (totally didn't see that coming). Anyhow, 3 fails the first requirement handily. And with regards to the second requirement, it crumbles under scrutiny as well. Where Screw's famed grey cassettes were collections of freestyled rhymes, several of the songs featured on this album are on separate albums altogether; E.S.G.' S 'G-Ride' is from Sailin' Da South, Botany Boys's 'Cloverland' is from Thought Of Many Ways, and so on. At best, 3 can loosely be classified as a compilation. At worst, it's no different than when someone culls together a bunch of songs they like, then uploads it to Dat Piff and calls it a mixtape. But this shortcoming isn't certain, so it seems like there might be some argumentative leeway. Ironically, it's the first condition where this album makes itself a viable selection. 3 N' Tha Mornin' isn't theoretically about DJ Screw, sure, but that's because no Screw tape was ever singularly about him. That's sort of the point, what made him so transcendent. He served less as the protagonist of each tape he made and more as the literary device; often times, that's far more important than the actual narrative, particularly within rap music (and probably hair metal). To argue that this album shouldn't be included in this list because Screw wasn't rapping on it is like arguing that Herman Melville wasn't a good writer because he didn't specifically mention himself in Moby-Dick.
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