Thursday Throwback! New England Hip Hop Massive-The Lineup (1993)

Almost missed the deadline to get in a thursday throwback for the week, but as per usual, better late than never. I found this track from surfing around YouTube this past weekend by a hip hop group appears to have existed not too far away from where this post is being written right now! These guys were known as the New England Hip Hop Massive, and even though they only cut a single song as a collective, hot damn, it was a good one. “The Line-Up” is pretty much a summary of everything that was good about rap in the early 90s. It’s an uptempo jam with one hell of a funk break; all these guys passing the mic back-and-forth exhibit no problems whatsoever attempting to keep up with it either. I bet the right DJ could drop this today at a party and still rock a floor with it, no problem.

After getting a couple comments on this after posting it on Facebook over the weekend, I came to find out this plate is selling for around, eh, $600 right now on the second hand market. Similar to most other indy hip hop from the pre-Interenet era, “The Line Up” probably saw no more than a few hundred copies, which were surely snatched up immediately around town. Needless to say, I’ll have to stick to watching it on YouTube. For now.