The Wire's 100 Records That Set The World On Fire [When No One Was Listening] (1998)

Odd that that Public Enemy is on that list, it's hardly obscure and I think was the last time when PE were part of the Zeitgeist.

― Boring, Maryland

public enemy were for a very, very long time the rap group White People championed to prove that they were Not Racist

i checked out some of the lesser acclaimed ones, records that the people writing the list probably didn't really listen to much but just wanted to champion to prove that their avant-gardism was not a culturally imperialist project. i enjoyed bally sagoo ok, don't knowk how it's dated but i'm sure there are worse records in the genre. if anybody ever talked at all about bally sagoo in the states i don't know who they are. i liked the chaba fadela too. the rai i know is mostly from, uh, i think a numero comp and the cheikha rimitti album which is really clearly and obviously an attempt to cross over to hipster western audiences but is also very fucking good

re: pearls before swine, balaclava never struck me much but i got a friend who's really into tom rapp. rapp was also big in the terrastock scene, bardo pond, and the free folk and all that, i get the sense that he's up there with the incredible string band in those circles

rapp could write some beautiful songs. "raindrops" is a great one. some of the stuff on "wizard of is" hits me pretty good too, but it's mostly rough and wild recordings - that's my scene. "love, you are not alone", you know, fucking amazing song.

I've subscribed to the wire for a long time and there has been a very visible changeover fro the old guard (yer Penmans, Reynoldses, Watsons with a focus on white 60s derived avant garde) to a less white and male stable of writers and focus of coverage. All to the good of course.