De La Soul: Art Official Intelligence (Mosaic Thump)

NO ONE who saw the packed, mostly young, black crowd reveling in the house party atmosphere of De La Soul's last UK gig in 1997 can doubt the enduring respect within hip hop for the group who, with the playful, free-form, jazz- and soul-inflected 3 Feet High And Rising (1989) provided virtually the only break to date in the genre's relentless gangsta domination. Every rapper since who's twisted the genre toward soulfulness or surreal mind-expansion owes a debt to them and their fellow Native Tongues.