Editor's note: ego trip’s Book of Rap Lists
An appreciation for one of the greatest books of all-time. Also: Jeff Weiss picks his favorite Source and hip-hop album cover.
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If you grew up in the 90s and listened to rap, you probably read The Source, Vibe, XXL, Blaze, Rap Pages, and many other hip-hop magazines. Seriously, ask yourself: did you learn more from studying calculus or listening to a Ghostface album on your Discman for an entire summer?
At a time when publishers tried to cash in on the popularity of the genre, one magazine named ego trip, which made its debut in 1992 as “the arrogant voice of musical truth,” stood out from its competitors. ego trip was the counter-culture hip-hop publication. Their irreverent tone and tongue-in-cheek approach to covering the genre cut right against the mainstream publications they rubbed shoulders with on the newsstand.
If this sounds like the same approach SLAM took with their publication, then it should come as no surprise that Tony Gervino, the magazine’s second editor-in-chief, cites ego trip as an inspiration for SLAM’s voice in “Cover Story.”
The group behind ego trip’s brilliance included Jeff Mao, Sacha Jenkins, Elliott Wilson, Brent Rollins, and Gabriel Alvarez. They loved hip-hop as much as their readers and it reflected in the way they approached the magazine. Whether it was hip-hop or sports, so many of the magazines which debuted in the ‘90s were a result of people who grew up reading about things they loved but now decided they wanted to present this thing they loved to an audience in a different way.
I came across this Jeff Mao Q&A recently, which provided some insight into ego trip’s approach at the time:
Q: One of the things that stood out about ego trip was that, on the one hand, it's clear as editors and writers, you guys took what you did very seriously. But on the other hand, there was a lot of humor, both subtle and obvious, throughout the magazine. How did you guys learn to balance that out?
A: It was checking out what other [magazines] were doing and seeing how seriously they took themselves. We were always ready to clown the competition. We had a chip on our shoulder, trying to outsmart and outwit and outwork everybody else. Very aware of what other people were doing. We'd read stuff in The Source and Vibe and say, "Oh, this is terrible." And, ironically enough, we started writing for those magazines as well.
In the same interview, Mao talked about how everyone on the editorial staff had jobs working at other magazines:
Q: I always found that interesting: that you all were running one magazine but still working at others.
A: I was working at Vibe. Eventually Elliot and Sacha took music editor positions — Elliott was at Source, Sacha was at Vibe. We would get our freelance work, working for the magazines, and at night, come by the office, and we'd be working on [ego trip] issues. Seeing the corporate structure of how it works... it's great 'cause you get a full-time job and you have benefits. You're making some money, you have access to things, you're moving up in the industry. But at the same time, you see all the layers of nonsense that are involved in the whole thing. We used a lot of fake names because we didn't want to get in trouble with rappers and labels.
ego trip folded in 1998, but the editorial team behind the magazine published a book titled “ego trip’s Book of Rap Lists” a year later. Soren Baker of the Los Angeles Times described it as a “one of a kind” publication, saying: “Although most of the information in “Ego Trip” could be viewed as esoteric, the insider information is presented in easy-to-understand charts and lists. Hip-hop novices should have little difficulty learning about the genre.”
Elliott Wilson elaborated on the origin story of the book in a 2014 interview with HipHopDX, saying:
We thought every book about hip hop history was like, ‘This is the Bronx, and then we go here.’ It was very straightforward, it was very scholarly. We were like, ‘That’s not how rap fans think.’ Rap fans are like, ‘Do you remember when Nice & Smooth was on MTV? Do you remember when A Tribe Called Quest was on David Letterman?’ We have these memories and moments that impacted us, and there was no book that housed all these feelings of a rap fan.
“ego trip’s Book of Rap Lists” is a treasure trove of hip-hop knowledge. The book is neatly categorized into sections which cover major themes including Lyrics, DJs, Clans, Posses, Crews & Cliques, Record Labels, Film, Sports, Cheddar, Beef, and Awards. In Foundation—a section of the book celebrating the many firsts in hip-hop—you will find a list of Lauryn Hill’s greatest musical influences (Nina Simone, Al Green, Stevie Wonder, and Aretha Franklin, in no particular order) and the genre’s most important firsts (Did you know: “Flashdance” was the first Hollywood feature film to feature b-boying).
You will also find commentary on the most disappointing debut rap LPs (Unfortunately, my favorite rapper in eighth grade Canibus made the top of the list. Second was The Firm’s self-titled 1997 album, which just happened to be one of the first CDs I ever owned), notable rap albums that were never released (shoutout Cormega’s Testament), and rap movie soundtracks that don’t suck (Soul in the Hole is my personal pick because it features one of my favorite non-album Wu-Tang songs).
The book includes cameos from your favorite rappers. Noreaga picks his favorite cinematic love stories (it includes “Gone With The Wind” and “There’s Something About Mary”). Inspectah Deck shares his favorite professional wrestlers of all-time (Number one: Ultimate Warrior). Kool Moe Dee put together a rap report card:
I honestly can’t remember a book I’ve revisited more over the past two decades. It’s impossible to pick up “Book of Rap Lists” and not find yourself down a 15-minute rabbit hole every time. For “Cover Story,” I referenced the book (and specifically a list titled “5 Things Pen & Pixel Will Not Put On An Album Cover”) for an interview I did with Pen & Pixel co-founder Shawn Brauch, who designed a 2018 SLAM cover featuring Anthony Davis and DeMarcus Cousins. The cover might have confused a new generation of fans who didn’t grow up worshipping album cover designs like Big Bear’s Doin Thangs. It was a nostalgic trip down memory lane for anyone who did grow up in the 90s and can mentally catalog every single No Limit Records release by their album cover.
“ego trip’s Book of Rap Lists” is surprisingly not too difficult to find for a book which came out over 20 years ago. Grab a Kindle copy, at Apple Books, as a used book, or place a bid on this very reasonable eBay listing.
I want to hear about your favorite hip-hop magazine and album covers this week. Email me and be automatically entered into a draw to win a copy of SLAM’s first issue. By the way, I started a thread with some of your favorite magazine covers here and will be updating it over the next several months.
Today I asked Jeff Weiss (founder of Passion of the Weiss and one of the most respected journalists in the game) to share his favorite Source and hip-hop album cover. Here are his picks:
“In retrospect, The Source's covers are fairly unoriginal. Roughly 99 percent of them feature rappers mean-mugging the camera, occasionally with some sort of slightly corny prop (Biggie, the King of NY stalking amidst the skyscrapers, RZA, Meth and Rae clutching the globe with a mesmeric glee like Trump clutching a Saudi Arabian orb). Nonetheless, they remain iconic and seared into the collective memory of every rap-obsessed Gen Xer and millennial. My pick actually comes from before I even started reading The Source (the Dre leaving Death Row cover, foregrounded amidst a sea of fire): it's Quik with a full-on blown out perm and the headline "A Big Blow Out!" He's rocking a custom-made Compton jacket and looks like the coolest motherfucker to ever, which, of course, is exactly what he is. In the words of Lucille Bluth: oh, that hair.”
“Of course, someone would've eventually had the idea to put themselves on a zig-zag pack, but Dre did it first, and used it for the indelible cover of one of the greatest albums ever made. To be honest, zig-zag should've just cut Dre a deal and made him the poster boy for their products going forward. RAW never would've gained any market share. This was the first cassette album that I ever remember buying (there were others before, but they have since been vaporized into memory dust), and it would never really be topped. Honorable mention though to H-Wood.”
On Friday, Alan Sepinwall of Rolling Stone picks his favorite Marvel comic book covers; Mirin Fader talks about her favorite magazine covers growing up.
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