Was The Source in its prime any different from Pitchfork?

[SteelCitySoldier]

I know about Miss Info.
But what you quoted is inaccurate. She did not singlehandedly award Illmatic 5 mics. All of the ratings were done by committee. The mind squad. I'm surprised you don't remember that.

I have pulled an interview from her before where she admitted having no say in how many mics Illmatic got.

So when did you start reading the Source? Sometime in the 2000s? And are you from the UK?

Schector and Mays were the white guys from Harvard. Bernard and Dennis are African American.

Naw it was one dude who got illmatic like 8 months before it dropped. Dude had been hounding Dennis (who was in charge of ratings) to give the album five mics but when he listened to it he didn't feel the same (cuz dude hyped it up so much), so Dennis told him to grab Miss Info and those two alone gave out the five mic rating.

Dennis did review The Chronic though and gives his reasoning in that link on why he didn't give out five mix reviews and also said he was wrong for not giving it out. That whole article is great for anyone who actually cares about the history of the whole review process and the fukkery of The Soure with Mays in charge.

 

[SteelCitySoldier]

I started reading the Source religiously in early 96, the issue with Ice Cube on the cover throwing up the W. It was hard to come across in CA. Eventually, you could find it in any Walgreens, but at first I had to go to record stores to cop.

I don't remember there being much information about the backgrounds of the writers and there was no way to find out more because this was pre internet. Tell me about some specific observations you made back in elementary school? Names and background information.

When did you start reading it?

I could care less about the current staff.
I'm interested in 90-97. Especially 90-91 when they were giving out 5 mics more freely and the identity of everyone on the Mind Squad when Illmatic got 5.
Do you have those names/background information?

Check out that link I posted, I promise you, you won't be disappointed

 

[AV Dicey]

Illmatic doesn't become the iconic album it is thus making Nas legendary in this site and other similar corners of hiphop fandom if not for the instant slobbering it got in the Source when it was reviewed. That 5 mic cosign was no joke.
This forum doesn't exist if not for The Source's nerdish ways. Prior to The Source hiphop was some shyt you heard and kept it moving...or read some goofy shyt on Right On and Black Beat, no one was doing theses on 'The Genesis' or 'Hi Powered', even its exposal for having agendas led to the cynicism that pervades the artform.
Thread is prima facie blasphemous

 

[SteelCitySoldier]

Illmatic doesn't become the iconic album it is thus making Nas legendary in this site and other similar corners of hiphop fandom if not for the instant slobbering it got in the Source when it was reviewed. That 5 mic cosign was no joke.
This forum doesn't exist if not for The Source's nerdish ways. Prior to The Source hiphop was some shyt you heard and kept it moving...or read some goofy shyt on Right On and Black Beat, no one was doing theses on 'The Genesis' or 'Hi Powered', even its exposal for having agendas led to the cynicism that pervades the artform.
Thread is prima facie blasphemous

Dude even said that. He was glad that he didn't give Chronic a five mic rating because it made people be like "Chronic ain't get five...so if this got five then it must be nice".

That dude Dennis knew what he was doing

 

[hex]

Illmatic doesn't become the iconic album it is thus making Nas legendary in this site and other similar corners of hiphop fandom if not for the instant slobbering it got in the Source when it was reviewed. That 5 mic cosign was no joke.
This forum doesn't exist if not for The Source's nerdish ways. Prior to The Source hiphop was some shyt you heard and kept it moving...or read some goofy shyt on Right On and Black Beat, no one was doing theses on 'The Genesis' or 'Hi Powered', even its exposal for having agendas led to the cynicism that pervades the artform.
Thread is prima facie blasphemous

Even in it's prime people wasn't checking for "The Source" like you're suggesting. To the point that it swayed people's opinion on an album?

It was more like "let me go cop this if I'm interested" then, later if they thought of it "what did 'The Source' think of it?"

Then again I'm older than most of the board so maybe young dudes were geeked off what "The Source" was saying. I dunno. It was always, at most, a supplement to any conversation that would take place about an album everyone already had. The cause of why they had the album, though? I can't recall that ever happening.

Fred.

 

[AV Dicey]

Even in it's prime people wasn't checking for "The Source" like you're suggesting. To the point that it swayed people's opinion on an album?

It was more like "let me go cop this if I'm interested" then, later if they thought of it "what did 'The Source' think of it?"

Then again I'm older than most of the board so maybe young dudes were geeked off what "The Source" was saying. I dunno. It was always, at most, a supplement to any conversation that would take place about an album everyone already had. The cause of why they had the album, though? I can't recall that ever happening.

Fred.

Well for one, I was one of those checking The Source during its prime and I've never been a NY resident and even while I acknowledge Illmatic's greatness I know I damn sure copped it as a result of that Source review (I had never heard that so called 'Live @ the bbq' verse)

And its not about being geeked off, during the early Source era hip hop was way regional and the only way to find out what others were listening to was through your college friends from outta state or mainstream mags such as The Source (with all the fukkery that encompassed i.e east/west beef etc) So they were not supplementary to any conversation, they literally created the east/west beef.

If not for the pseudo in depth journalism of The Source not only does this forum not exist, hell this thread where the OP asks us to compare and contrast some obscure element of the artform does not exist. And Future would just be some catchy shyt I heard on the radio and maybe copped the album and then talked about it with my friends when chiefin while Run The Jewels would be a "what the fukk is a run the jewels?" (because I first read about The Funcrusher Plus ep on...you guessed it, The Source)

Even LL has got that fukkin mike tatted on his arm

 

[DPG]

the source was not the real source in the era when you read in 96-04.

the real source stopped back during the westside connection review and ice cube selling out.
before that the source was the holy grail.
till, they disenfranchised the writers.


art barr

Yup, the Source was pumping out terrible ratings and subpar reviews during that period and their overall integrity and quality just continued to slip over the years. They become far too commercial and politically correct and their magazines were filled with mostly advertisements. They also lacked any real credibility when it came to their reviews due to their proven track record of showing bias and favoritism towards artists located in or near their geographic home of New York. Additionally, they would give higher ratings to certain artists and groups based upon the amount of advertising revenues paid by their label or to simply aid in their promotion.

 

[Art Barr]

If I remember this, I'll ask my mum and my big bro if they have magazines from the 90s in the basement. Or you can google the reviews you are looking for and find the names of the reviewers in the bottom. I can give you the first one, Miss Info, gave Illmatic 5 mics. From Chicago her parents owned a toy store, factory or something, moved to NY to study at an Ivey League school and took it from there.

It will be hard to find as much info about freelancers from 25 years ago unless they became famous.

Some names.

Miss info was like every bboy crush in the chi and she was a great bgirl in a grassroots manner.
Not to mention a bit older but in the age group of Alcatraz Dem dare party goers that I was in.
She was like the chick all the younger bboys had a crush on.
Me included and a great socialite to the scene back then.
She was at every function like I was at every function and she probably went to more, too.
All cause she was cliqued in with all predominate crews.
Yet, she was with older more prominent bboys and you would have been a kid to her.
She is a bgirl for real.
One of the very few left, too



Art Barr

 

[mobbinfms]

Just finished part 2 of that interview the fukkery

I knew a lot about the "rise and fall" of The Source but this is some next level shyt. Only reason Benzino got away wit that shyt though was because Mays was a bytchboi. nikka wasn't bytchin nobody else there but him. If Mays had told him to fukk off then The Source would have been OK but Mays wanted to be that nikka...or should I say cracka so he sided wit Benzino.

Mays basically fukked up an entire company because he wanted to be a thug. Money wasn't even in play here, RSO wasn't going to blow, Benzino wasn't a business partner or anything just a nikka from the hood who befriended a CAC with a degree from Harvard and took advantage of him and still continues to do so to this day because they run Hip Hop Weekly or some shyt...smh. Dave Mays got to be one of the dumbest muthafukas in Hip Hop History.

You posted this right as I started going back and forth with @Harry B
He drops a lot of names in it. Dapped and repped for posting.
Couple of takeaways.
From 92-94 during the moratorium on giving albums 5 mics, the person with the final say on ratings was an African American breh from Harlem
This quote here makes me think that most of the people on the editorial side (the people deciding the mics) were black or Latino.
RD: The Source Awards began in 1991 as a simple reader survey bound into the magazine. In 1992 things took a small step forward as an embryonic version of the awards ran during a couple of consecutive episodes of Yo! MTV Raps. At the end of 1993 Dave informed us that he was planning to turn The Source Awards into a major event and that he needed the editorial staff to pitch in wherever necessary. This was right as the conflict between Dave and editorial began to escalate and many of us were not looking forward to the prospect of spending our few moments of downtime slaving away on one of Dave’s side projects. But at that point we were still a team and we all understood that to the outside world if the Awards didn’t come off as advertised the blame would fall mostly on editorial, so we tried to make the best of the situation. It was tense, though. Dave was in the habit of handing out unsolicited critiques of the editorial side and only really treated people in a civil manner when he needed something. If he didn’t need to parade advertisers through the editorial plantation or need brown faces to accompany him on meetings, Dave treated us as little more than a bunch of chattering voices that he was under no obligation to listen to.

 

[mobbinfms]

Naw it was one dude who got illmatic like 8 months before it dropped. Dude had been hounding Dennis (who was in charge of ratings) to give the album five mics but when he listened to it he didn't feel the same (cuz dude hyped it up so much), so Dennis told him to grab Miss Info and those two alone gave out the five mic rating.

Dennis did review The Chronic though and gives his reasoning in that link on why he didn't give out five mix reviews and also said he was wrong for not giving it out. That whole article is great for anyone who actually cares about the history of the whole review process and the fukkery of The Soure with Mays in charge.

The other breh was Jon Shecter. He disputes that be kept the album hidden and says that while it was disputed, a lot of people agreed with him that the album deserved five mics.
Here's a part of a tweet he did about it.
It’s about 9pm, but we used to work late back in the Golden Era Source days. Mind Squad and all that. So I knew cats would still be there. I get to the office and I gather all the heads in the conference room. I remember who was there: @MatteoGlen @CeeWild @FrozenFiles. We had a pretty shytty system in there but it didn’t matter, I pop in the tape and the powerful musical magic emits from the speakers. Everyone is nodding their heads, eyes wide, mouths open, it’s hip-hop paradise. When those funky/eerie/powerful xylophone notes from One Love come on, I remember @FrozenFiles is literally lying on the floor…He can’t comprehend how good it is. None of us can. It’s the best shyt we’ve heard in our lives.

 

[mobbinfms]

Check out that link I posted, I promise you, you won't be disappointed

You kept trying to put me on, and I kept ignoring you
Never again breh

 

[mobbinfms]

Dude even said that. He was glad that he didn't give Chronic a five mic rating because it made people be like "Chronic ain't get five...so if this got five then it must be nice".

That dude Dennis knew what he was doing

Yeah - he said that by the Chronic not getting 5, the albums that did get 5 in 90-91 were all elevated.
In the long run though, the Chronic is held in higher regard than all the albums that got 5 in 90-91. Or at a minimum, held in as high regard as all those albums.

 

[mobbinfms]

nd its not about being geeked off, during the early Source era hip hop was way regional and the only way to find out what others were listening to was through your college friends from outta state or mainstream mags such as The Source (with all the fukkery that encompassed i.e east/west beef etc) So they were not supplementary to any conversation, they literally created the east/west beef.

You're forgetting about Yo and Rap City. Put me on to shyt outside of the Bay waaaaaaay more than the Source.

 

[mobbinfms]

They also lacked any real credibility when it came to their reviews due to their proven track record of showing bias and favoritism towards artists located in or near their geographic home of New York.

This isn't true. I will post a link to a thread I made about the Sources top 100 albums list from 98 that morphed into a discussion about regional bias that the breh @DANJ! completely shut down with recollections of reviews. A lot of reviews were posted too.

 

[mobbinfms]

http://www.thecoli.com/threads/edit...to-be-myth-source-top-100-albums-list.255224/
@Kieran