It has the atmosphere of a smoke-filled cipher or late-night basement jam. “I Got Next/Neva Haddam Gun” is a stripped-down, bare-bones yet upbeat track. In the face of growing commercialism, he attempted to “bust back with consciously charged art.”Īs a whole, I Got Next is a solid and worthy entry into KRS’s extensive body of work. In the midst of all of this, KRS made teaching and preserving the essence and tenets of hip-hop culture his priority. Hip-Hop records were receiving daytime spins on mainstream radio and play on MTV (back when MTV still played videos, that is). Labels were pouring millions into promotion. Select artists were selling millions of records. Hip-Hop was on its way to becoming a billion dollar industry. The creation of the organization, and later the release of I Got Next, coincided with the shift with how hip-hop was perceived, marketed, and consumed. The Temple of Hip-Hop was particularly ambitious, as KRS envisioned the organization as one that would maintain and promote hip-hop culture. By that time, KRS wasn’t new to the rodeo when it came to founding hip-hop related organizations, as he had been the driving force behind the late ’80s Stop the Violence Movement and the early ’90s Human Education Against Lies (H.E.A.L.) organization. I Got Next was KRS’s first album after creating the Temple of Hip-Hop organization in 1996. The majority of I Got Next concerns the preservation of hip-hop culture as a whole, which KRS viewed as very much a socially conscious goal. Yes, there were songs like “Black Cop,” “Sound of the Police,” and “Free Mumia” scattered over his two previous albums, but since KRS “went solo,” he started to narrow his focus towards exhibiting his rhyme skills and extolling means of self-improvement. KRS’s music had started getting less overtly political ever since BDP “disbanded” in 1993. But in reality, I Got Next was likely the last album of his that approached greatness. Twenty-five years ago, when he released I Got Next, his third solo album, it looked like he really was going to be here forever. He was a pioneer, and his face belongs on hip-hop’s Mt. KRS was a commanding presence in the studio, on stage, and in the lecture halls. Over the next decade, he recorded albums that were lyrically and stylistically superior, as well as politically revolutionary. It was a work of sheer lyrical and musical genius, and it started KRS-One on the path to become one of the greatest emcees to ever touch a mic. BDP, with their 1987 debut album Criminal Minded. Thirty-five years ago, Lawrence “KRS-One” Parker debuted as the lead rapper of Boogie Down Productions a.k.a. Happy 25th Anniversary to KRS-One’s third studio album I Got Next, originally released May 20, 1997.
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