I’m going to put my neck on the line with this one: I truly believe that DJ Mark ‘the 45’ King is the best producer in hip-hop music. Maybe not in these days and times, but, back when it mattered, he ran the game, with hit after hit, blessed and sprayed with his signature production.

Even if his best was over 20 years ago, he still gave us Jay-Z’s ‘Hard Knock Life’ using the (‘Annie’ sample) and Eminem’s ‘Stan’ (making Dido a household name). Mark still lurks on the scene, and I’m always hopeful that he’ll bring out another banger, embraced by Underground and commercial head alike. 

Lakim Shabazz was a member of the loose collective known as the Flavour Unit. Lakim was probably the most conscious of the group, with most of both his albums dealing with issues of black people, especially racial pride and injustice.  ‘Black is Back’, with its roaring blaxplotation-sampled beat, Malcolm X vocal refrain and lyrics exploring racial identity- much the way Rakim was doing at the same time- gave hip-hop heads, at the time, a positive image of assertiveness, black pride and empowerment. Leading the way for groups like Brand Nubian and Poor Righteous Teachers to espouse similar themes and concepts. 

Much of Lakim’s first album, with production that’s tight as a drum, explored similar themes over the ’45’ King’s’ layered and nuanced samples, whistles, bells and dramatic, almost cinematic violin stabs. Lakim’s Islamic garb showed he wasn’t afraid to be himself. While Islam and the Muslim faith has taken an enormous knock since 9/11, it was heartening, at one time, to see a positive side to a religion that took many a knuckleheaded street- gangbanger and turned them into a productive member of society, not so much busy doing ‘dumb shit,’ as Ice Cube once said.