Creating a vinyl collection of classic rap albums from Los Angeles is nearly an impossible task.
From G-funk to gangsta rap to jerkin’, ratchet, and nervous music, the city has had a wildly prolific run of introducing subgenres that have helped shape the nationwide sound. LA’s rap history is so rich and so diverse, you’d need to dedicate a few rooms in your home to store all the vinyl paying homage to this city’s history.
Of course, there are some obvious starting points. No collection is worth its salt without representation from Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Kendrick Lamar, and 2Pac. Those are all featured in the below guide, which you should consider a starting point to building a great collection of rap vinyl from The City of Angels. Of course, this is only a good place to start. Hundreds, if not thousands, of other rap classics from LA could make a good argument for being on this list. Once you’re done grabbing these essentials from the Complex shop, begin building a list that pays tribute to one of rap’s great histories.
Price: $29.99
There are classics and then there are classics. Does it get more legendary than N.W.A’s Straight Outta Compton, pound for pound the best West Coast gangsta rap album of all time?
You’ve got Ice Cube at the top of his game, Dr. Dre, DJ Yella, and Arabian Prince cooking up some of the hardest beats in West Coast history, MC Ren showing why he’s an all-time great, and the undeniable charisma of the group’s unofficial leader, Eazy-E.
Quite simply, no collection of LA rap vinyl is complete without N.W.A’s Straight Outta Compton. The city’s sound would have never been what it is without this album.
Price: $35.98
It’s easy to overlook Ice Cube’s solo discography considering just how influential N.W.A was, but his second solo effort, released in 1991, remains an all-timer in West Coast rap.
Come for one of the best diss songs in all-time with album closer “No Vaseline,” stay for the 3D lenticular cover that brings the corpse next to Cube’s imposing presence to life.
Price: $29.99
It’s not a Los Angeles rap list without some classic G-funk, and it ain’t classic g funk if it’s not coming from the king of the subgenre, the great Warren G. This album is worth the purchase for “Regulate” alone, but Regulate… G Funk Era is a through and through classic. Even better? Def Jam pressed the vinyl in a particularly fantastic “fruit punch” color. This is an essential album for any Cali vinyl collection.
Price: $50
No vinyl collection that pays tribute to Los Angeles rap would be complete without an entry from Tupac Shakur, who, though not an LA native, helped define the city’s modern sound.
While any release from his discography will fit the billing, we’re particularly partial to this edition of The Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory. Not only is it a stone cold classic, but the LA Kings edition vinyl features a rare alternative cover featuring Pac rocking an LA Kings hat, plus a vinyl coloring that interpolates the hockey team’s colors. The gray and black swirl is as crisp as the classic songs on this once-in-a-generation album.
Price: $32.99
We can spend all day arguing whether or not Dr. Dre’s 2001 is the pinnacle of his discography.
Anyone willing to make an argument for The Chronic wouldn’t find many dissenters. There are two all-timers he dropped in the ’90s, and while The Chronic has plenty of diehards, nothing says LA classic like 2001. It smells like weed smoke, sounds like a cruise in a lowrider, and evokes feelings of the halcyon days of LA rap. It’s the quintessential album every Cali hip-hop devotee needs in their collection.
Price: $25
With a catalog as vast and adventurous as Snoop’s it’s forgivable to overlook some certified classics, but there’s a perfect way to rectify any blindspots to his 2000 smash, Tha Last Meal.
It arrived at a pivotal time for The Doggfather, marking his final studio album released on No Limit Records and his first album on his newly founded label Doggystyle Records. Despite saying goodbye to No Limit, he still recruited label head Master P to handle a significant portion of the excellent production on the album.
Price: $38
You could go a number of ways with a Kendrick Lamar entry into the perfect LA vinyl collection. If you’re an old head, maybe Section.80 is your pick. If you’re into grand epics, look no further than To Pimp A Butterfly. Into chart toppers? Take DAMN. If you’re a recent devotee, perhaps GNX is right for you.
Want to show people how cool you are? untitled unmastered is an obvious choice. But no album defines the Kendrick Lamar experience, nor his relationship to LA and the Compton neighborhoods that raised him, than good kid, m.A.A.d city. If you need an extra push, the album looks mighty nice spinning on a turntable with its translucent black finish.
Price: $32.99
It’s easy to overlook other artists on the seminal Top Dawg Entertainment label just because of Kendrick Lamar’s star power, but to do so would be eliminating some of the best rap albums in West Coast history from your collection.
Look no further than ScHoolboy Q’s Oxymoron, a certified classic in the city and nationwide. “Collard Greens” and “Man of the Year“ are two of the best songs to emerge from Los Angeles in the 2010s, but ScHoolboy brings the heat from beginning to end on this classic.
Price: $19.99
YG wasn’t the first rapper to popularize jerkin’ and ratchet music in LA, but he brought these styles into the mainstream, and they became subgenres that defined the city’s sounds into the mid-2010s and into the 2020s. My Krazy Life, YG’s official debut studio album, brought the G-funk sounds of LA and the hyphy stylings of Bay Area rap into a thrilling new direction, leaning heavily on DJ Mustard before he was MUSTAAAAAAAAAARD to help author the sound.
This album, too, is pressed to Def Jam’s special “fruit punch” variant, and it’s an excellent addition to any collection looking to boast LA rap from the 21st century.
Price: $27.98
Vince Staples first began making noise with gritty, realistic portraits of his Long Beach youth on mixtapes like 2011’s Shyne Coldchain Vol. 1 and the excellent 2014 EP, Hell Can Wait. The latter marked his first release on Def Jam, and on his debut LP for the label, 2015’s Summertime ’06, he showed exactly why the iconic label invested so heavily in his star power.
The album is a front-to-back classic, a love letter to long summer days and an angry missive on how youth can be stripped so quickly in the face of violence. Make sure to scoop up the record that introduced Vince Staples, The Superstar to the rap world.
