Nia is the debut studio album by American hip hop duo Blackalicious. It was released in Europe by Mo' Wax on August 30, 1999, and re-released in the United States by Quannum Projects on February 29, 2000, with a slightly altered track listing. John Bush of AllMusic called Nia "an album that stakes the claim of Chief Xcel and Gift of Gab as not only the best pair of rappers in the underground, but also the best pair of producers." Patrick Jones of PopMatters commented that it "renews your faith in the power and potential of hip-hop." Nathan Rabin of The A.V. Club said, "Blackalicious' work will strike some listeners as hopelessly naïve and New Age-ish, but Nia is nevertheless an audacious, uncompromised, enormously promising album by a group with the courage to disregard hip-hop's codes and unwritten rules to create music that is vitally, distinctly its own." Exclaim!'s Del F. Cowie praised the album's "superior conceptual execution and soulful statement".
Wow, this is great! "Hour long hip hop album I've never heard of" is usually a groan-worthy addition for me, but this was enjoyable all the way through. Great flows, great beats. Very cool. 4/5.
Not my usual genre but I enjoyed this. It was a little long for me but there was a good variety and a nice groove to it. “You Didn’t Know That Though” stood out to me as particularly enjoyable.
This was a pleasure to hear. Funky and lyrically clever, with old school Afrocentric hip hop vibes. Starts to feel a bit overstuffed on the back half, but still a great listen. Thanks for sharing it. Fave Songs: Deception, A to G, The Fabulous Ones, If I May, Shallow Days, You Didn't Know That Though, Do This My Way, As the World Turns
very much an underground sounding album. reminds me a lot of MF Doom. The last couple tracks are pretty annoyingly positive and almost preachy, especially Making Progress.
Rap progresivo. Me ha gustado. Un 4.
Excellent MCs, production. They had me in the 1st 60 minutes. Then it got a little stale
Sassy n'fun. It is an album that grew on me over multiple days.
Well it's a 90s album which means it is going to be way too long. Unsurprisingly I found this album really drags in the latter half, but it's got some really nice grooves. Definitely has aged way better than a bunch of 90s hiphop. I agree with the other comments that say they hear MF Doom in this. Or was he influenced by this? Not sure. If they cut out about 20-25 minutes this would be a really gem. My personal rating: 4/5 My rating relative to the list: 4/5 Should this have been included on the original list? Yes.
I was a college kid in the early 2000s, so obviously I have a lot of experience with Blackalicious just being played in the background a lot. It seems fairly ubiquitous in that time and place. That being said, Blackalicious has always been sweet and always been something I enjoyed. It was nice listening to an album separate from that context. Good stuff for sure.
Eh this was average. 3/5.
Alright, I guess
Very interesting hip hop album, would have this over a lot of the other hip hop on the list. Just runs a bit over my listening attention span to get 4 stars.
An interesting LP at the intersection of hip-hop, rap, and soul, with some spoken word thrown in for good measure. This was an enjoyable listen, but did not leave much of an impression for me – struggling now to recall more than a sample or bar that captured my attention.
I did not feel to much for this album