Different from the others

Stepin' Strong: "Rhymes Different from the Others" (Rough Luxury, 1989)

I recently grabbed this from the Bustthefacts blog, which posts up a ton of obscure 80s and 90s rap albums. I'd been wanting to hear the song in its entirety since DJ Shadow played a portion in his 2003 BBC Essential Mix/Diminishing Returns mix, which might be my favorite DJ mix ever. The album it's drawn from, Roughouse Orchestra, is a 1989 compilation on the Rough Luxury label out of the Bronx. Although one group featured on it, the Universal MCs (later the UMCs and, after that, 3-2-1), went on to some success, the comp is pretty obscure.

After a little poking around, I learned that Rough Luxury is still in business (!) and the album is legitimately available in digital from Juno (!!). The versions sold on Juno are vinyl rips, but they sound pretty good-- occasionally scratchy, but loud and clear. I really recommend copping both this and the other Stepin' Strong track; both sound like they could have been on the first Jungle Brothers album, which is about as high as my praise gets.