Scarface

Brad Jordan came out of the Fifth Ward with a voice that sounded like it had already seen everything. Before Houston rap was a sound the industry recognized, Scarface was building a catalog that proved the South had its own standard. The Diary is the center of gravity, the 1994 album that expanded what hip-hop could hold emotionally and structurally. But the catalog around it holds up. The World Is Yours. The Fix. Records that document a rapper doing the work across three decades without softening the edges.