The other day someone asked for an explanation of DJ Khaled's whole deal, and I replied, "it's kind of like when half the music industry would band together to make sure Ringo Starr's solo albums were successful, except instead of a former Beatle it's a loud silly former Miami radio personality."

DJ Khaled released Father Of Asahd last week, and it's a testament to his unique place in hip hop and pop culture that he's now 11 albums deep. Only a handful of the dozens of rappers he's worked with have released so many high profile albums, and he's outlasted a lot of the artists who were on his early hits (hi Akon). And while Funkmaster Flex and DJ Clue were the trailblazers that brought the concept of "retail mixtape" compilation albums into major label hip hop, DJ Khaled has really been the one who's done the most with the idea, dropping yearly albums with incredible guests lists and hit singles, and becoming a mainstream celebrity who pops up in Pitch Perfect movies and hosts the Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Awards. I have a love/hate relationship with DJ Khaled's albums, but I always check them out just to see who's on them, and over the years I have really enjoyed some tracks on these things.

DJ Khaled deep album cuts (Spotify playlist):

1. I Ain't Worried f/ Ace Hood and Rick Ross
2. Bitches & Bottles (Let's Get It Started) f/ Future, T.I. and Lil Wayne
3. Brown Paper Bag f/ Dre, Young Jeezy, Juelz Santana, Fat Joe, Rick Ross and Lil Wayne
4. Can't Stop f/ T-Pain and Birdman
5. Rep My City f/ Pitbull and Jarvis
6. Nas Album Done f/ Nas
7. Good Man f/ Pusha T and Jadakiss
8. They Ready f/ J. Cole, Big K.R.I.T. and Kendrick Lamar
9. Freak N You f/ Lil Wayne and Gunna
10. Black Ghost f/ Vado
11. Bitch I'm From Dade County f/ Dre, Trick Daddy, Trina, Rick Ross, Brisco, Flo Rida and C-Ride
12. I Swear I Never Tell Another Soul f/ Future, Yo Gotti and Trick Daddy
13. Bring The Money Out f/ Nelly, Lil Boosie, Ace Hood and Schife
14. Weather The Storm f/ Meek Mill and Lil Baby
15. She's Fine f/ Sean Paul, Missy Elliott and Busta Rhymes
16. Don't Ever Play Yourself f/ Jadakiss, Fabolous, Fat Joe, Busta Rhymes and Kent Jones
17. That Range Rover Came With Steps f/ Future and Yo Gotti
18. Standing On The Mountain Top f/ Poo Bear and Ace Hood
19. Before The Solution f/ Beanie Sigel and Poo Bear
20. Suicidal Thoughts f/ Mavado
21. Never Surrender f/ Scarface, Jadakiss, Meek Mill, Akon, John Legend and Anthony Hamilton

Tracks 3, 11 and 19 from We The Best (2007)
Tracks 15 and 18 from We Global (2008)
Tracks 5 and 13 from Victory (2010)
Track 4 from We The Best Forever (2011)
Tracks 2, 8 and 20 from Kiss The Ring (2012)
Tracks 10 and 21 from Suffering From Success (2013)
Tracks 1 and 12 from I Changed A Lot (2015)
Tracks 6 and 16 from Major Key (2016)
Tracks 7 and 17 from Grateful (2017)
Tracks 9 and 14 from Father Of Asahd (2019)

So what really pisses me off is that DJ Khaled's first release, 2006's Listennn... The Album, isn't available on streaming services. I'm not even sure why, since it came out on Koch/E1 just like his next 3 albums that are all readily available. But it's easily my favorite album of his career, he started out strong with that one. Over the years Khaled's albums have gotten away from really representing Miami and Florida heavily, with lots of Rick Ross/Trick Daddy/Pitbull verses and T-Pain hooks over Runners/Cool & Dre/Diaz Brothers beats. Flo Rida's verse on "Bitch I'm From Dade County" was so good that I was always kind of bummed out when he turned into a pop rapper.

I'm still partial to the other earlier ones, although Kiss The Ring is definitely my favorite of the ones from this decade. And I appreciate that he's always kind of covered all the regional bases and gets NY and west coast rappers, there's some great Jadakiss and Kendrick verses on Khaled albums. "Black Ghost" producer Beewirks and I follow each other on Twitter, shout to him for that great beat. Some of these songs were pretty well known with promo singles or videos ("Brown Paper Bag," "Bitches & Bottles," "Nas Album Done") but weren't really hits on the level of "All I Do Is Win" so it seemed fair to include them. People love "Brown Paper Bag" for the verses but it's honestly got the worst hook of DJ Khaled's entire catalog, Dre from Cool & Dre should never ever sing.

Inevitably, there's kind of a repertory cast that you get over and over on these albums, it only seemed right to include one of the token Mavado tracks and "Suicidal Thoughts" is really good. Ace Hood has always been kind of a punchline, especially since he stopped having hits and his watch self-destructed on live television, but the guy can rap. And Kent Jones really shocked me on "Don't Play Yourself" when he came in at the end of a posse cut full of NYC legends and held his own, I'd only heard him sing up to that point. But even though Khaled leans on certain superstars over and over and is often pretty slow to bring newer artists into the fold, he occasionally gets some interesting combinations. I never thought Boosie and Nelly on the same song could sound good.

One of the ironies of DJ Khaled's career is that, even with all the jokes about how he doesn't do anything, he pantomimes 'working hard in the studio' so much people have an outsized idea of how much he produces on his album albums. On some albums he's credited as a co-producer on several tracks, but it's hard to say how much he really did on those songs, and he only has a handful of solo production credits across all his albums, including "Standing On The Mountain Top" and "Before The Solution" (both of which feature Jason "Poo Bear" Boyd, who appeared on those 2 early Khaled albums, then disappeared from Khaled's next 6 albums and returned on the last couple as Justin Bieber's go-to songwriter). It's kind of a shame, I actually like Khaled's beats and wish he produced more often, he did more (usually as 'Beat Novacaine') in his Terror Squad days.

Previous playlists in the Deep Album Cuts series:
Vol. 1: Brandy
Vol. 2: Whitney Houston
Vol. 3: Madonna
Vol. 4: My Chemical Romance
Vol. 5: Brad Paisley
Vol. 6: George Jones
Vol. 7: The Doors
Vol. 8: Jay-Z
Vol. 9: Robin Thicke
Vol. 10: R. Kelly
Vol. 11: Fall Out Boy
Vol. 12: TLC
Vol. 13: Pink
Vol. 14: Queen
Vol. 15: Steely Dan
Vol. 16: Trick Daddy
Vol. 17: Paramore
Vol. 18: Elton John
Vol. 19: Missy Elliott
Vol. 20: Mariah Carey
Vol. 21: The Pretenders
Vol. 22: "Weird Al" Yankovic
Vol. 23: Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
Vol. 24: Foo Fighters
Vol. 25: Counting Crows
Vol. 26: T.I.
Vol. 27: Jackson Browne
Vol. 28: Usher
Vol. 29: Mary J. Blige
Vol. 30: The Black Crowes
Vol. 31: Ne-Yo
Vol. 32: Blink-182
Vol. 33: One Direction
Vol. 34: Kelly Clarkson
Vol. 35: The B-52's
Vol. 36: Ludacris
Vol. 37: They Might Be Giants
Vol. 38: T-Pain
Vol. 39: Snoop Dogg
Vol. 40: Ciara
Vol. 41: Creedence Clearwater Revival
Vol. 42: Dwight Yoakam
Vol. 43: Demi Lovato
Vol. 44: Prince
Vol. 45: Duran Duran
Vol. 46: Rihanna
Vol. 47: Janet Jackson
Vol. 48: Sara Bareilles
Vol. 49: Motley Crue
Vol. 50: The Who
Vol. 51: Coldplay
Vol. 52: Alicia Keys
Vol. 53: Stone Temple Pilots
Vol. 54: David Bowie
Vol. 55: The Eagles
Vol. 56: The Beatles
Vol. 57: Beyonce
Vol. 58: Beanie Sigel
Vol. 59: A Tribe Called Quest
Vol. 60: Cheap Trick
Vol. 61: Guns N' Roses
Vol. 62: The Posies
Vol. 63: The Time
Vol. 64: Gucci Mane
Vol. 65: Violent Femmes
Vol. 66: Red Hot Chili Peppers
Vol. 67: Maxwell
Vol. 68: Parliament-Funkadelic
Vol. 69: Chevelle
Vol. 70: Ray Parker Jr. and Raydio
Vol. 71: Fantasia
Vol. 72: Heart
Vol. 73: Pitbull
Vol. 74: Nas
Vol. 75: Monica
Vol. 76: The Cars
Vol. 77: 112
Vol. 78: 2Pac
Vol. 79: Nelly
Vol. 80: Meat Loaf
Vol. 81: AC/DC
Vol. 82: Bruce Springsteen
Vol. 83: Pearl Jam
Vol. 84: Green Day
Vol. 85: George Michael and Wham!
Vol. 86: New Edition
Vol. 87: Chuck Berry
Vol. 88: Electric Light Orchestra
Vol. 89: Chic
Vol. 90: Journey
Vol. 91: Yes
Vol. 92: Soundgarden
Vol. 93: The Allman Brothers Band
Vol. 94: Mobb Deep
Vol. 95: Linkin Park
Vol. 96: Shania Twain
Vol. 97: Squeeze
Vol. 98: Taylor Swift
Vol. 99: INXS
Vol. 100: Stevie Wonder
Vol. 101: The Cranberries
Vol. 102: Def Leppard
Vol. 103: Bon Jovi
Vol. 104: Dire Straits
Vol. 105: The Police
Vol. 106: Sloan
Vol. 107: Peter Gabriel
Vol. 108: Led Zeppelin
Vol. 109: Dave Matthews Band
Vol. 110: Nine Inch Nails
Vol. 111: Talking Heads
Vol. 112: Smashing Pumpkins
Vol. 113: System Of A Down
Vol. 114: Aretha Franklin
Vol. 115: Michael Jackson
Vol. 116: Alice In Chains
Vol. 117: Paul Simon
Vol. 118: Lil Wayne
Vol. 119: Nirvana
Vol. 120: Kix
Vol. 121: Phil Collins
Vol. 122: Elvis Costello & The Attractions
Vol. 123: Sonic Youth
Vol. 124: Bob Seger
Vol. 125: Radiohead
Vol. 126: Eric Church
Vol. 127: Neil Young
Vol. 128: Future
Vol. 129: Say Anything
Vol. 130: Maroon 5
Vol. 131: Kiss
Vol. 132: Dinosaur Jr.
Vol. 133: Stevie Nicks
Vol. 134: Talk Talk
Vol. 135: Ariana Grande
Vol. 136: Roxy Music
Vol. 137: The Cure
Vol. 138: 2 Chainz

This entry was posted on Monday, May 20, 2019 at 6:36 AM. You can skip to the end and leave a response.