Tracks 2, 6, 9 and 13 from Come Home With Me (2002)

Tracks 4 and 11 from Diplomatic Immunity by The Diplomats (2003)

There was a point when liking Cam'ron and The Diplomats kind of felt like a meme to me and I kinda distanced myself from the whole thing and became partisan about preferring State Property or The LOX, etc. But now that some time has passed, those corny associations have fallen away a little bit and I still do enjoy a lot of music from Cam and Dipset's peak. And I wanted to include Diplomatic Immunity since it was credited to 'Cam'ron presents The Diplomats' and is really one of my favorite albums from the era, right up there with Cam's best solo albums. 

Obviously, Cam growing up with Dame Dash and making the jump to Roc-A-Fella was a really serendipitous boost for his career, particularly because The Blueprint had just come out and Cam ended up having chemistry with Just Blaze and Kanye West and being able to run with their sound and put his own spin on it. But sometimes I think Cam deserves more credit for how much he and Juelz and Jimmy had most of their sound and attitude all figured out on the excellent and underrated S.D.E., pretty much everything except the sped up soul samples. And obviously they later brought up their own stable of producers like the Heatmakerz and AraabMuzik that helped make the Dipset sound something distinct from the Roc-A-Fella sound. Back in 2006 I interviewed Stay Gettin' Productions, the Baltimore production duo who did "Bubble Music" and a number of other memorable Cam'ron/Diplomats tracks (including "Dead Motherfuckers," "Shut The Fuck Up," and "Girls, Cash, Cars")