Here Are Your Top 10 Rap Albums of the 80s, 90s & 2000s. Get Ready To Pick 2 Wild Cards

Yesterday (February 7) closes Round 2 of the 2000s bracket of “Finding The GOAT Albums.” You—the voter—definitively decided which 10 albums go forth to the final 32 albums across all eras.

Tomorrow (February 9) begins the first of two wild card rounds to add the 2 additional albums to the 10 winners from the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, respectively. These two opportunities to vote on albums that were not included in the initial 120 selected for the competition will be divided into 1980-1996, and 1997-2015—with the second poll running Thursday (February 11). In addition to a plethora of suggestions (many, which AFH heard from you), there will be an opportunity for write-ins. As was the case in Finding The GOAT MC, these wild cards can truly contend for the top.

The Top 10 user-determined albums from the 2000s are a cross-section of Hip-Hop over those 15 years. Jay Z and Kendrick Lamar together took 40% of the available real estate, with each touted lyricist sending two albums into the Top 10—based on user votes. The two artists with an album already confirmed in the finals prior were Ghostface Killah and Outkast. With Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) cemented in, on the solo side, G.F.K.’s first LP in the new millennium bested 50 Cent’s studio debut even as a massive commercial underdog. Outkast’s Stankonia joins its late ’90s predecessor, Aquemini. Also notable is Madvillain’s debut. The 2004 union of MF DOOM and Madlib is the first album without major label affiliation to make the finals, chronologically, since Ice Cube’s Death Certificate. The Stones Throw Records release is completely independent, toppling the platinum, #1 2014 Forest Hills Drive by J. Cole.

Here are the 10 Greatest Of All Times Rap Albums from the 2000s, as decided by you, in order of margin of victory:

Kendrick Lamar’s good kid, m.A.A.d city
Jay Z’s The Blueprint
Madvillain’s Madvillainy
Eminem’s The Marshall Mathers LP
Common’s Be
Jay Z’s The Black Album
Outkast’s Stankonia
Kanye West’s The College Dropout
Ghostface Killah’s Supreme Clientele
Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp A Butterfly

Here are the other 20 albums already in the finals:

1980s

Slick Rick’s The Great Adventures Of Slick Rick
The D.O.C.’s No One Can Do It Better
Run-D.M.C.’s Raising Hell
Eric B. & Rakim’s Paid In Full
LL Cool J’s Radio
Boogie Down Productions’ Criminal Minded
Public Enemy’s It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back
N.W.A.’s Straight Outta Compton
Eric B. & Rakim’s Follow The Leader
De La Soul’s 3 Feet High And Rising

1990s

Raekwon’s Only Built 4 Cuban Linx…
Wu-Tang Clan’s Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)
A Tribe Called Quest’s The Low End Theory
Nas’ Illmatic
A Tribe Called Quest’s Midnight Marauders
The Notorious B.I.G.’s Ready To Die
Dr. Dre’s The Chronic
Outkast’s Aquemini
Ice Cube’s Death Certificate
2Pac’s All Eyez On Me

Related: The entire “Finding The GOAT: Albums” series thus far