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Busta Rhymes BangerZ

Thirty tracks from the most physically astonishing rapper alive. Busta Rhymes has been doing things with breath control that nobody else attempts for thirty-five years.

Trevor Smith Jr.

Busta Rhymes was born in Brooklyn to Jamaican parents, and that Caribbean inheritance is the key to everything — his rapid-fire, patois-inflected delivery comes directly out of the Jamaican deejay tradition, sped up and applied to New York rap.

He came up in Leaders of the New School, and his verse on A Tribe Called Quest's "Scenario" in 1991 is one of the most famous guest appearances in the genre's history — the moment a supporting player took over a record entirely.

What followed was a solo career built on two things: a physical technique that few rappers can approach, and an understanding that hip-hop was a visual medium. His videos with Hype Williams are among the most inventive ever made.

What to listen for

"Woo Hah!! Got You All in Check" and "Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Could See" are the two that made him a star, and both are pure kinetic energy.

"Gimme Some More" is the technical peak — built on a sample from Bernard Herrmann's Psycho score, and one of the most unsettling hit records ever made.

"Touch It" and "Dangerous" are the biggest, and "What's It Gonna Be?!" with Janet Jackson came with a video that reportedly cost over two million dollars.

"I Know What You Want" with Mariah Carey is the crossover, and "Victory" with Biggie and Diddy is the posse cut.

The collaborations show his range: Luther Vandross's "Lovely Day," Sean Paul's "Gimme the Light," The Pussycat Dolls' "Don't Cha" and Rick James on "In The Ghetto."

"Rastaman Chant" with the Wailers is the Jamaican thread made explicit — from the Chant Down Babylon project, and the clearest evidence of where the delivery comes from.

Go deeper

The Coming (1996) and When Disaster Strikes... (1997) are the two albums, and Extinction Level Event 2 (2020) is the late-career return that surprised everyone by being good.

A Tribe Called Quest's The Low End Theory for "Scenario," and the Hype Williams videos are essential viewing rather than optional.

For the Jamaican deejay tradition underneath it all: Super Cat, Ranking Joe and U-Roy. Once you hear the connection you cannot unhear it.

A closing note on the physical technique. Breath control at the speed Busta Rhymes works is genuinely athletic, and it is worth listening to a track like "Gimme Some More" purely for where he takes a breath — which is almost nowhere. Thirty-five years in, he can still do it live, which is the part that most rappers half his age cannot match.

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