Raising Hell (album)

Returning home to Queens in late 1985 after their extensive touring, they soon put themselves on lockdown at Chung King studios in Manhattan for three months. In place of producer Smith, a cocky new maverick was brought in: Rick Rubin. Even though Rubin's and Russell's names were on the production marquee, the two non-group members oversaw and added to the music on Raising Hell more than created it. "Rick and Russell got production credit, but we [the group members] really did everything", DMC states. "We did that album in like three months. It was so quick because every rhyme was written on the road and had been practiced and polished. We knew what we wanted to do. Rick was all music and instruments. Jay was music and DJing. And me and Run was lyrics. We definitely had a game plan."^[11]

Raising Hell features the well-known cover "Walk This Way" featuring Aerosmith (largely the work of its leaders, Steven Tyler and Joe Perry). While the song was not the group's first fusion of rock and hip hop (the group's earlier singles "Rock Box" and "King of Rock" were), it was the first such fusion significantly impacting the charts, becoming the first rap song to crack the top 5 of The Billboard Hot 100. Raising Hell peaked at No. 1 on Billboard's Top R&B Albums chart as the first hip hop/rap album to do so, and at No. 3 on the Billboard 200.^[6]

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[12]
Chicago Tribune	[13]
Encyclopedia of Popular Music	[14]
Pitchfork	7.7/10[15]
Q	[16]
Rolling Stone	[17]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide	[18]
Spin Alternative Record Guide	10/10[19]
Uncut	[20]
The Village Voice	A−[21]

Raising Hell was voted fifth best album of 1986 in the Pazz & Jop poll of American critics nationwide, published by The Village Voice.^[22] Robert Christgau, the poll's creator, wrote in a contemporary review: "Without benefit of a 'Rock Box' or 'King of Rock,' this is [Run-D.M.C.'s] most uncompromising and compelling album, all hard beats and declaiming voices."^[21]

In the Los Angeles Times, Richard Cromelin wrote: "If the same old boasts are wearing thin and the misogyny gets grating, the beats are infectious and varied and the vocal trade-offs can be dazzling."^[23]

It ranked number 8 among the "Albums of the Year" in NME.^[24]

In 1987, the Soul Train Music Award for Best Rap - Single was jointly awarded to Run-D.M.C. and Aerosmith for "Walk This Way".^[25]

In 1989, the Toronto Star music critics took to look over the albums they had reviewed in the past 10 years to include in a list based on "commercial impact to social import, to strictly musical merit."^[26] Raising Hell was placed at number four on the list, describing it as "the record to move rap from the ghetto to the suburbs. Blame it or celebrate it, you can't deny Raising Hell's impact.^[26]

In 1998, the album appeared in The Source's 100 Best Rap Albums. Q magazine (12/99, p. 162) – 5 stars out of 5 – "... the apex of pre-Public Enemy, beatbox-based hip hop, a monument of massive, crisp beats plus the genre-bending 'Walk This Way'." Vibe (12/99, p. 162) – Included in Vibe's 100 Essential Albums of the 20th Century.^[27] Uncut (11/03, p. 130) – 4 stars out of 5 – "[An album] that forced the music biz to take rap seriously." Rolling Stone (12/11/03, p. 126) – "[T]he pioneering trio took hip-hop into the upper reaches of the pop charts, introducing mainstream to a new urban thunder: rap rock." AllMusic – 5 stars out of 5 – "... the music was fully realized and thoroughly invigorating, rocking harder and better than any of its rock or rap peers in 1986 ..."

In 2003, the album was ranked number 123 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time,^[28] maintaining the rating in a 2012 revised list,^[29] dropping to number 209 in a 2020 reboot of the list.^[30] It ranked fourth on Chris Rock's list of the Top 25 Hip-Hop Albums of all time, and the comedian called it "the first great rap album ever".^[31]

In 2006, the album was chosen by Time as one of the 100 greatest albums.^[32] Time named it No. 41 of the 100 best albums of the past fifty years and stated that the album was "rap's first masterpiece".^[33]

In 2012, Slant Magazine listed the album at No. 65 on its list of "Best Albums of the 1980s".^[34]

Public Enemy's Chuck D considers Raising Hell to be the greatest hip-hop album of all-time, and the reason he chose to sign with Def Jam Records.^[35] "It paved the way for so many bands," he explained, "and opened minds."^[36] In Hip Hop Connection, he ranked the album at number one in his top ten (which also included Tougher Than Leather) and said: "It was the first record that made me realise this was an album-oriented genre."^[37]

• Raising Hell at Discogs
• Raising Hell at RapGenius
• Raising Hell^{[permanent dead link]} (Adobe Flash) at Radio3Net (streamed copy where licensed)