by James Di Fiore

Created on: April 15, 2008

In an era when the best hip hop tracks had the smallest budgets for their accompanying videos, it can be tough to decide which videos can be considered the best of all time. However, if we measure these videos in the context of being the realest, and NOT perpetuating the hip hop stereotypes, the following list is a can't miss selection of the best vids in hip hop history.

WHAT THEY DO - THE ROOTS (1996)

From a group known to bend reality in hip hop and carve their own path, The Roots 1996 single "What They Do" is still relevant to this day. The video personifies the stereotypes - champagne, fly cars, money flashing and scantily clad women. Just one thing.....it's all fake. The Roots pointed out what was wrong with hip hop videos by spoofing the genre's tendency to showcase material items as if they carried weight. Ironically, this single was the very first time The Roots reached the Billboard Album Charts, coming in at #34. In a time when most videos relied on stereotypes to sell records, The Roots went the opposite direction, proving there were still a formidable audience hungry for the real essence of hip hop.

JUST TO GET A REP - GANGSTARR (1991)

From the acclaimed 1991 album 'Step in the Arena', Gangstarr's "Just to Get a Rep" is one of the most important hip hop videos ever made. The track tells the story about life on the streets and what goes on in the mind of a perennial stick up kid. The message is personified with this line - "Shorty said 'naw', pulled the trigger and stepped//it was nothing....he did it just to get a rep." Placing a microscope on the sheer ignorance of black on black crime in the ghetto proved powerful, even with the miniscule video budget (reportedly under $10 000). Gangstarr almost had the monopoly of having both street cred and the intellect to know that there is a better life out there for cats from the mean streets. While other rappers give credence to violence, Gangstarr showed there was an appetite for a Utopia - the ghetto life without the need to get a rep.

FIGHT THE POWER - PUBLIC ENEMY (1989)

The film 'Do the Right Thing' by Spike Lee is considered to be one of the most groundbreaking films of all time, and the soundtrack still sells thousands of copies each year. 'Fight the Power', another politically charged tune by conscious pioneers Public Enemy, contains the message for black citizens to rise up against abuse of power and fight back. The video begins with clips from the civil rights march in 1963, then, surprisingly, shows

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