Happy 35th Anniversary to Queen Latifah’s debut album All Hail The Queen, originally released November 28, 1989.
Dana “Queen Latifah” Owens’ Academy Award-nominated performance in the hit 2002 movie Chicago propelled her to widespread fame. More movies and a successful TV show followed, making Latifah a household name. This new—and let’s be honest, white—fan base probably had no idea that the lady with the Arabic-derived name was already revered in the world of hip-hop.
Latifah’s Hollywood success has also overshadowed her reputation even within hip-hop, but rap heads with longer memories know how impactful she was both in front of the mic and behind the scenes. On the business side, Latifah helped form the Flavor Unit with Mark the 45 King, bringing through talented emcees like Lakim Shabazz, Lord Alibaski and Latee, and later Naughty by Nature, among others. Latifah was also a member of the Native Tongues collective and therefore in and around the formative years of the Jungle Brothers, De La Soul and A Tribe Called Quest. On the musical side, Latifah has released several stellar albums, the finest being her 1989 debut All Hail The Queen.
The production credits on All Hail The Queen read like a golden era dream: beats by Prince Paul, Daddy-O, Mark the 45 King, and engineering by Paul C. Mark the 45 King contributes the most, with Latifah paying tribute to her Flavor Unit leader by shouting out his name throughout the album, especially on the opener “Dance For Me” and “Inside Out.” Mark the 45 King’s production brought out the harder side of Latifah’s rhyme style, consequently making “Wrath Of My Madness” and “A King And Queen Creation” All Hail The Queen’s standout songs. The latter track also has Mark the 45 King rapping, which is something he should have done more often. “Wrath Of My Madness” was remixed several years later by DJ Premier, continuing All Hail The Queen’s association with some of hip-hop’s most legendary producers.
Native Tongues members frequently appeared on each other’s music often based around who happened to be in the studio when each group or solo artist was recording. De Le Soul’s 3 Feet High And Rising, Jungle Brothers’ Done By The Forces of Nature and All Hail The Queen all came out in 1989, and were recorded at similar times. It explains why Latifah is featured on the De La and Jungle Brothers albums (the “Buddy” single and “Doin’ Our Own Dang,” respectively), and why De La Soul show up on All Hail The Queen’s “Mama Gave Birth to the Soul Children,” produced by the trio’s honorary fourth member, Prince Paul. It’s a brilliantly crazy song, full of the free-association raps that would soon see plugs One and Two elevated to legendary status.
Listen to the Album + Watch the Official Videos:
As was a trend at the time, All Hail The Queen includes a hip-house track, “Come Into My House.” The short-lived hip-house fad was driven in part by the Jungle Brothers’ “I’ll House You” from the previous year, and it’s probably Latifah’s relationship with the JBs that influenced the inclusion of the song on All Hail The Queen. Thankfully it’s better than many other hip-house songs from the same era.
I’m always reticent to label women as “female rappers.” This seems contrived to me—they are simply rappers, regardless of gender. That said, it’s difficult not to make the distinction when discussing “Ladies First.” The track, one of my all-time personal favorites, is a celebration of women in hip-hop and a rallying call against anyone ignorant enough to have thought women could not make it in a world as male-dominated as hip-hop. Latifah is in fine form here, but guest star Monie Love ferociously steals the show. Love is another overlooked founding member of the Native Tongues and references her place within the crew with this mesmerizing line: “Desperately stressing I'm the daughter of a sister / Who's the mother of a brother / who's the brother of another / Plus one more.”
Latifah saves the album’s most socially conscious track until the back end, tackling inequality towards women, homelessness and black-on-black crime. “Evil That Men Do” also features a brief appearance from Boogie Down Productions leader KRS-One, adding weight to the proceedings.
Queen Latifah continued making straight-up rap albums through the early ‘90s before ending the millennium with material that leaned more towards soul and R&B. Her acting and TV career has brought her continued success, but she returned to her hip-hop roots as the centerpiece of a tribute to New Jersey rappers at the 2019 MTV VMAs and most recently, she performed at A GRAMMY Salute to 50 Years of Hip-Hop in December 2023.
LISTEN:
Editor's note: this anniversary tribute was originally published in 2019 and has since been edited for accuracy and timeliness.