Great Days In Rap Album Release History

June 18, 2013 is pretty good, Imma let you finish, but these are the greatest release dates in rap history.

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Complex Original

Image via Complex Original

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Today is June 18, 2013, the ballyhooed release day for three highly anticipated albums: Kanye West's Yeezus, J. Cole's Born Sinner, and Mac Miller's Watching Movies With the Sound Off. The competition is a bit uneven—Kanye is predicted, predictably, to walk away with the week. But it got us thinking about other legendary sales battles in hip-hop history.

Which in turn made us think about how different release dates are now. This week's Twitter anticipation was very different from unwrapping your Aquemini and Hard Knock Life CDs back on September 29, 1998.

For those of you who just steal music, or download it from iTunes, back in the day, buying a CD involved a laborious process of removing plastic wrap and carefully peeling away a sticker that, if you weren't careful, could scar your CD case with sticker-glue for the rest of time. 

What was it really like on some of history's more epic release dates? Just in time for June 18, we've got 18 of history's most legendary release dates, and give you a picture of what was going on at that time.

These are Great Days In Rap Album Release History.

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EPMD's Unfinished Business & Beastie Boys' Paul's Boutique both released on July 25, 1989.

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Ice-T's Power & Eazy-E's Eazy-Duz-It both released on September 13, 1988.

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LL Cool J's Mama Said Knock You Out & Too Short's Short Dog's in the House both released on August 27, 1990.

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Naughty By Nature's Naughty by Nature & Nice & Smooth's Ain't a Damn Thing Changed both released September 3, 1991.

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Digital Underground's This Is an EP Release & Geto Boys' We Can't Be Stopped both released on July 1, 1991.

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The Pharcyde's Bizarre Ride II the Pharcyde & Kool G Rap & DJ Polo's Live and Let Die both released on November 24, 1992.

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Wu-Tang Clan's Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) & A Tribe Called Quest's Midnight Marauders both released on November 9, 1993.

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Souls of Mischief's 93 'til Infinity & KRS-One's Return of the Boom Bap both released on September 28, 1993.

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The Fugees' The Score & 2Pac's All Eyez on Me both released on February 13, 1996.

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Foxy Brown's Ill Na Na, DJ Shadow's Endtroducing....., and Mobb Deep's Hell on Earth all released on November 19, 1996.

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Eminem's The Slim Shady LP & The Roots' Things Fall Apart both released on February 23, 1999.

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OutKast's Aquemini & Jay-Z's Vol. 2... Hard Knock Life both released September 29, 1998.

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M.O.P.'s Warriorz & Ja Rule's Rule 3:36 both released on October 10, 2000.

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Ludacris' Back for the First Time & Reflection Eternal's Train of Thought October 17, 2000.

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OutKast's Stankonia, Jay-Z's The Dynasty: Roc La Familia, Binary Star's Masters Of The Universe all released on October 31, 2000.

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Jay-Z's The Blueprint & Fabolous' Ghetto Fabolous both released on September 11, 2001.

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2Pac's Resurrection, Jay-Z's The Black Album, & G-Unit's Beg for Mercy are all released on November 14, 2003

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Kanye West's Graduation & 50 Cent's Curtis both released on September 11, 2007.

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