Missy Misdemeanor Elliott

For all intents and purposes, Whitney Houston retired from being a full-fledged recording artist after her third album, 1990s I'm Your Baby Tonight, choosing to be a Streisand-like celebrity who cultivated a career through movies, soundtrack contributions, and social appearances. She may have been content to continue in that direction for many years if Arista president Clive Davis didn't push her into recording My Love Is Your Love, her first album in eight years, which easily ranks among her best. Never before has Houston tried so many different sounds or tried so hard to be hip. It's one thing to work with Babyface, the standard-bearer of smooth soul in the '90s, but it's quite another to hire Wyclef Jean, Lauren Hill, Missy "Misdemeanor" Elliott, and Q-Tip – all cutting-edge artists (albeit on the accessible side of the cutting edge), the kind who never would have been associated with Houston in the late '80s.

For all intents and purposes, Whitney Houston retired from being a full-fledged recording artist after her third album, 1990s I'm Your Baby Tonight, choosing to be a Streisand-like celebrity who cultivated a career through movies, soundtrack contributions, and social appearances. She may have been content to continue in that direction for many years if Arista president Clive Davis didn't push her into recording My Love Is Your Love, her first album in eight years, which easily ranks among her best. Never before has Houston tried so many different sounds or tried so hard to be hip.

In November 2003, hip-hop legend Jay-Z threw what would become a legendary retirement party at the most important music venue in the nation: a sold-out Madison Square Garden. Joining him for this monumental musical celebration were some of the most popular artists in the industry including Beyonce, Mary j. Blige, Missy Elliott & R. Kelly along with hip-hop icons P. Diddy, Kayne West, Damon Dash and more.

Packaging-wise and title-wise, the Rhino label's Hip Hop: The Collection is as generic as they come, but after that, all complaints are minimal. Get it at the right price, and it doesn't even matter that the theme is mega-broad and that the T.I. hit isn't one everyone knows, because when a collection goes from Afrika Bambaataa's seminal electro-rap "Planet Rock… Don't Stop" to Missy Elliot's "Get Ur Freak On" with barely any filler in the middle, the freak is on and the planet is certainly rocked. The set jumps time periods at will, and yet the sequencing works, so consider it a time capsule or a portable party, because it's both.