Erick Sermon - No Pressure Date: 1993 Label: Def Jam Styles: Hardcore Rap, East Coast Rap, Hip-Hop Track Picks: Stay Real

When EPMD finally unraveled after months of rumors and internal turmoil, Erick Sermon wasted no time grabbing the mike. He's quite obsessed with proving he can cut it alone, although his self-titled debut didn't move far from EPMD's trademarks: fat, crunching basslines, neatly inserted samples lifted mainly from Zapp, tight vocal edits, and Sermon's mush-mouthed, deadpan raps. His targets included condoms, sexual warfare, hip-hop groupies, and would-be rap challengers. While this contains the obligatory "bitches" and "niggas" references, there's not as much gun worship as you might expect. No Pressure is as much, if not more, EPMD's final release as Erick Sermon's debut.