“Definition” by Black Star

"Definition" was the first single from Mos Def & Talib Kweli Are Black Star, the pair's 1998 album on Rawkus, and it wears its lineage proudly. Hi-Tek built the beat on a sample of Boogie Down Productions' "The P Is Free", and the chorus borrows from BDP's "Stop the Violence", which is exactly the point: the whole song is a call for hip-hop to end its violence.

It was an underground hit that still made number 60 on the Billboard Hot 100, and AllMusic's Jason Kaufman has called it flawless. The album brings it back later as "RE: DEFinition", and Rawkus eventually put it on Best of Decade I: 1995–2005, its greatest-hits set.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.