Big L

Born Lamont Coleman, and a member of Fat Joe's DITC (Diggin' in the Crates) crew, Big L's first album, 1995's Lifestylez ov da Poor and Dangerous, garnered little notice, but by the late '90s he'd become one of the most well-respected underground hip-hop MCs in New York, thanks in large part to the 1998 single "Ebonics." Unfortunately, Coleman was murdered in Harlem on February 15, 1999, a couple of months shy of his 25th birthday. The Big Picture is an uneven collection of music he was working on before his shooting; tracks such as "Ebonics," "Holdin' It Down," and "Flamboyant" portray Big L as a rapper full of potential that his early death squandered, one of the sadder what-if stories of recent hip-hop. (MICHAELANGELO MATOS)

From 2004's The New Rolling Stone Album Guide