Culture

Kool Moe Dee’s Old Report Cards Of The Best 80s And 90s Rappers Include An Amazing Easter Egg

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Kool Moe Dee's Old Report Cards Of The Best 80s And 90s Rappers Include An Amazing Easter Egg

Getty Image / Michael Benabib/Michael Ochs Archives


  • Kool Moe Dee is one of New York’s founding members of the Rap community and his influence impacted some of the biggest names including Tupac, Nas, Jay-Z, just to name a few
  • Someone unearthed old ‘report cards’ from Kool Moe Dee where he’d rank rappers in the 80s and 90s based on 10 categories and the results are fascinating and reveal an easter egg
  • Read more fascinating articles on BroBible right here

Does anyone else out there feel like the 90s were 15 years ago while the 00’s were just ten years ago? I can’t explain it but that’s how it seems in my head. The 90s definitely don’t feel like they were 22+ years ago but that’s precisely how old these resurfaced Kool Moe Dee rap ‘report cards’ are.

Kool Moe Dee was one of Rap’s founding figures with his impact on the NYC Rap scene shaping some of the most legendary rappers of all time. His style influenced Nas, Jay-Z, Tupac, N.W.A., Will Smith, and others. But here we get to see how Kook Moe Dee felt about individual rappers in the late 80s and 90s (the 90s before Eminem, I guess).

There are two ‘report cards’ here from Kool Moe Dee, one from 1988 and one from the 90s. The one from 1988 is particularly interesting because it yields an easter egg below. His ranking of The Beastie Boys actually came back in a lyric on The Beastie Boys ‘Intergalactic’ from 1998 where they reference their score with the line “Got an ‘A’ from Moe Dee for sticking to themes.”

The first report card is the one from 1988 and the second one (from the 90s) down below is a LOT more controversial, in my opinion. But I wanted to call out that Beastie Boys easter egg from this one.

Kool Moe Dee Resurfaced Rap Report Cards Feature Beastie Boys Easter Egg

The ten categories that Kool Moe Dee uses to rank rappers are Vocabulary, Articulation, Creativity, Originality, Versatility, Voice, Records, Stage Presence, Sticking To Themes, and Innovating Rhythms.

The 90s one is fascinating for all sorts of reasons. He gave Jay-Z the lowest score of anyone (a 6) for Stage Presence and Jay-Z scored an 82 / B overall from Kool Moe Dee. Master P was on FIRE in the 90s but only got a C+ from Kool, including a 6 for Vocabulary. Meanwhile, Mystikal (he misspelled it as Mystical) was Master P’s protege and he scored 90 points!!! That was good enough for a solid A (wouldn’t that be an A- on a normal grading scale?) after Mystikal scored perfect 10s for Creativity, Originality, and Innovating Rhythms.

Lauryn Hill scored the highest total of anyone in the 90s on Kool Moe Dee’s report card. She tallied a whopping 97 points (4 more than Tupac and 2 more than Biggie). Lauryn Hill only lost points for Records, Stage Presence, and Sticking To Themes where she received 9s.

The thing that bothers me the most about Kool Moe Dee’s 90s Rap Report Card is how he’s got Snoop Dogg at a B+ with 87 points. That score is lower than Redman, Keith Murray, DMX, Ice Cube, Busta, Treach, Method Man, Ras Kas, Sticky Fingers, Mystikal and a few others. I’m not saying Snoop is a better rapper than ALL of those figures but he’s definitely better than most. And I’d argue that his cultural impact is bigger than most of the ones I listed.

Music Fans React To Kool Moe Dee’s Rap Report Cards

I’d LOVE to see how this would look in 2022.

Anywhere, here’s some Kool Moe Dee before we leave:

Cass Anderson BroBible headshot and avatar
Cass Anderson is the Editor-in-Chief of BroBible. Based out of Florida, he covers an array of topics including NFL, Pop Culture, Fishing News, and the Outdoors.
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