When Naughty by Nature’s “O.P.P.” took over America in late 1991, rap wasn’t yet the mainstream force it would one day become. There’d been moments: Public Enemy was big, as was N.W.A. But so were MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice, artists who’d softened rap for anyone that considered Public Enemy and N.W.A. too confrontational for mass consumption. In looking back on Naughty by Nature’s self-titled breakthrough, 30 years later, Treach acknowledges that they’d found a distinct path. “It took us to the pop charts,” he tells Apple Music. “That’s a whole different type of look right there.”
The grittier moments on Naughty by Nature are there (“Uptown Anthem,” “Guard Your Grill”), and the production gives you as good a sense of the layered, sample-heavy place hip-hop was at as Gang Starr or Tribe could. But those early years the group spent honing their approach at parties and talent shows around East Orange, New Jersey (including in their previous incarnation, The New Style), had given them a more generous outlook on the art of people-pleasing—they could be true to the culture without alienating any one audience (“Everything’s Gonna Be Alright”). And as catchy as “O.P.P.” is, it’s also clever: Kids liked it, but parents knew it, too.
Reflecting on the album’s 30th anniversary, Vin Rock says that for him, Naughty by Nature is what hip-hop was meant to be. “It’s from the inner city, it’s from disenfranchised people and kids,” he says. “But we took this craft and culture and showed everybody what it can be when you take your poverty and turn it into your paradise. I’d like to think that Naughty by Nature reminds people of a good time.”