While The College Dropout announced Kanye to the music world as an artist, Late Registration is where he truly began to establish his reputation as one of the finest innovators in hip hop history. The ingenious choice and manipulation of samples for tracks such as 'Touch The Sky' and 'Diamonds From Sierra Leone' lit up the future not only for Kanye himself, but for an entire generation of eventual rap stars. Kendrick Lamar's recent groundbreaking LP wouldn't exist were it not for Late Registration, along with many other lauded albums. Hip hop was made simultaneously more complex and accessible by this one record, an astounding achievement considering Kanye's innocuous beginnings as a non-performing producer. Decade Defining Track: Gold Digger
