Spank Rock

The future of hip-hop? Who cares? Shelf-life aside, though, Baltimore club/hip-hop group Spank Rock have made some of the most original, thoroughly insane dance music of the early 2000s. As distinctly regional as Chicago house and Detroit techno in the mid '80s, Spank Rock's raunchy blend of heavily deconstructed samples and beats with club music's hands-in-the-air accessibility and hip-hop's lyrical focus is the sound of Baltimore at the turn of the century. Spank Rock's 2006 full-length, YOYOYOYOYO, is a dusted mash-up of Paisley Park funk, Miami booty beats, and explicit yet cerebral raps.