20 of the best live R&B and hip-hop albums

The ‘90s was a prime time for MTV, because it had so many different facets of music programming. One of which was their live concert series Unplugged, and Mariah Carey’s performance is still a top-tier standout. With Carey's five-octave range, the series helped display her talent to the masses. During her Unplugged, fans can hear a supreme violin section alongside 10 background vocalists that sound like a mini-choir. Some song favorites include "Emotions," "Make It Happen," and a cover of The Jackson 5 hit "I'll Be There."

When people discuss the greatest vocalists, Luther Vandross is typically a top artist on the list. With a tone so flawless, smooth, and silky, it’s no wonder people referred to him as the “Velvet Voice.” He recorded Live at Radio City Music Hall 2003 to perform some of his biggest hits. He sets the mood of a good time, and fans can be heard saying how much they love him on the album opener "Never Too Much." Some of the loudest cheers are heard when Vandross performs songs like "If Only For One Night" and the nearly 10-minute performance of "A House Is Not a Home." 

When artists choose to release a live album, it’s usually done when an artist has a few albums already in their catalog. However, Erykah Badu went against the norm and dropped her live album within several months of her debut. Besides performing songs from her Baduizm album, this was also the introduction to her hit song “Tyrone.” She also shows her appreciation for ol' school music when she performs her own renditions of Roy Ayers’ “Searching” and The Mary Jane Girls’ “All Night Long.”

When rappers perform with live bands, it always brings new life to their music — something that a DJ element can’t always showcase. Nas knew this all too well when he celebrated the 20-year anniversary of his debut album, Illmatic, with the National Symphony Orchestra. This ensemble brings a classic and theatrical mood to his album, especially on his ambitious anthem "The World is Yours." Before he performs the track, he tells the crowd, "You put stuff down on that paper, you'd be surprised that atmosphere reads it, the universe reads it, and hears it" as he reflects on manifesting his future. 

By the time Donny Hathaway released his Live album, he already had two albums in his discography. The album is composed of live performances in Los Angeles and New York. While he performed a couple of his own songs like “The Ghetto,” he also puts his own soulful spin on Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On” and Carole King’s “You’ve Got a Friend.”

In the 2000s, Alicia Keys was proving to the world that she was next-up in the R&B world. In 2005, she recored her Unplugged album at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, as part of MTV’s Unplugged series. 

Since Keys is also a pianist, it made sense for her to release a live album in which she performed songs from her first two projects. During the live renditions, songs like “Karma” enticed the crowd with enthralling string and horn sections, and she played a more soulful arrangement of “You Don’t Know My Name.”

J. Cole is the type of artist who not only reps the city where he grew up, but he acknowledges how much it impacted his journey. He decided to take his third album, Forest Hills Drive, on the road and then released the live album on his birthday. In addition to the album title being named after the street he grew up on, it was only right to have Cole perform the entire album in front of a crowd at Fayetteville's Crown Coliseum. It's the perfect homecoming for Cole, as he performs tracks like "January 28th" and "03' Adolescence."

In the mid ‘90s, D’Angelo was helping to usher in the sound of neo-soul. His Live At The Jazz Café, London album was recorded just months after his 1995 debut, Brown Sugar. However, it wasn’t released until three years later, and then a reissue of the full show was made available in 2014. On the live album, he takes the audience to church with an organ arrangement on “Jonz in My Bonz” and funky bass line on “Lady” that is arguably better than the original song.

The Roots have always been in a league of their own — a hip-hop band that adds instrumentation of soul and jazz to their sound. When they released their live album The Roots Come Alive, it was after the commercial success of their fourth album, Things Fall Apart. While their hit song “The Next Movement” is the perfect opener, fans can also hear songs alongside Common and a smooth version of “You Got Me” with singer-songwriter Jill Scott. 

Mary J. Blige’s The Tour was recorded during two Los Angeles shows of her 1998 Share My World Tour. Not only does the queen of hip-hop soul put emotions into her songs, but the commentary on this album can make fans feel like they're actually present. Before she went into her cover of Chaka Khan’s “Sweet Thing,” she said, “I got one question for each and everyone of you out there: How many of you out there have a sweet thing tonight?" The crowd went wild. She also performed some of her own hit songs like “Real Love,” “My Life,” and “Everything.” 

In the ‘90s, Unplugged was always a must-watch event. By the time Maxwell performed his show, he only had one album in his discography, Maxwell’s Urban Hang Suite. While fans can hear Maxwell sing his original tracks from that album, they can also hear his smooth renditions of Nine Inch Nails’ “Closer” and Kate Bush’s “This Woman’s Work.”

It was her stellar set at Coachella in 2018 that displayed Beyoncé's showmanship on astronomical levels. The performance was filled with an HBCU-style marching band as her backing, which is perfect for her songs “Crazy In Love,” “Lose My Breath,” and “Freedom.” She even had a fraternity step show before going into her hit song “Party.” She also brought out fellow Destiny’s Child members Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams to join her for “Say My Name” and “Soldier.” Beyoncé wanted to bring Black history into her performance, while also making her mark as the first Black female artist to headline Coachella.

Kanye West released his live album Late Orchestration several months after his sophomore project, Late Registration. He recorded the album at Abbey Road Studios in London with a few hundred guests in attendance. He was backed by an all-female orchestra with guest appearances from Lupe Fiasco and John Legend. The string orchestra works perfectly on songs like “Jesus Walks," “Drive Slow,” and “All Falls Down.” 

After the success of Marvin Gaye’s album Let’s Get It On, his label encouraged him to tour the album for promotion, although he dealt with stage fright. In January 1974, he performed in front of a crowd at Oakland Coliseum in the Bay Area. The introduction on Marvin Gaye Live! is perfect as the MC referred to him as, “The man has become a legend in his own time.” Crowd cheers could be heard as he went through songs like “Trouble Man” and “Inner City Blues,” but nothing beats the loud crowd reaction when Gaye sang “Distant Lover.”

When Jay-Z released Jay-Z Unplugged, it was just a couple of months after dropping his sixth album, The Blueprint. He opened the show saying to the audience, “Welcome to Jay-Z’s poetry,” as fans responded with applause and snaps. Performing his songs alongside hip-hop band The Roots, it's a perfect pairing in front of a live audience. The Roots provided more soulful and classical elements to Jay's songs like “Izzo (H.O.V.A.),” and to the audience's surprise, Jay brought out Mary J. Blige to perform their collaboration “Can’t Knock the Hustle.”

Just two years after the band Sade released their fifth album, Lover’s Rock, they released their live album properly titled Lovers Live. The audience was drawn in hearing lead singer Sade Adu’s voice from the very beginning of “Cherish the Day” and moving into tracks like “Smooth Operator” and “Is It a Crime?” The album gives fans the quiet-storm element they always long for when listening to Sade.

Besides her work with The Fugees, it’s still hard to believe that Lauryn Hill has only released one solo album in her career. Just four years after releasing The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, she dropped her anticipated live album MTV Unplugged No. 2.0. At the beginning of Hill's performance, she told the audience that she was going to perform new songs, and the lyrics would reflect her life journey. She then went into an acoustic set of songs, including “Freedom Time” and “I Gotta Find Peace of Mind.”

Mac Miller saw commercial success in the rap game after releasing his first two albums, Blue Slide Park and Watching Movies with the Sound Off. His album Live From Space was recorded in 2013 while on The Space Migration Tour. Miller was a self-taught musician on instruments like the piano, guitar, and drums. So it was only right that he wanted to bring some instrumentation into stage sets. He teamed up with eclectic band The Internet as his backing, bringing some more soulful elements to songs like “The Star Room” and “Objects in the Mirror,” which included vocals from The Internet’s lead singer, Syd.

While the MTV Unplugged series was typically a concert for a solo artist or a group, they tried something new when all the artists from Uptown Records were featured on an episode. The show included Jodeci, Father MC, Mary J. Blige, Christopher Williams, and Heavy D & The Boyz. While Jodeci went through their catalog, they also gave a rousing rendition of Stevie Wonder’s hit song “Lately.” Other standouts came from Blige as she sang “Sweet Thing,” and Heavy D & The Boyz got the crowd hype on their performance of “Blue Funk.”

Throughout Stevie Wonder’s career, he’s recorded a number of live albums, but one of his standouts is Live at the Talk of the Town. One thing fans can always count on is hearing Wonder play the piano and his staple harmonica. On this album, Wonder performed some of his biggest hits, including “Pretty World,” “My Cherie Amour,” and “I Was Made to Love Her.”