August of 1990 was unseasonably warm. The hottest month in one of New York City’s hottest years in history, ever, it was a fitting climate for the release of one of hip-hop’s greatest albums.

LL Cool J, née James Todd Smith, began releasing albums in 1985 after connecting with Def Jam: his first, Radio, went platinum. The year 1987 came, and he released Bigger and Deffer. All looked promising for LL Cool J’s much-anticipated third release, 1989’s Walking with a Panther.

Though a commercial success (see “Going Back to Cali,” “Big Ole Butt” for favorites), the album was lauded by many critics as too poppy, and lacking in substance. The LL Cool J that dominated the first two albums by “rhymin’ and designin’ with your girl in my lap” now fell flat with promises that seemed, well, repetitive. “With so much happening outside of the recording studio and on the streets,” wrote David Browne in Rolling Stone, “is being the boaster with the mostest enough?”

One year later, LL Cool J released Mama Said Knock You Out, regarded by many as his magnum opus. It was a booming, layered response to those who felt he had begun his slide into oblivion. Though “Mama” is used in the album’s title, it was actually LL’s grandmother who gave him the directive to knock out his critics. To date, the album has sold more than 2 million copies and was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America. The album also garnered LL Cool J the 1991 Grammy for Best Rap Solo Performance.

Marley Marl, the album’s producer and one of the industry’s most venerable beatmakers, takes us back 25 years.

How it all began.

Marl, a D.J. at WBLS, invited LL Cool J to the station to promote Walking with a Panther. Once there, Marl told him how much he liked “Jingling Baby,” a track on the album, and expressed his interest in remixing it. LL agreed, but wanted to redo his vocals.

“Next thing you know, we started making other tracks,” says Marl. “We didn’t know where we were going with it. It became the Mama Said Knock You Out LP, but we were just making random tracks . . . going to the clubs . . . after we went to the clubs, going home and trying to capture the same feeling in the studio with the music. All of a sudden, we’re, like, eight tracks in, and I didn’t even have a contract to do an album with him. We were just grooving. After we were in the studio and we felt each other, we just kept it moving.”