Our data begins in 1988, the first year Billboard’s year-end Top R&B Albums chart featured at least 20 rap albums. At this point, hip-hop was evolving from a singles-oriented genre into an album-oriented one, with full-lengths like Public Enemy’s It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back (58 minutes; 16 tracks), EPMD’s Strictly Business (44 minutes; 10 tracks), and rap’s first double album, DJ Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince’s He’s the D.J., I’m the Rapper (72 minutes; 17 tracks) among the year’s most popular rap records. But overall, the biggest hip-hop albums of 1988 were decidedly succinct compared to what would come later, with the average runtime at about 49 minutes, and the average number of tracks at around 12. And, as always, format played a role: Most people in the late ’80s were buying cassettes, and ingrained limitations including the modest capacity of physical media helped keep runtimes in check.

The shortest popular rap album of the late ’80s was Brooklyn MC Dana Dane’s Dana Dane With Fame, which managed to pack all of its goofiness and dark humor into 37 minutes of breezy rhymes and beats. On the other hand, the longest was As Nasty as They Wanna Be by 2 Live Crew—18 tracks and 79 minutes worth of horny, bass-heavy party music, with each of the four members getting their own tape side. While As Nasty as They Wanna Be’s commercial success was partially due to the censorship controversy that surrounded it—the album was ruled obscene by a federal judge, making it illegal in parts of Florida for almost two years—it also helped pave the way for more lengthy, bawdy rap albums.