ACCORDING TO CHRIS ROCK,RAISING HELLIS "RAP'S FIRST MASTERPIECE," and he's absolutely right (Chuck D also agrees). Run DMC dropped the landmark work (first hip-hop album to go multiplatinum) in 1986, with the bombastic beats, furious bars traded between Rev Run and DMC, and Jam Master Jay's sharp, faster-than-Jack-B-Nimble cuts carrying the album, and by extension, rap, straight to the mainstream.