Black Sunday (Cypress Hill album)
Black Sunday is the second studio album by American hip hop group Cypress Hill. It was released on July 20, 1993, by Ruffhouse and Columbia Records, and proved as successful as their debut, Cypress Hill. The album debuted at No. 1 on the US Billboard 200, selling 261,000 copies in its first week of sales and became the highest Soundscan recording for a hip hop group at the time. Also, with their previous album, Cypress Hill, still in the charts, they became the first hip hop group ever to have two albums in the Top 10 of the U.S. Billboard 200 at the same time. The album went quadruple platinum in the U.S. with 3.4 million units sold.
Background
The first single, "Insane in the Brain", became a crossover hit. A clean censored version of the album was also made which removes the song "A to the K". The song "Hand on the Glock" is a re-recorded version of the track "Hand on the Pump" from the debut album Cypress Hill.On July 20, 2023, an expanded edition of the album was released to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the album, with five additional songs.
Reception
The single "I Ain't Goin' Out Like That" was nominated for the Grammy Award's Best Rap Performance of the year category.Rolling Stone - 4 stars - Excellent - "…it's the Cypress combo of stark grooves and cinematic gangsta fairy tales that allows them to rule the streets, a formula not messed with on Black Sunday…"
The Source - 4 stars - Excellent - "…a darker sequel…this album is definitely worth buying as it easily rips the frame out of all those Cypress bandwagon jumpers…"
- Included in Qs list of the 50 Best Albums of 1993.
- Ranked No. 35 in Melody Makers list of "The Albums of the Year" for 1993.
- Ranked No. 29 in the Village Voices 1993 Pazz & Jop Critics Poll.
- Ranked No. 8 in New Musical Expresss list of "The Top 50 LPs of 1993".
Track listing
Notes- Later repressings have a fade at the end of "Insane in the Brain" due to sample clearance issues, & "Lock Down" is omitted.
Personnel
Cypress Hill
- B-Real – vocals
- Sen Dog – vocals
- DJ Muggs – turntables, arrangements, executive production, programming and mixing (recorded music)|mixing]
Additional personnel
- T-Ray – producer
- John Gamble – engineer
- Andy Kravitz – engineer
- Manuel Lecuona – engineer
- Jason Roberts – engineer
- Chris Shaw – engineer, mixing
- Joe Nicolo – executive producer, mixing
- Chris Schwartz – executive producer
- Jay Papke – design
- Anthony Artiaga – photography
Charts
Weekly charts
| Chart | Peak position |
| Greek Albums | 19 |
Year-end charts
| Chart | Position |
| Australian Albums | 93 |
| New Zealand Albums | 12 |
| US Billboard 200 | 98 |
| US Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums | 98 |