Strictly Business

Erick Sermon and Parrish Smith of EPMD appear in a dim, moody photograph on the cover of their debut, with the title punched out in big yellow and blue letters inside a tilted box, like the stamp on a business deal.

The duo from Brentwood, Long Island took their name from Erick and Parrish Making Dollars, and Strictly Business, released on 7 June 1988, matched their laid-back, mumbled flows with funk and rock samples, from Zapp on "You Gots to Chill" to Eric Clapton's "I Shot the Sheriff" on the title track. Its loose, heavy grooves became a template for East Coast production.

The cover's corporate joke fits a group that treated rap as a trade. The block lettering announced EPMD's long-running "business" theme, carried through every album title that followed, from Unfinished Business to Business Never Personal.