Michael Roberts of the Cleveland Scene weighed in on the impact N.W.A. had on hip hop. Roberts concludes, “The legacy of N.W.A. is more about getting wasted and getting laid than it is about destroying a racist power structure. That shouldn’t be a surprise, since the former is a lot easier to accomplish than the latter. But at its best — and ‘Straight Outta Compton’ certainly qualifies — gangsta rap can rattle the Man even as it provides a seductive soundtrack for excess. And that’s definitely worth taking credit for.”

Jeff Liles of the Dallas Observer ran a scathing article on N.W.A. after the Dallas Morning News ran a huge write-up on them earlier this month. Liles said, “Public Enemy was militant and educated; the members of N.W.A. were merely anti-social role players. And their music was prostitution on a number of different levels. It sold out the urban African-American public as a people who justified violent crime as a reasonable means to an end. At the same time, they (along with Ice-T and, later, Tupac Shakur) allowed white entertainment executives to pimp them out as ideological spokesmen for their fractured and desperate community.”

Terry McDermott of the Los Angeles Times put together a fantastic account of the origins of N.W.A.’s underground rise to become basically the founders of a genre in the late 80’s. McDermott wrote, “N.W.A had more of an effect in less time than probably any figures in pop music history. It’s as if Sinatra had become Sinatra by cutting a single record, as if Dylan quit before going electric. N.W.A incited a revolution that redefined hip-hop just as hip-hop was poised to overrun popular culture. As pop has increasingly become the culture that matters, hip-hop has reached deep into mainstream America.” The article at latimes.com has since been removed.