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Queens rapper Noreaga (also known as N.O.R.E.) was one of the most distinctive voices of the late ’90s hardcore hip-hop scene. He found critical and commercial success, both as a member of the duo Capone-N-Noreaga and as a solo artist, well into the 2000s. Born Victor Santiago, Jr., to a Puerto Rican father and black mother, N.O.R.E. was raised in the Lefrak City housing projects in Queens, New York. In the early ’90s, while serving a sentence for attempted murder at the Green Haven Correctional Facility, he befriended Queensbridge native Capone. Once released, the two began rapping together under the mentorship of Juice Crew veteran Tragedy Khadafi, appearing in The Source Magazine’s “Unsigned Hype” column in 1995. The duo attracted widespread attention in 1996 with the release of the single “L.A., L.A..” The song—a response to Tha Dogg Pound’s “New York, New York”—is considered a key record in the infamous East Coast/West Coast battle. Only 18 at the time, Noreaga’s unorthodox style of rapping immediately stood out. VIBE Magazine described his flow as “staggered, high-pitched parrot riffs.” The Source called it “word association-style poetics.” Capone-N-Noreaga’s debut The War …