The Diplomats

The Diplomats, a Harlem-rooted hip-hop crew also known as Dipset, originated in the late 1990s when Cam'ron and Jim Jones assembled the core unit. Juelz Santana and Diplomat Records president Freekey Zeekey completed the quartet, with further contributors including 40 Cal, J.R. Writer, and Hell Rell appearing chiefly throughout their most active stretch in the early 2000s. Both volumes of Diplomatic Immunity captured their sound, pairing gritty street-centric rhymes with dense, sample-driven beats. After each member turned to individual solo work during a long absence, the group resurfaced in 2018 on Diplomatic Ties.

Although several members had already guested on Cam'ron’s 2000 Epic Records release S.D.E. and the 2002 Roc-A-Fella album Come Home with Me, the crew’s official introduction arrived in 2003 with the sprawling double-disc Diplomatic Immunity. The gold-certified set entered the Billboard 200 Top Ten and showcased Master P alongside DMX, while production came from Kanye West and Just Blaze. They issued the follow-up Diplomatic Immunity 2 the subsequent year. An open-ended break stretched into the 2010s amid sporadic internal disputes and solo commitments. A fleeting reunion signal in late 2010 failed to materialize, leaving nearly a decade before their next official project. In the interim Koch distributed a run of underground compilations, among them More Than Music, Vol. 1 (2005) and Vol. 2 (2006), Dipset Mania (2011), and A-Million Dipset Mania: Back to Business, Vol. 2 (2013). The multi-part Diplomats mixtape series also documented their output across 2002–2005.

The original four members reconvened in 2015 for the mixtape American Dream, which included Lil Wayne, Styles P, Faith Evans, and Dave East. Their third studio album, Diplomatic Ties, reached stores in late 2018 via Set Life/Empire. The nine-track effort brought in Belly, the Lox, Tory Lanez, and Trav.