Professional ratings
Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
Metacritic	90/100
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic
Blender
Entertainment Weekly	A
The Guardian
NME	9/10
Pitchfork Media	7.9/10
Rolling Stone
Spin	8/10
Uncut
The Village Voice	A−

Original Pirate Material is the debut album by the English rapper and producer Mike Skinner, under the name The Streets. The album is a unique take on UK garage and has lyrics dealing with everyday circumstances and occurrences. The album originally rose to #12 on the UK Albums Chart in 2002, and then peaked at #10 in 2004 after the release of the second Streets album A Grand Don't Come for Free. The album received critical acclaim; in March 2003, NME placed Original Pirate Material at number 46 on their list of the "100 Best Albums of All Time". They subsequently placed Original Pirate Material at number 9 in their list of the "100 Best Albums of the Decade".Observer Music Monthly ranked it as the best album of the 2000s.

In the United Kingdom, four singles were released from Original Pirate Material: "Has It Come to This?", "Let's Push Things Forward", "Weak Become Heroes" and "Don't Mug Yourself".

Skinner has stated that his main early influences were from the United States, in particular Wu-Tang Clan MCs such as Raekwon and RZA, as well as east coast rapper Nas's album Illmatic. However, Skinner attributes the album as emerging from the UK garage scene of the late 1990s. His stance when making the album was to combine the UK garage sound with a lyrical content about "all the little adventures you go on" rather than the style of UK hip hop, which he accused of being "someone from Reading pretending to be Biggie or Q-Tip".

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Wikipedia