a tribe called quest reunion

And no, they never re-brokeup. They're just refusing to record as long as they're signed to Jive, who won't let them out of their contract.

Sad that this group got messed up because of the business of music.

The new Lupe Fiasco/Neptunes song sounds totally like the Q-Tip solo album.

i had a dream that the most recent episode of the wire (which i still havent seen) was all about a tribe called quest. kind of from their secret origins to the last album. and it ended with them handing in "the love movement" to the record label and q-tip / me (cuz i'm always the protagonist in my dreams) announces at the end of the episode, kind of spontaneously, "this will be our last album!" and shocks everyone

wtf dude

i know. and they spent most of their time in this really fancy open-concept record label office. and something about a monster in the forest?

how is that even an episode of The Wire!? like they run "Way Down In The Hole" and the opening credits and then, boom, Q-Tip contract negotiations and the fuckin' Cloverfield monster?

i think at the end there was a scene with mcnulty. i was like 'oh shit, i just realized this whole episode is just about tribe! crazy concept episode!'

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v662/cerberus314/thatsracist.gif

...

yeah that's gotta some real flubbed comedy gif placement there, i don't even get it.

gabbneb explain yourself

the gabbneb device is malfunctioning

could it be payback for this:

thatsracist.jpg

-- gabbneb, Thursday, September 27, 2007 4:27 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Link

it's a GIF

-- s1ocki, Friday, September 28, 2007 12:07 AM (4 months ago) Bookmark Link

well met, gabbneb

http://www.savage1.com/Sweet%20Revenge%202.0.jpg

still waiting for answers

WHAT HAPPENED HERE.

thatsrosebud.gif

all canadians look alike

great revive

lololol

the real episode is bound to be a letdown (not to mention my fuckin coworker already spoiled it for me)

next time revive the dreams thread, not the tribe thread, breaux

lololololololololololololololololol

next time revive the dreams thread, not the tribe thread, breaux

-- gabbneb, Thursday, January 31, 2008 9:45 PM (14 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

did i just get put in my place by the gabbenator??

I think you as a matter of fact yeah

you think i what?

People We Like

"this will be our last album"

"..."

*ta-ta-tah-tah-tah-taaahhhhh*

they handed it in on this weird piece of metal, like it was on a usb stick but it looked like a piece of jewelry.

new documentary by michael rappaport!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__2hzD3gNVw&feature=player_embedded

I was really hoping for more seasons of The War at Home.

i didn't know jarobi was back with them, i always wondered what his role was in the group. hope there's at least some on him and not all phife vs. tip drama

was really hoping for final cut footage of slocki's dream (w/ gabbneb commentary track)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/41/Phife-dawg-jm3-funyons.jpg

nglish: photo of Malik Taylor / Phife Dawg while eating Funyuns™

man gabbneb was the fukkin worst

I would like to have had that dream.

i would have a thousand orbits back before a single gabbneb

DAMN PHIFE YOU GOT FAT

I blame the Funyuns™.

ps - I love Michael Rappaport something fierce. I feel like maybe I should be more ashamed of that than I am.

what did "gabbneb" even mean?

idk he seems like a bro to me xp

Yes, that's part of it. Also, I literally bumped into him in NY once and was really funny and nice in a v charming sort of way.

Funions are so gross.

i was behind michael rappaport in the drive-thru @ mcdonald's once, he was there with an SUV full of kids trying to order a ton of food. it was about what you'd expect it to be.

actually come to think of it another time i saw him at an ice cream place with a bunch of kids once, trying to corral them while they were all running around with ice cream cones.

haha i just looked up rapaport on wiki to see how many kids he has and saw this:

Rapaport is married to Nichole Beattie and they have two children, sons Julian Ali and Maceo Shane. He revealed on VH1's 2008 Hip Hop Honors that his son was named after Vincent Mason (nicknamed "Maseo") of the rap group De La Soul.

I think MR's mellowed out over the years. Lili Taylor put a restraining order on him when they broke up.

hey HEY come OVAH HEah we gotTA GO! FINISH YA ICE CREAM alRIGHT?

hahaha

So I was on walking down a really empty block when the bumping into ocurred just when he happened to be saying something to the friend he was walking with and that something happened to be "blah blah herpes blah" so after excusing ourselves and laughing etc we started to walk in oposite directions and he yells back at me, "Hey, just so you know I was talking about someone else having herpes. It's not me, I def don't got herpes!"

HEY COULD I GET ahh two...TWO HAPPY MEALS and a....yeah a TWENTY PIECE MCNUGGET LARGE FRIES and....hey HEY QUIET DOWN...uh a CHOCOLATE MILKSHAKE

It's like I'm right there with him.

lmao @ enbb

"Hey, just so you know I was talking about someone else having herpes. It's not me, I def don't got herpes!"

things shouted to strangers on the street very much in character

twitter saying Phife is dead :(

:(

arghno no confirmation i can see

yea seems like diabetes - very sad - so young

i still kept hoping they might do another record one day

nah that was never gonna happen. personal rifts too strong/Jive contract too strong.

yea

so sad

noooooooooooooooooo

goddammit

RIP

way way too young

aw man, this is so sad

fuck

RIP

He was a fly MC who was five foot three and very brave.

RIP funky diabetic

oh god awful

Aw crap this is so sad

goddammit. RIP.

this year is brutal so far. will miss you, five foot assassin. :(

HFS was not expecting this. aaggghhh RIP

instantly reminded of my favorite moment from the doc, him and Tip rehearsing their little arm-swinging dance step before the show

a tribe called quest reunion (in hell)

jk, RIP

Pretty great

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRujBI_vPSM

"Steve Biko" is one of the jams of all jams

"Award Tour" as well, in fact so many off Midnight Marauders

that traffic guy is the best omg

RIP

listening to Beats Rhymes and Life, the biggest sin of which was coming after two back-to-back of the greatest rap albums ever, good stuff

haha phife just said

"Eating through your crew like Stephen King's The Langoliers" <3

has always been unfairly maligned in my opinion - it is a dark complex beast - i know not many will agree but although it may not have the highs of the previous two for me it is consistently great and at least the equal of MM and LET

beats rhymes and life i mean

Listened to The Love Movement yday, still v strong.

I mean I don't think they put out a record that wasn't blinding. Even that post-Instinctive Rhythms remix LP was strong throughout, and didn't feel like a ripoff.

"Find a Way" is among their best imo. Don't care for the rest though.

"Start It Up" is also great

tape of ATCQ London gig 1994
https://soundcloud.com/flip-the-script/a-tribe-called-quest-midnight

it is a dark complex beast

THIS is why Beats Rhymes & Life is great, it just always gets ignorec cause it doesn't have any certifiable jams like their other albums do. If anything, The Love Movement stands out as their weakest because it feels like a self-consciously "lighthearted" overcorrection to BR&L.

it just dawned on me that I haven't played BR&L in its entirety in over a decade

so yeah at a bare minimum the first four songs on BR&L are flawless

Phony Rappers is top 5 Tribe for me

Find a Way is probably at least top 10.

Too bad I only think about stuff like his after someone dies, but I was just reflecting on how different and powerful tribe seemed to me when their videos strangely got beamed into my 12-year-old DC middle class Jewish kid house. I mean all MTV was a strange experience at that age but I remember tribe videos in particular as something I liked a lot and wasn't totally sure how to process. The scenario video (and the lyrics - wtf were these guys talking about but it seemed amazing and creative and hilarious), that black and white jazz video that suddenly, jarringly goes into the bright colored Buggin Out. The whole different way that the three of them expressed masculinity that wasn't really like many other rappers or rock stars. (Obvs there were others but I'm talking about my limited range of knowledge at that age).

Later I think I backed away from them a bit, never disowning them but not wanting to be that white guy that always talks about Tribe.

wait waht?!

http://ambrosiaforheads.com/2016/08/a-tribe-called-quest-new-album/

Will Ron Carter be on it?

Pleasantly surprised to find this was not recorded after Phife passed

new album out 11/11/16

Maybe I'm just a cynical arsehole, but I can't imagine anything about a new Tribe Called Quest album in 2016 being anything other than an absolute train wreck.

iwanttobelieve.gif

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/06/arts/music/a-tribe-called-quest-new-album-interview.html

Right now my expectations for this are about on par with De La Soul's latest album.

I think coming to these types of albums with zero expectations sometimes results in a pleasant listen

^

The guest spots from Jack White and Elton John are certainly promising.

This is definitely going to be better than Low End Theory

xp i'm going to pretend that i think you're kidding and not google that

even if that's serious, the Jack White song on Beyonce's album is fantastic so I'm not overly concerned about it

honestly it was the elton john note that gave me pause
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZY2p7oE7Bpw

they're on SNL next weekend (11/12) with Dave Chappelle, so this is your alert to tape it

I might reserve judgement on this till I've actually heard it. I think I'm okay with being behind the trend on declaring it awful. And it's not impossible that it might be good.

Hey, this new album sounds great!

are you listening 2 it???

also s/o to ali shaheed for the luke cage soundtrack great stuff

Yes, I am listening to it now. I rarely download albums illegally anymore but I made an exception for this one. It sounds like a proper atcq album with a dash of psychedelia thrown in, a good deal of phife and some appropriate guest spots. Tip and Dre should form a duo.

i thought there were a few good things but overall it's meh

so is it out or did it leak or what exactly? Is there a streaming exclusive?

There's a leak. It will be out on the streaming services tomorrow.

cool, thanks!

This is all better than I expected.

I've only listened to the first two songs so far. Based on them, my first reaction is that this is the best album of the year.

it's kind of exactly what i need to hear right about now

wow this is great

damn, sweet CAN sample running under "Lost Somebody"

first track hits the ground running

first three tracks alone justify the hype

pleasantly surprised at how great this is! it's very much a tribe album without feeling like a retread of past albums.

i tweeted this but i'll repeat, this feels like it should have been the commercially unsuccessful but underated messy and darker followup to Midnight Marauders, basically like their version of De La's Buhloone Mindstate or Jungle Brother's J. Beez With the Remedy.

it feels so familiar yet new. like i bought a new version of a comfy old sweater i used to have. It really is just what i needed this week.

yeah this is really good on one listen

tip and andre 3000 should do an album together

Yeah, good description.

The buhloone/j beez comparison, that is.

It feels alive where brl and lm sounded a bit sterile

^^^^ absolutely

buhloone is secretly my second favorite de la album so yeah i'm feeling that comparison

"better than BRL and The Love Movement" are all the persuasion I need.

dis generation feels like a classic

This album is really good, after that disappointing ass de la soul album I was pleasantly surprised

I actually bought a physical copy of the De La cuz I was so excited and I sold it on Amazon within the week; even got most of my money back b/c it was like new.

just got to track 6 melatonin and it totally knocked me out. wow.

one of you fuckers needs to dropbox this to me or something plz plz

Does Jarobi rap on this?

I think so!

the Elton interpolation is well done btw

xp Yeah, Jarobi's all over these tracks. And he sounds incredible. His voice really complements Phife and Tip's, and he's got some good lines

Blown away by how great this is. I couldn't have even dreamed about this album being anywhere near this good (especially after that lifeless De La project)

Shakey, no Spotify?

the Elton interpolation is well done btw

― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, November 11, 2016 2:05 PM (four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah the elton and jack white guests raised some red flags when the album was announced but they are really unobtrusive

I am against spotify

fair

I'm still worried about John Mayer filling in for Phife on SNL, but who knows, maybe they'll pull it off

jarobi does sound surprisingly good.
the elton track isn't too obtrusive but it's still the weakest song on "side one" imo

i dunno i like how it gets kinda trippy when they looping "solid wall of sound" verbed out like that

second listen this is even better, quite a triumph

Among the album's pleasures is Andre dropping the motormouthed delivery that had turned him into the hip hop Steve Vai.

I love this, just what I needed.

as is my penchant, i'm trying to listen to the first half several times before digging into the second half.
would welcome current hot takes on if it maintains, drastically improves, declines...?

I am against spotify

...but plz Dropbox me this album gratis

lol

haha i was gonna say that but wanted to cut shakey a break

getting an album free from a friend is different from getting an album for (mostly) free from a company that doesn't pay artists

imo

ie trading dubbed cassettes /= actively supporting a company that robs artists of royalties

but cool thx guys I will have to wait until I get paid next month and can (maybe) afford to buy a physical copy from an actual store/person

Apple Music is free for the first three months fyi

Apple, another company that doesn't pay me

but cool glad we're having this argument yet again I'm sure we will all learn valuable lessons

if i had the mp3s i'd send em shakes

i'm actually not seeing any physical copies of this - cd or vinyl...does anyone know the plan for that?

next week

ah cool, wanna get this on vinyl

Shakey, how do I reach you?

I webmailed you my e-mail thx bro

Ha, he beat me to it.

matt:
http://atribecalledquest.shop.musictoday.com/store
site is a little shaky but i helped my local deli guy order his vinyl through here!

shakey check out this site its cool http://www.albumforest.co/

agree on greatness of this album

I was in tears from the second I heard the opening snare and Tip's first verse.

I can't get over how nostalgic yet of the moment this feels.

This shit right here gives me hope

^^^

It's so good

Are you reviewing it?

Yah

This album is what the nation needed

this is crazy good. was going to wait till I made it through the whole album to post but then "Mobius" ends up being built around "Two Oldtimers" by Dieter Moebius & Conny Plank & thank you

This album is what the nation needed

OTM

so i was talking with a young woman (let's say 25) this afternoon and i said, "hey have you heard the new tribe yet?" and she didn't know what i meant so i said "have you heard the new tribe called quest?" and she said "i've heard OF them" and okay so THIS is what being old feels like

LET'S MAKE SOMETHING HAPPEN

Am liking what I hear so far, yay Spotify.

Really nice album

I like that it is genuinely new and modern rather than just trying to capture the old magic. It's also their most serious and politically-minded album.

Whoa damn

sounded better on each play yesterday, looking forward to listening to it more over the weekend

just want to live inside space program but everytime tip gets to "and the president's refined / in her wing she's confined / with about thirty percocets and five bottles of wine" i get aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

also wanna renege on my earlier negativity on "wall of sound"; it opened up in headphones... matt otm basically

i will cop to approaching the elton john/busta rhymes collabo with some prejudice; I'm pleased they proved me wrong!

Def makes me want to revisit the last two Tribe albums

Me too, but I still like their older stuff better.

Love Movement was a legit masterpiece. So is this one. Pretty awesome they went out with two great final albums that sound nothing alike.

I relistened to TLM yesterday morning as I do every couple years to learn whether my yawn needs rescinding. Nope.

Another thing to acknowledge, esp because he sounds so revitalized being back with Tribe, bug Busta is one of the godddamn forces of nature in the history of music

man Tip is one sexy motherfucker, always was.

Busta is one of the godddamn forces of nature in the history of music

that part in "mobius" where he's like "ohwaitwaitwaitwait i gotta do it again! i gotta do it again!"

Yeah in the article they talk about how they hung out in the studio kicking around ideas, instead of just emailing verses and beats like most albums now, parts like that you can really feel that, I think that's a big part of what makes this feel so good

Also s/o to Consequence who maybe isn't as distinctive as everyone else but drops some really cold verses that give the album a little more street feel in a couple of places that i think adds to it in a nice way

I don't hate The Love Movement the way I did when it was first released but it's to my ears a clear step down from BRL, which itself is a step down from the first three albums. The new one blows it away easily; I'd rank it with Low End and MM.

I think I agree with that.

I don't hate The Love Movement the way I did when it was first released but it's to my ears a clear step down from BRL, which itself is a step down from the first three albums. The new one blows it away easily; I'd rank it with Low End and MM.

yes this is where I'm at tbh

Love Movement is an acquired taste. BRL just isn't very good.

Agree the new one may be even better than Love Movement, though. It's just much more in line with what people want from a Tribe album.

Busta been one of the best rappers alive the last few years tho

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xl_s-9TbO-M
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhIrzbhEGvs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cklwGaNKMCo

Don't get me wrong,"Start It Up" is fire; I think it's the album is a little monochromatic after that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDxKVYUHBdA

I don't know what the deal is with Ali Shaheed not being in that photo or on the album but still appearing in the performance?

Did he contribute a lot on their previous albums or is he mostly their live DJ?

Ha, props to Tip taking a moment to clown himself on "Ego".

I think "Lost Somebody" is the only song here I don't care for. Good intentions, obviously, but it doesn't really land, and it detracts from the illusion that the LP was completed before Phife died

I can't stop listening to this

I don't know what the deal is with Ali Shaheed not being in that photo or on the album but still appearing in the performance?

Promo photos will have been taken during the week, not at the taping.

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/albumreviews/review-a-tribe-called-quests-we-got-it-from-here--w450235

"Bohemian everydude funkonauts" A+. Awesome on point review Whiney. This record is the world to me this last week.

well done bro

Thanks guys!

excellent work – listening to the album for the fourth time in an hour.

nice one, Whiney! I liked BRL well enough when it came out, but didn't listen to it a ton. I don't think I've ever listened to TLM. Maybe I should give them a shot.

Yeah, I mean I was certainly lukewarm on them when they dropped, but I think Dilla's legacy has proven they were actually onto something

does something about the mixing/mastering on this sound a little weird to anyone else? like the vocals are kind of buried and hard to hear, especially in the early part of the album?

The vocals mix is really bothering my partner - she keeps asking, "are you sure this is the final version?"

no it does sound pretty raw but i like that

If it's too quiet, you're too old!

we're all too old

never rly listened to them before but this is great

yah that's basically where i'm at

I don't know what album you all are listening to but this is godawful

jk this is really good!

you guys just coming into ATCQ now should really get up on the first three albums as soon as possible

my younger brother is a massive fan, weird that i've never given them a proper go. but yeah this feels like the balm we all need rn

imago how have u never at least heard Low End Theory?

it was from ages ago and ages ago music is booooring

(j/k, i don't know)

my younger brother is a massive fan, weird that i've never given them a proper go. but yeah this feels like the balm we all need rn

― imago, Monday, November 14, 2016 4:04 PM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol

its funny as hell in this current political moment to watch ppl who ignored certain styles of music come around on them now that its social media cool

i mean im not mad, more money to rappers i like, im just saying

this is just great. I mean, I would think that, I can remember the first time I saw the "El Segundo" video on Yo! and I get real nostalgic thinking about that but man. What a tremendous piece of work.

I can remember the first time I saw the "El Segundo" video on Yo! and I get real nostalgic thinking about that

Same! And then I went and bought the cassingle after church.

you had to get it!

tbf deej i've made it my project to hear more or less everything this year from loads of genres regardless of 'social media cool', this album one of the better ilm finds for sure, respect to those who were there from the start though

yeah thank god for ilm scouring the earth for such rare finds

lol "social media cool." It's fucking Tribe Called Quest, not the return of Mission of Burma or something.

I can imagine A Tribe Called Quest not having the same centrality to life outside the US. For example, Low End Theory was the theme music of every high school party I went to. I could imagine LJ not having that same experience.

Nah A Tribe Called Quest were, if not big in album sales over here, at least well known, you'd see their videos a lot and their following did grow throughout the 90s. More to the point it was the type of rap that played well over here, there'd be plenty of people you'd meet in college for whom Low End Theory would be one of the five rap CDs they owned.

I'd imagine if you went to university after 2001 or so you'd have missed out of them altogether though, except Can I Kick It obviously. But the type of rap they represented would have felt outmoded in the 00s.

New album is fantastic anyway.

Tribe were/are a v big presence in New Zealand, Granny/Noodles otm

I mean Josh, whoops. Their videos kept being played here long after the first two records, anyway, and loads of my younger friends are posting new album stuff on fb.

lol "social media cool." It's fucking Tribe Called Quest, not the return of Mission of Burma or something.

― Josh in Chicago, Monday, November 14, 2016 8:13 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

dont ask me why lj thought they werent worth investigating

you guys just coming into ATCQ now should really get up on the first three albums as soon as possible

― ¶ (DJP), Monday, November 14, 2016 5:02 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

any Anderson.Paak verses on them?

lol

this is one of the quickest hours in music history, it feels like an album half its length

Pretty disingenuous to pretend the buzz around this is just about "social media cool" and not because it's one of the best-loved and most unifying groups in the history of rap returning after nearly 20 years, just after the death of a key member, with an album that is actually as great as anyone could have hoped.

lol "social media cool." It's fucking Tribe Called Quest, not the return of Mission of Burma or something.

― Josh in Chicago, Monday, November 14, 2016 8:13 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

dont ask me why lj thought they werent worth investigating

Not high enough on RYM

idk if this is the answer you're fishing for but their two major albums have average scores over 4, which is quite something

Shaming people for discovering great music late is kind of a self-defeating gesture, no? Better late than never.

spotify does this playlist of old school/new school/golden age hip hop playlist called "the Gold School", they change up every week and this week's it's all Tribe, and I guess the biggest compliment that I could pay this album is that these tracks sound totally natural and great in the mix with stuff from People's, Low End, MM and BR&L and Love Movement

Shaming people for discovering great music late is kind of a self-defeating gesture, no? Better late than never.

― human and working on getting beer (longneck), Tuesday, November 15, 2016 10:22 AM (forty-one minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

better never than having to read imago posts :P

so jag louis
ask his tattooist
he was like the waterboy now they sayin you can do it!

since I still harangue metal noobs I don't really have the moral authority to remind guys in their thirties that "HOW DID YOU NOT KNOW ABOUT THIS??? YOU FUCKIN NOOB!!!" doesn't make you look young and cool, it actually makes you look like aging Beatles fans commenting about Yoko Ono on a story on USA Today

still, congratulations to everybody who wants to come off as cool & hip as me bothering people who try to get into metal, it's a super good look I'm sure you'll agree

hm thought the tone was pretty respectful outside of the to-be-expected deej zing.

imo making fun of rateyourmusic style shenanigans is always a good look

I wonder how fat Q-Tip is.

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, July 20, 2006 12:24 PM (ten years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

tip is very slim and trim XD

his style is kinda fat tho, reminiscent of a whale

lol

q tips are really thin

vast aire and biggie were/are rly fat

its nominative determinism i think

Who didn't eat no ham and eggs?

Melanin is so good

great typo

yeah i know it looks pathetic

lol

Poignant interview.

aaaand good news: http://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/chart-beat/7581458/a-tribe-called-quest-billboard-200-chart-no-1

have been listening to this all week & loving it. Lifelong crush on Q-Tip still intact; goddamn he sounds like high school in the best way <3

Yeah, I've been listening to this all day everyday since it came out, my favorite song changes with each listen.

Louis, have u listened to low end theory yet?

Low End Theory changed my life

finally getting to this. i am stunned at how good this is.

i feel like with how fucked up 2016 has been, this new album is a perfect elixir.

listening to the low end theory for the first time right now

back in the day when I was a teenager, before i had status and before i had a pagerrrrrr

these are some heavy uplifting vibes

ah man Kendrick fits with Tribe so nicely........love his verse

Gonna be a good day for you louis

otm

welcome to the coolest planet in the galaxy

they got some basslines huh

I mean this in the best possible spirit but for all the wit and sass of TLET, I think I prefer the new one. Obviously I can see how towering this was in 1991 or whenever

That's more meant to be 'the new one is fucking incredible' than 'tlet is crap' - it's obviously great

^^ before you had status

this is terrific. "we the people" is a classic ATCQ track already after one listen. theres a Can sample somewhere on the album too

ah man Kendrick fits with Tribe so nicely........love his verse

he REALLY sounds like Mike Ladd to me on that verse - I even had to check it wasn't Mike.

Christgau:

As it was envisioned, this through-conceived meld of rhythm and voice, harmony and hook, ideas and feelings, life and death would have dawned upon us 11/9 as a collegial reminder in the spirit of its title: OK ma'am, the wolf has skulked away from the door, now let the people shape their destiny. Track one moans "The heat the heat the heat the heat" to signify climate change not law enforcement before it states its cross-racial political purposes with a forthright "It's time to go left and not right." And fundamentally, that was the idea. Of course the hour that ensues isn't uniformly ideological—this is music, their first in decades and their last ever, and music's impulses and necessities are their heart. But not their brain. With everybody home and Busta Rhymes moved into the guest room, the drama is all in reuniting seeker Q-Tip, whose long apprenticeship as a fusion musician finally yields some beats, and family man Phife Dog, who left this mortal plane in March but rhymes all the way to the final track. The album represents both their bond and the conscious black humanism they felt sure the nation was ready for: struggle yoked with work ethic, "forward movement" with "instinctual soul," "answer for cancer" with "learning is free," and damn right race-blind law enforcement. Hillary is a "woman with the wisdom who is leading the way," "The Donald"—Phife rhyming here, no later than March—all "Bloodclot you doing/Bullshit you spewing/As if the country ain't already ruined." The election didn't turn out like they figured. We know. But the music remains, urging us to love each other as much as we can as we achieve a happiness it's our duty to reaccess if we're to battle as all we can be. Its statement of principle didn't get the victory it foresaw. But it remains a triumph. A PLUS

For real

this is a 10/10 record, easily

is the vinyl going to be widely available or only thru the okayplayer site?

still playing this daily and being slayed by it daily

that's a really good xgau piece

turns out Midnight Marauders is more to my taste than TLET

That's a pretty standard opinion. Lots of fans cite Midnight Marauders as their favorite. (It's partially a generational thing; younger listeners seem to prefer MM)

Normally I'd say that two years isn't enough time to mark a generational divide, but there was a lot of movement in hip hop during those two years. Still, MM isn't The Chronic or Bacdafucup, and not a huge departure from the ATCQ albums before it, so hmm.

TLET/MM is basically The Godfather/The Godfather II

younger listeners like the computer voice on MM it makes them think of future

both are great

true sort of xp

and yeah, amazing discovery ty ilx

TLET/MM is basically The Godfather/The Godfather II

― ¶ (DJP), Monday, November 28, 2016 3:31 PM (twenty-four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

ya they are both great and arguments for either one are fun to engage in even if it doesn't matter which one is better

still haven't heard the new one. i should listen, even if im always skeptical about reunion albums

Low End Theory and MM came out practically back to back but Midnight Marauders feels like a much more social album imo; it's livelier and more extroverted than Low End Theory, which has kind of a reclusive quality to it. I prefer Low End Theory, but MM feels more like a party than a spoken word session, so it makes sense people gravitate toward it.

Genuinely jealous you get to dive into these albums for the first time imago.

marcos you will like this record

TLET was such an eye-opening record for me at just the right time that I will always rank it highest. MM was like a victory lap.

^^^

My relationship to ATCQ across the first three albums was "This is great, I should pay attention to these guys" -> "HOLY SHIT THIS IS THE GREATEST ALBUM I HAVE EVER HEARD" -> "HOLY SHIT THEY DIDN'T HAVE A LETDOWN AFTER RELEASING THE GREATEST ALBUM I'VE EVER HEARD"

(then it was "This is good but not on the same level as the first three" -> "I only can remember 2 songs on this but those two songs are fire" -> "HOLY SHIT HOW IS IT POSSIBLE THAT DECADES LATER THEY CAN BE THIS GOOD? RIP Pfife")

haha yes

Yep.

Which two songs on TLM? "Find a Way" is one of their greatest creations imo

That and "Start It Up"

it's really depressing to look at the list of albums released in september 1991 and realize which ones the 16 yr old me bought at the time instead of 'the low end theory'.

Psychotic Supper - Tesla
No More Tears - Ozzy Osbourne
Use Your Illusion I - Guns N' Roses
Use Your Illusion II - Guns N' Roses
Blood Sugar Sex Magik - Red Hot Chili Peppers

The bass on "Find a Way" is so massive. Such great Dilla beats all over that album

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Us-4dzcY9A

crushing hard on this album rn tbrr

Didn't TLOT and Nevermind come out the same day? I remember buying both because I couldn't choose.

Also that day was Blood Sugar Sex Magick

Midnight Marauders and Enter The Wu-Tang came out on the same day in '93, which is crazy

CD arrived today after four days of download. This is magnificent. And making me want to go back and re-evaluate Kamaal The Abstract, which I never quite understood the bile towards, but also never quite got.

Is this CD's sound significantly better---?

lol I started trying to list my favourites on each album and ended up just listing basically everything smh

marcos you will like this record

― Οὖτις, Monday, November 28, 2016 4:10 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

haha yea this is a great record

Off one listen to the cd, vs about 4 to the download, I reckon it's a bit different.

my favorites are becoming clear, but the shine's not really coming off this album in general. so great front to back.

otm

http://themartorialist.blogspot.be/2016/12/generic-list-post-stop-lyin-edition_5.html

that guy a) has the most enormous chip on his shoulder and b) is British and a probable DiS poster

AOTY this

"Bonita Applebum," which I included on a 100-favorite-songs list one, is brilliant. It and De La Soul's "Eye Know" and P.M. Dawn's "Reality Used to Be a Friend of Mine" are as surpassingly beautiful today as they were 25 years ago. And the photo of Michelle Obama holding the Tribe album when Phife Dawg died was pretty much the only thing that moved me in the thriving celebrity-obituary industry.

Found the new album for $8 today. Love "Black Spasmodic" (even though, if I'm hearing it right, it's about fake rappers, a subject that seems a little dated--lyrics don't matter much to me if a song sounds great). A couple of other songs caught my ear, and that's about it. Don't like "We the People" at all. Hope it will grow on me, but that doesn't often happen.

Did this album survive beyond the initial praise period? Nary a mention online after so many "Hosannas".

it's getting a lot of end of year love. it's in my top ten for sure.

Album of the year for me

in my top five and holding strong

are we not online????

yeah safe to say it wasn't just initial hype; this album is going to be remembered

My favorite album of the year, too.

They blood pressure high?
Why? They don't play no more
Probably

I meant outside iLXville, of course

This album is brilliant. We The People is only going to get better/more powerful/more poignant as the year goes on. That chorus is dark as shit.

The past 2 months would have felt very different to me without this album. Will it survive? I guess we'll find out, but as of now I see nothing suggesting otherwise.

Very strange that this album that was released to hype in November and spent most of December showing up in the top 10 of nearly every music site's 2016 list has completely fallen off the internet on Dec 30.

this album is -- how you say -- fucking incredible.

yeah it's super dense and rich and awesome through and through, keep coming back to it

finally listening to this and wow yes this bangs

Vinyl for this is nice. Lyric sheet! And some stuff in the credis i didnt recognize (like the Sabbath sample)

this album is -- how you say -- fucking incredible.

― Treeship, Saturday, January 14, 2017 8:28 PM (six days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i've been reading this post in a russian accent

yes this is incredible

there's a line on this album that phife has where he says "talking bout my work ethic" that i originally misheard as "got that obama work ethic" and i kinda want to get that tattooed somewhere

I've been looking forward to a summer with this album. Why not start today?

yes!

shit bangs

WE GOT TO GET OUR SHIT TOGETHER

This album is a goddamn miracle

^^^

Yes.

https://vimeo.com/201470063

been listening to this album again for the first time in awhile and goddam it holds up

Same! Even some of the tracks I'd usually skip are decent.

https://img.discogs.com/P9aedSoLvJdpgKeRt1KPBVM0MgM=/fit-in/600x584/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/R-9577362-1494735428-6791.png.jpg

5 years ago today. one of the most timely releases in my life! this shit hit just right

This won “Best international album” at the Brits, that year.

It was somewhat glossed over on the tv coverage. To be fair, there were some unassailable reasons for that, but a bit more detail and some music from it would have been nice.

What were the reasons?

it's still scarcely believable how good this turned out

in the context of a comeback, not in context of how good they were before

"We Got It from Here..." is easily in their top three best albums, and I will die on this hill.

Low End > Midnight > We Got It

Checks out.

Low End is so clearly inferior to the other two, as a relative newcomer, imo

Hard disagree, as someone who grew up on them!

I'm giving We Got It From Here another listen and yes it's fantastic.

I'm not sure why I haven't listened to it more. Maybe when it came out the vocals felt low in the mix to me or something?

Low End is the best one wtf xxpost

"Scenario", "Excursions", "Buggin' Out".....

NOT NO PARKAY, NOT NO MARJARINE
STRICTLY BUTTER BABY, STRICTLY BUTTER

Low End is the best one

otm

it's impossible to overrate.

the reunion album, while i do agree it was an inspiring miracle that it happened, was solidly decent and nothing more. if it was reviewed in the source magazine in 1995, it would have received four mics and i would have agreed with that.

now, midnight marauders on the other hand, that fucking album is overrated without merit. it's still good, and a hiphop classic, but it's not even the group's best album.

midnight marauders and low end are very close, i prefer marauders but don’t really get worked up if someone prefers low end theory.

we got it from here is a five mic-er in my mind, but then again the source gave project pat’s ghetto green 2.5 mics so what do they know

now, keep in mind, i'm time traveling with my source magazine ratings to a period when their ratings a) were fairly accurate and b) weren't reacting against anything except how they felt about the album being reviewed.

i think there's two firm tribe opinions that we can all agree on: 1) they were fucking rad and 2) that was a shame about the love movement, wasn't it?

haha OTM

There's a great album lurking somewhere within The Love Movement but that certainly isn't what we got

that's the only one I haven't heard to date.

I even like Beats, Rhymes, and Life a lot. doesn't quite hit the highs of the previous two, but it has "Stressed Out" on it, and "Phony Rappers".

also Consequence!

"Start It Up" and "Find A Way" are great, and then comes the creeping realization that nothing else on the album is going to be monochromatic refractions of those two songs with little to no percussive or melodic variation (aside from "Like It Like That") (I'm not including bonus tracks here, obv; the Spotify version elevates dramatically at "Scenario (remix)" and leaves you wondering why they put all of that bland beige shit on the album proper)

Nobody’s mentioned “Peoples instinctive travels” etc..

I have personal reasons for that one being my fav, and the best,etc.

Still though…..l

"Left My Wallet in El Segundo" is nice. it's good overall, but I feel like it's a mega leap from that to LET which is why it gets forgotten.

"Bonita Applebum" also classic

"There's a great album lurking somewhere within The Love Movement "

Great EP I'd say

"Find My Way" bumps. The rest -- well, I've tried.

Nobody’s mentioned “Peoples instinctive travels” etc..

I have personal reasons for that one being my fav, and the best,etc.

Still though…..l

Yeah the first three albums are all great, and We Got It From Here too, that was miraculous. Low End is still my favorite of the four, and I'd probably place We Got It From Here second - it's the only one I got to know when it came out, and given that moment in time & history, it feels all the more powerful.

They even made the 2017 Grammys memorable (at least for their performance):

https://vimeo.com/302978618

LET has always been my favorite as well. I’ve always found it odd that people rank MM above it, which feels like thinking Stankonia is better than Aquemini or something

In my head the production on Low End is really sparse compared to Marauders, which makes me question why I like it more. But then I listen to it and am reminded. Marauders actually feels a little overproduced by comparison

It's splitting hairs for me but I prefer MM just because that's my peak era of hip hop production & engineering. LET set the bar and MM refined it. It's just a liiil more dense sonically yet still tight/focused. There's lil things popping into the mix or happening in the background which doesn't really happen in LET.

Also prob biased because "Scenario" was never my fav to begin with and it's v played out, never need to hear it again

'overproduced' is a criticism that usually means I'll like something, lol

LET has always been my favorite as well. I’ve always found it odd that people rank MM above it, which feels like thinking Stankonia is better than Aquemini or something

Hah, I think Low End is Tribe's best and would call Stankonia OutKast's best.

Song for song I’ll take MM, there is not a bad track imo. As for LET you have songs like Rap Promoter and ..show businesses. Perhaps LET has the higher highs

Not like we haven’t gone through this exercise countless times lol

re: beats, rhymes & life and the love movement—

i usually kind of think of br&l as even with midnight marauders. not because of anything other than i like them about the same. to me they're both 4.5-5 mic classics and i have never understood why br&l was considered disappointing. of course, i bought them at the same time (br&l's release date, to be exact) so i heard them both for first the time basically back to back. br&l was a smoother, slicker sound but to me it felt like the next logical step. i have always considered it classic, if for nothing else than it confirmed for me that dilla ("jay dee" / "the ummah" when working with q-tip at the time, of course) was THE guy to check for in the liner notes.

tlm was legitimately disappointing. songs with nore? really???? some solid beats, but yeah it felt like where the slickness of br&l was in line with the vibe, on tlm it was just . . . so *meh*. that said: "find a way", "like it like that", and "the love" are all top tier tribe and i would easily include them in a "best of" set. 3 mics, tops. and even that's generous. i never really counted the tracks after "rock rock ya'll" because they were all from older 12" singles, but they're all pretty much classic songs (except "money maker", which was just another disappointing new track).

trivia time:
tlm was released the same day as aquemini. talk about passing the torch. anyway, i've always just assumed andre's verse on "rosa parks" was about the br&l disappointment backlash (`kinda sour cause my favorite group ain't comin' widdit`). wonder what he thought of the love movement.

BR&L has too many mid tempo moments for me to embrace.

📹

There's a great album lurking somewhere within The Love Movement but that certainly isn't what we got

LET is my fav Tribe LP but Electric relaxation might be my fav Tribe jam. After Hours is the best jam off the debut.

2nd the love for the instrumental

haven't listened to TLM for such a long time, bought the fancy 3LP version the day it came out. I tried to love it but it never clicked outside of Find A Way (helped by the fact I already liked the Bebel/Towa Tei track it samples from). MM is my fav, that opening salvo of Biko and Award Tour never fails to make me smile.

The old lady saw us on the lawn with the Henny
Turn the pool party into the one from McKinney
Might've been racist like the waitresses up in Denny’s
Swore we had twelve gauges, automatics, and semis
Now they wanna condemn me for my freedom of speech
'Cause I see things in black and white like Lisa and Screech
Presidents get impeached and others fill in the throne
But veterans don’t get the benefit of feelin' at home

Was watching the Tribe doc again last night and had forgotten they'd done this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZrK39H5zp4

The “classical” cheese mellowed to the sounds of Mozart’s The Magic Flute. The “rock” cheese listened to Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven.” An ambient cheese listened to Yello’s “Monolith,” the hip-hop cheese was exposed to A Tribe Called Quest’s “Jazz (We’ve Got)” and the techno fromage raved to Vril’s “UV.” A control cheese aged in silence, while three other wheels were exposed to simple high, medium and low frequency tones.

According to a press release, the cheese was then examined by food technologists from the ZHAW Food Perception Research Group, which concluded that the cheese exposed to music had a milder flavor compared to the non-musical cheese. They also found that the hip-hop cheese had a stronger aroma and stronger flavor than other samples.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/hip-hop-and-mozart-improve-flavor-swiss-cheese-180971721/

Boy this cheese really has a lot of flavor

back in the day when i was a teenager
before I had status and before I had a pager
You could find the Abstract
Nibbling on Samsø
My pops used to say it reminded him of Tybo

I said "now daddy don't you know that things go in cycles?"
way that Stilton cheese is just ampin like Stichel

Seems like a poorly designed experiment to have the hip hop cheese exposed to a song with prominent jazz samples but no separate jazz cheese.

not sure if this experiment makes me happy or angry. either way, wow that's really stupid.

rude

Cheese just there vibing on some tunes and you gotta call it stupid

Cheese (We've Got)

Shorty let me tell you about my only vice
It has to do with coagulated milk and it ain't nothing nice