De La Soul - Classic or Dud?

it's funny, at the time it seemed like such a turn, but de la soul as dead doesn't sound like nearly as much of a departure from 3 feet high as it did then

It seemed to be more in the marketing: "We don't want people to call us hippies"

yeah definitely, and obviously the cover with the broken flowerpot, the ring ring video being black and white,i think that affected how i perceived it. but stuff like oodles or pease porridge etc could totally be on 3 feet.

Stakes is HIgh seemed like a big departure. DelaisDead really seems similar in vibe to 3feet in vibe. Yeah it's a little darker but it still has the silly skits and sort of jokey songs and such

dilla feature on bionix raises the score from 3.5 to 4.5

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07-IEONSbaw

sheesh thought all these posts were gonna be about Trugoy but I go the local store and somehow 3 Feet High and Rising is there? what the hell

slamming.

where's the box?

okay, taking a de la meme break to address this—

they say the "f word" a lot (and i don't mean fuck). i had normalized it so much back then —also they are using it mockingly in some instances— that i guess i just didn't think anything of it. to their credit(?) they left them all in there.

also "pease porridge" has several noticeable replacements in the samples. song is essentially the same but i know the og too well so i can hear the differences.

Do they really say that word in anywhere that isn't a skit?

Freddie Foxx does at the end of the first AOI album but I can't think of where else?

They're not ATCQ after all

bumpy knuckles says whatever he wants

okay, it's been 30+ years.

can someone please explain "who do u worship?" to me.

(i've always just assumed that there is no explanation because hi we're de la soul and prince paul.)

(kind of the second album's "delacratic" or "dave has a problem... seriously")

"pass the plugs" also very god tier and maybe the best thing they ever did.

(let me tell about that time i did a presentation on hiphop in junior year english class and i played "pass the plugs" as one of my example songs.)

I always found "who do you worship" confusing too lol

I guess the asshole guy is who many people want to be?

Yeah I got that I just never understood the purpose of the noisy bits, what they represented

They sound like a response to a dare to make a beat out of The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway by Genesis!

Only just learned they supposedly sampled Anyway by Genesis... I can't hear it...

just marathon`d everything in my own order; started with buhloone and ended with de la soul is dead and, welp, greatest fucking group of all time.

(also re:"who do u worship?" i always took that to be a portrayal of / fourth wall break look into what was going on in hemorrhoid's life when he wasn't around to bully jeff and his friends. maybe i'm taking the "story" of the album too far though. is this the same jeff from "brain washed follower" and "the mack daddy on the left"?)

epilogue:

this will never not make me laugh:

woman 1: you know who that was?
man: nope.
woman 1: the guy from de la soul. pos. posdnuous.
man: who!?
woman 1: you heard of de la soul, right?
man: right.
woman 2: (in background) YOU KNOW...(unintelligible)
woman 1: well he was the one from de la soul.
man: the one wit the real nappy hair?
woman 1: the one with the... the dark skinned one.
man: wit the glasses??
woman 1: yeeeah!
woman 2: EW THE UGLY ONE!

Wrong Tom’s deep dive into The Magic Number is well worth a read:

Ok children…

De La day is finally upon us, and as if I’d let this moment pass without doing a thread, so strap in as we dissect The Magic Number pic.twitter.com/L9GvVPer3I

— wrongtom (@TheWrongtom) March 3, 2023

haven't listened to bms for at least 15 years until today but gee what a towering achievement and also kinda surprised at how well my not v good memory still recalled all the lyrics and asides

waiting for the piano to kick in on i be blowin made me kinda giddy with joy tbh

https://www.discogs.com/artist/1139036-Jeff-32

de la soul is for the children.

i'm sorry the whole jeff thing has me in stitches right now

greatest discovery of the weekend: the version of Stakes is High I've had on my computer for YEARS and listen to often...was somehow missing the last track, Sunshine!

there was a big enough gap from owning the CD as a teen and downloading it after college that that track was scrubbed from memory, never knew i was even missing it. what a gem!

My fav track on that album

alltimer.

very sweet email from the band:

Dear Dave,

You were the heart of our group. You brought so much creativity, energy, and passion to our music, and your influence will be felt for years to come.

Your passing is a great loss not only to us, but also to the entire hip-hop community. You were a true artist who used music to inspire and uplift others, and you will be deeply missed by all who knew you.

This is heavy on our hearts and minds but we are smiling and even laughing at all the great times we shared with you. As we attempt to navigate this world without you, we stand grateful and proud of all you accomplished on this earth.

We would like to say thank you Dave for being a big brother. Thank you for being a friend. Thank you for the wise words placed in your verses. Thank you for the music you produced that is loved by so many. Thank you for never wanting to compromise the quality of our brand. Thank you for helping us become a group that will remain etched in the timeline of hip hop culture as well as the fabric of music and for now on when we perform “Ring Ring Ring Ha Ha Hey” we will say “2-2-2-2-222 we got an angel in heaven who can talk to you”.

We love you Dave and thank you Dave!

Everyone, please celebrate the life and legacy of Dave Jolicoeur, Trugoy the Dove, Plug 2, Dave.

Our music is now available digitally on all streaming services now! We did it Dave!

for now on when we perform “Ring Ring Ring Ha Ha Hey” we will say “2-2-2-2-222 we got an angel in heaven who can talk to you”.

this suggests they'll keep on performing post-Trugoy. Which I think is a good thing, but not entirely what I expected.

It may be they're simply not in a financial position to call it quits.

They’ve always toured relentlessly. One of the few hip-hop acts that easily puts on a hundred shows or more in the course of a year

Been slowly catching up on these albums after not listening to them for years…

3 Feet retains all its charm, such a fresh sound for its moment and I was reminded all over again how many acts in the 90s were biting this. The skits though. I don’t exactly mind them but they always kept me from coming back to this as often as it probably deserved.

De La Soul is Dead I actually find pretty tedious. The ratio of filler to fully form tracks is way off, it’s just not focused at all.

And then we get to Buhloone which I’m listening to now for the first time since probably 2000?? My god what a leap forward this is. It’s just absolutely flawless.

Back in the day of choosing what to spend your $15 on, I never picked up Stakes is High nor anything after that so I’m excited to dig into that next.

pgwp otm about ...is Dead. I love the singles, "Bitties...", "Millie Pulled a Pistol on Santa," a couple things I can't remember at the end, but while it's got a groove it wears me down.

I wouldn't judge Is Dead that harshly but this definitely confirmed to me that Buhloone is their best album, and I agree that 3 Ft > Dead.

This performance-disk version, which omits 15–20 minutes of skits and japes, brings ...Is Dead into focus. It really is probably their best, it's just somewhat destructively intermingled w/ a Prince Paul comedy record https://www.discogs.com/release/210087-De-La-Soul-De-La-Soul-Is-Dead

I think its so cool that Scha Dara Parr got a spot on Buhloone Mindstate

as fun as it was to hear all that stuff again i had been thinking about making skit-free playlists of 3 feet high and Is Dead

without the skits how will we know who likes money and who needs a haircut???

hey we are always going to need to know who has dandruff

de la doesn't get the credit they deserve for shining a light on the global dandruff pandemic

I used to be against the skits, then I heard an argument that the skits were meant to be an alternative to the traditional silent gaps between tracks. For some reason, framing them from that perspective made them all work for me after that.

the skits on 3 feet are pretty inextricable from the whole experience for me. i'm not opposed to a skitless edit of 'dead' especially if it shaves about 20 mins off the runtime