• Audio

    Super Duty Tough Work – Episode 43: The Return of the Native Tongues

    Although groups like De La Soul and A Tribe Called Quest were mainstays of hip-hop’s golden era from the late 80’s & early 90’s, both groups fell out of the public eye in the last decade. Thankfully for their fans around the world, the stars aligned and both groups dropped impressive comeback albums in 2016. While most hip-hop media will talk about the comeback albums themselves, we decided to take it a step further and breakdown why both comebacks were successful. It gets risky returning from any leave of absence, but we got the keys. There are six keys that De La Soul & A Tribe Called Quest employed that made their comebacks successful, and we give you all of them.

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  • Blog

    De La Soul Just Won: And Here’s Why

    delasleep

    Today was the 25th anniversary of De La Soul’s classic debut album, 3 Feet High and Rising. I’ve owned the album, on cassette mind you, since it was released and definitely view it as one of the most influential albums of all time.  From the selection of bugged out samples; to the invention of skits; to the “every-other-bar” rhyme patterns–De La Soul was eclectic and innovative. To top it off, they were arguably the first hip-hop group to make it ok to be a little…weird. Their landmark single “Me, Myself, and I” epitomized how comfortable they were being themselves and not participating in the gold chain infested hip-hop look that their contemporaries were promoting at the time.  Needless to say, 3 Feet High and Rising took off.