A Tribe Called Quest was an American hip hop group formed in Queens, New York City, in 1985, originally composed of rapper and main producer Q-Tip, rapper Phife Dawg, DJ and co-producer Ali Shaheed Muhammad, and rapper Jarobi White. The group is regarded as a pioneer of alternative hip hop and merging jazz with hip hop, influencing numerous hip hop and R&B musicians.
Stetsasonic is an American hip hop band. Formed in 1981 in Brooklyn, New York City, New York, Stetsasonic was one of the first hip hop acts to perform with a full band and use live instrumentation in their recordings, paving the way for future hip hop bands such as The Roots. The band combined beat-boxing, sampling technology, and live band performance, incorporating R&B, jazz, dancehall reggae, and rock into its sound. Stetsasonic is also considered one of the acts that pioneered jazz rap.
Midnight Marauders is the third studio album by American hip hop group A Tribe Called Quest, released on November 9, 1993, by Jive Records. Recording sessions for the album occurred at Battery Studios, Platinum Island Studios and Scorcerer Sound in New York City. Its production was mainly handled by Q-Tip, with contributions from Skeff Anselm, Large Professor and the group's DJ, Ali Shaheed Muhammad. A culmination of the group's two previous albums, People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm and The Low End Theory, it features an eclectic, gritty sound based on jazz, funk, soul and R&B samples, in addition to socially conscious, positively-minded, and humorous lyrics.
The Score is the second and final studio album by the hip hop trio Fugees, released worldwide on February 13, 1996, on Columbia Records. The album features a wide range of samples and instrumentation, with many aspects of alternative hip hop that would come to dominate the hip-hop music scene in the mid- to late-1990s. Primarily, The Score's production was handled by Fugees themselves, Jerry Duplessis and Warren Riker, with additional production from Salaam Remi, John Forté, Diamond D, and Shawn King. The album's guest verses are from Outsidaz members Rah Digga, Young Zee, and Pacewon, as well as John Forté, and Diamond D. Most versions of the album feature four bonus tracks, including three remixes of "Fu-Gee-La", and a short acoustic Wyclef Jean solo track entitled "Mista Mista".
Anthony Depula, known professionally as Tony D, was an American hip hop artist from Trenton, New Jersey.
Nappy Roots is an American alternative Southern rap group. The group met in Bowling Green, Kentucky in 1995 while attending Western Kentucky University. They are best known for their hit singles "Po' Folks", "Awnaw", "Roun' The Globe" and "Good Day". They were the best selling hip hop group of 2002. The group consists of Milledgeville, Georgia native Fish Scales and Kentucky natives Skinny DeVille, B. Stille and Ron Clutch.
Lord Finesse is an American rapper and hip-hop record producer from The Bronx, New York best known as the leader of the D.I.T.C. crew. About.com ranked him number 29 on its list of the Top-50 Hip-Hop Producers.
Boot Camp Clik is an American hip hop supergroup from Brooklyn, New York City, which is composed of Buckshot, Smif-N-Wessun, Heltah Skeltah and O.G.C.. Most of the members are from Brownsville, but Buckshot is from Crown Heights and Tek is from Bedford-Stuyvesant.
Percy Lee Chapman, known by his stage name Tragedy Khadafi, is an American rapper and record producer. Chapman hails from the Queensbridge Housing Projects in Queens, New York City, and helped spawn other hip hop artists such as Mobb Deep, Capone-N-Noreaga, Nas. He is documented to be the first to use the phrase "illmatic" in 1988 on a record called "The Rebel", from the Marley Marl album In Control, Volume 1, which was an inspiration and influence on fellow New York rapper Nas.
Holy Intellect is the debut album by hip-hop group Poor Righteous Teachers, famous for its pro-Five-Percenter messages. The album includes the hip-hop classic "Rock Dis Funky Joint", which sampled "Slippin' into Darkness" by War, a 1970s funk band.
Pure Poverty is the second album by the American hip hop group Poor Righteous Teachers, released in 1991. "Shakiyla [JRH]" was released as a single.
Black Business is the third album from hip hop group Poor Righteous Teachers. It was released on September 14, 1993, under Profile Records. Black Business is the group's last album with any production by Tony D.
The New World Order is the fourth and final album by the hip hop group Poor Righteous Teachers, released in 1996. The effort didn't sell as well as their past work but received strong reviews. The New World Order features production from PRT members Father Shaheed and Culture Freedom, as well as Ezo Brown, KRS-One and DJ Clark Kent and is the group's only album to not contain production by frequent collaborator Tony D. Guest appearances include the Fugees, KRS-One, Nine, Brother J of X-Clan and Junior Reid. The album contains the singles "Word Iz Life" b/w "Dreadful Day" and "Conscious Style".
"Me Myself and I" is a song by American hip hop trio De La Soul, released in April 1989 as a single from their debut studio album, 3 Feet High and Rising (1989). It was the group's only number one on the US Billboard R&B chart. The song also topped the Billboard Hot Dance Club Play chart.
Timothy Grimes, better known by his stage name Wise Intelligent, is an American hip hop musician from Trenton, New Jersey. He is a member of Poor Righteous Teachers. He released The Talented Timothy Taylor in 2007. His third solo studio album, The Unconkable Djezuz Djonez, was released in 2011. In 2012, Complex included him on the "50 Most Slept-On Rappers of All Time" list. In 2017, he released a collaborative album with Gensu Dean, titled Game of Death.
To Hell and Black is the debut and only studio album by American hip hop group Capital Punishment Organization. It was released through Capitol Records on August 7, 1990, and featured its two lead singles "Ballad of a Menace" and "This Beat Is Funky". The album peaked at No. 33 on the Billboard Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart.
Anthony Hill, known by his stage name YZ, and alias Ali Sa'id Nur al-Din, is an American rapper from Trenton, New Jersey.
Alternative hip hop is a subgenre of hip hop music that encompasses a wide range of styles that are not typically identified as mainstream. AllMusic defines it as comprising "hip hop groups that refuse to conform to any of the traditional stereotypes of rap, such as gangsta, bass, hardcore, and party rap. Instead, they blur genres drawing equally from funk and pop/rock, as well as jazz, soul, reggae, and even folk."
Jonathan Owens, known by his stage name Casual, is an American rapper, producer, and one of the founding members of the alternative hip hop collective Hieroglyphics. He also reads and has been studying Egyptian Hieroglyphics for many years, makes videos on the subject on his YouTube channel Smash Rockwell as well writing about it on his blog rap god. As a rapper Casual initially became known for his freestyle battle rhymes in the Bay Area hip hop scene and later developing into a solo artist. He is known for diverse lyrics, a complex multisyllabic East Coast influenced flow but with a distinctive Oakland accent. Casual's debut album Fear Itself released on Jive records in 1994 when he was 17 years old garnered both critical and commercial success. Along with Del tha Funkee Homosapien Casual went on to become one of the most prominent and recognizable faces of the Hieroglyphics crew, releasing three albums all on the Hieroglyphics crew's own label, Hiero Imperium. He has released thirteen solo albums as of 2023.
"Get Down" is the third and final single released from Nas' 2002 album God's Son. It features descriptive storytelling by written and performed by Nas, who also produced the record with frequent collaborator Salaam Remi. In addition to elements of "Funky Drummer" by James Brown, the track also samples "The Boss" by Brown, which was previously made famous by the West Coast rapper Ice-T on his 1990 single "You Played Yourself"; the same sample was used in Poor Righteous Teachers' song "Word from the Wise" and Lord Finesse's "Bad Mutha". It was not as popular as Nas' previous two singles from God's Son, but still reached #76 on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks chart.
