Tribe Called Quest, A

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A TRIBE CALLED QUEST

Formed: 1988, Queens, New York; Disbanded 1998, New York, New York

Members: Ali Shaheed Muhammed (born Brooklyn, New York, 11 August 1970); Phife Dawg (Malik Taylor; born Brooklyn, New York, 20 April 1970); Q-Tip (Jonathan Davis; born Brooklyn, New York, 10 April 1970).

Genre: Hip-Hop

Best-selling album since 1990: Low End Theory (1991)

Hit songs since 1990: "Can I Kick It?" "Check the Rhime," "Award Tour"

Along with the Digable Planets and Gang Starr, New York's A Tribe Called Quest pioneered the use of jazz in hip-hop music during the early 1990s. After years of James Brown–influenced funk production, critics and audiences alike welcomed a change in sound. However, A Tribe Called Quest did more than simply sample jazz melodies and rhythms. They, better than most, understood how the aesthetics of jazz could be used to transform hip-hop's sound and culture.

The trio of rappers—Q-Tip, Phife Dawg, and DJ Ali Shaheed Muhammed—first came to public notice with People's Instinctive Travels and Paths of Rhythm (1990). Like other members of their collective, the Native Tongues Family (De La Soul, Jungle Brothers, Queen Latifah), the group members dressed in neo-African fashion and rapped with equal parts humor and social consciousness. Their aesthetic was colorful and playful, an expressive, sunny artistry that stood in contrast to the darker, harder edge of rappers like Kool G Rap in New York or N.W.A. in Los Angeles. Their album borrows liberally from across the musical spectrum, including the moodiness of rocker Lou Reed (for their call-and-response club hit "Can I Kick It?"), the bounciness of the funkateers Brothers Johnson (for their single "I Left My Wallet in El Segundo"), and the complexities of the obscure saxophonist Billy Brooks (for the French-filled "Luck of Lucien"). Creatively, the group displayed a musical breadth not previously seen in hip-hop.

With their second album, Low End Theory (1991), the group refocused and refined their sound. Hip-hop might have sampled jazz before Low End Theory, but A Tribe Called Quest's sophomore effort was one of the first that a jazz afficionado could truly appreciate. Rather than stack a heavy wall of noise, Tribe strips everything down to the bare bones: a rhythm section of bass lines and drums and minimalist melodic arrangements of jazz loops and soul samples. From the catchy, midtempo bounce of "Check the Rhime" to the energetic rush of "Scenario," the album remains one of hip-hop's best produced efforts. Q-Tip and Phife Dawg's lyrics are more complex on this album as they tackle a range of issues. From critiquing unscrupulous record execs and gossiping groupies to eulogizing fallen rappers, Low End Theory captures the ethos of "beats, rhymes, and life," in the words of one of their later album titles.

Tribe's follow-up album, Midnight Marauders (1993), builds on all the elements that made its predecessor so memorable. Their sublime samples plumb deeper, and their lyrics are more clever: This album captures the group at the height of their abilities. The sound they produce is impressively sophisticated—every element is meticulously engineered with songs like "We Can Get Down" and "Oh My God" blending elements from several songs to create a cohesive whole out of spare musical parts. Songs like "God Lives Through" and "Steve Biko (Stir It Up)" also reflect the group's spirituality and forward-looking perspective. Midnight Marauders represents one of the last hurrahs of commercially embraced optimism in rap music before artists like the Wu-Tang Clan and Notorious B.I.G. dramatically darkened hip-hop's worldview.

The group's last two albums before disbanding in 1998—Beats, Rhymes, and Life (1996) and The Love Movement (1998)—attempt to follow the same path as their predecessors but with mixed results. At a time when hip-hop had become harder and grittier, some saw Tribe as too soft to stay contemporary, but the real liability was their change in musical style. On Beats, Rhymes, and Life, Tribe began to work with Detroit producer Jay Dee, whose penchant for filtering his samples—making everything softer, more muddled—alienated previous fans who liked Tribe for the clarity and sharpness their songs traditionally offered. By the time The Love Movement was released, Tribe was treated as has-beens, lumbering musical dinosaurs who had been overtaken by a new species of hip-hop.

A Tribe Called Quest may not have survived the end of the 1990s, yet they largely embodied and defined hip-hop's loftier ideals in the first half of the decade. The group's progressive outlook and impressive musical versatility made them popular not only with hip-hop fans but also with jazz devotees and rockers.