source: discogs.com
Q-tip, aka Kamaal or Jonathan Davis, had the rare fortune of making millions of dollars when he was a teenager as a band member of the Hip Hop group A Tribe Called Quest. His gift with poetry, rap, positive messages, and samples honoring jazz legends sets him apart from the majority of modern day rappers.
There are many struggles he has faced, as his sound hasn’t always been what major record labels want, but he was relentless in seeing his vision through to the end. He still continues to tease out ways jazz and hip hop can play together.
Along this journey in close to 10 albums, there are at least three essential traits seen in Q-tip's group and solo excursions that every artist should mimic.
Within this discussion I may mention A Tribe Called Quest or Tribe instead of Q-tip, because he often blends and lends his abilities to his group during collaborations.
source:65.media.tumblr.com
1. DEVELOP HORIZONTAL AND VERTICAL SKILLS
Horizontal Skills: Everything it takes to go from having an idea, to successfully selling your idea to your fans.
Vertical Skills: The elements required to master an art, ability, or activity you enjoy.
Q-tip is a bonified emcee and a skilled rapper who can switch speeds, rap for long periods without breathing, and has mastered various rhyming schemes over decades of inventive beats. These vertical abilities are what makes him great as a solo artist or team member.
His horizontal skills are what can bring others together and help to produce a unified album. His ability to sing, make a studio, master and produce and album, lively stage presence, and bring together the best artists are some of the things that are in his horizontal skill set. This is the glue and spirit behind his group efforts, but you really see it when you hear all his solo projects between Amplified and The Renaissance then follow that with the latest Tribe Called Quest album called "Thank You For Your Service..."
2. CREATE IN THE INTERSECTIONS
source:
If you were to draw a Venn diagram for Q-tip’s interests of hip hop, and jazz, you would see a general overlap revealing the heart of a lot of his music. He has continued to source samples from R&B, disco, rock, and experimental music as well.
Q-tip doesn't merely release rap album after rap album, he finds rare sounds and instruments, and creates over these carefully curated audio artifacts.
His rap songs become not just the music of the streets, but a sonic quilt with patches of sounds handed down from generation to generation.
In Quest’s latest album, the Willy Wonka sample was surprising to hear, but the specific words sampled add color to a narrative that makes its way through the album.
Some of the musician’s Q-tip has sampled in Amplified and The Renaissance are:
Amplified
source: wikipedia
The Renaissance
source: wikipedia
3. COLLABORATE TO DIVERSIFY YOUR ART
source: thetvcollective.org
Tribe was at the forefront of collaborating in rap songs, and is known for it’s extensive list of credited and uncredited guests that appear throughout their albums.
In their most recent album, Kanye West, makes an audible appearance despite his name not being mentioned in the linear notes.
Here is a short list of artist Q-tip and Tribe have worked with their albums (source: wikipedia):
- Ron Carter
- Bustah Rhymes
- Leaders Of The New School
- Norah Jones
- Large Professor
- Consequence
- Faith Evans
- Tammy Lewis
- Mos Def
- Redman
- Korn
- Jack White
- Kendrik Lamar
- Kurt Rosenwinkel
- Kanye West
- D' Angelo
- Andre 3000
- Talib Kweli
- Jarobi
- DJ Red Alert
- DJ Skratch
- J Dilla
They go beyond making albums with their friends and colleagues and sometimes write songs together, creating a “popcorn effect” where they trade versus within a song, say some lines in unison, or even provide a response to a lyric.
This creates a sense of unpredictability that makes other tracks that only feature one or two artists refreshing and not monotonous.
If the goal of art is to push boundries and help listeners open their minds and ears to new messages and sounds, Q-tip and his friends have blazed a brilliant trail that we all should follow.
Here is a link to Tribe's latest album from their store and on iTunes.
And here are some of my favorite albums they've released.