A Tribe Called Quest Set To Release Final Album in November

When people talk about the greatest rap groups of all time one name which never gets left out is A Tribe Called Quest. The group was formed in the late eighties by Q-Tip, Ali Shaheed Muhammad, Jarobi White and deceased member Phife Dawg. The group had its heyday in the nineties with their last official studio album being released in 1998. So when the news that the group has one more album in store for their fans it came as quite a surprise. It has now been officially announced that the album should be out in November this year.

The group released its first album People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm to relatively little commercial success but still had some notable songs including one of the group’s signature songs Can I Kick It? The group found commercial success with its second album The Low End Theory which attained platinum status. Tribe was one of the cornerstones of nineties hip hop, particularly on the more positive side considering how popular gangster rap had become at that point. They released three more studio albums and eventually moved on to other things. Q-Tip was probably the most visible of the bunch – he continued to produce and appear on various records. Phife released an album titled Ventilation: Da LP.

No one expected that the group would reunite to bring us one more album after all we’re talking about 18 years since they released their last LP. News that Tribe will be releasing a new project came a few months ago by way of Epic Records CEO, L.A. Reid. The best thing about this project is that it will contain new material from Phife which was recorded before his death; lord knows it wouldn’t be a Tribe album without the gifted wordsmith.

The official date was released by the three surviving members through the use of social media. They released a string of notes that outline what lit a fire under them and drove them to create brand new material, starting with their performance on The Tonight Show in 2015 with another iconic rap group The Roots. The note mentioned that Phife “left [them] with the blueprint of what to do” before he passed. The complete note is at the end of this article.

Other notable figures who were involved in the new project include close collaborators Busta Rhymes and Consequence.

I’m personally interested to hear what the group has in store for us. Tribe has never disappointed, after all they are an integral part of Native Tongues, a collective of gifted poets, wordsmiths and musicians. I can only imagine the tribute they will pay to their fallen member Phife in this project. November 11th can’t come fast enough so that I can hear how the crew “will complete [its] Paths of Rhythm”