It’s a deftly rapped episode, an almost quaint effort compared to famous diss tracks such as 2Pac’s “Hit ‘Em Up.” Tribe, then again, never fronted their act like a bunch of gat-carrying gangstas - that was not their beat. Instead of firing off death threats to West Coast emcees, Tip and Phife tell the story of a spontaneous rap battle happening in a NYC subway station - and how they humiliate their rival with their unmatched skills. Released at the height of rap’s coastal rivalry, “Phony Rappers” remains a classy example of a diss track. The track’s message is what makes it so prophetic. Q-Tip flipped a sample from the vocal soul band The Emotions’ “Blind Alley” to create the diss track - courtesy of his crate-digging instincts. Beats, Rhymes and Life kicks off with Q-Tip calling out the posers on “Phony Rappers.” According to Tip, everyone wanted to jump on the hip-hop train, but few could write great poetry and then rap it. To this backdrop, ATCQ chipped in with elegance. Nas, Puff Daddy, and Biggie against Snoop Dogg, Dr.
Keep it moving tribe called quest full#
Hip-hop heads know the story: in the mid-1990s, the hip-hop scene was full of animosity between the East Coast and West Coast. The group was used to critical acclaim, and hip-hop’s East-West rivalry was sizzling. When Tribe released Beats, Rhymes and Life on Jive in July 1996, the stakes were high. The Source magazine, an authoritative voice in hip-hop criticism, gave two of these albums their highest possible rating: five mics. Their records shaped jazz-rap and East Coast hip-hop like few other records ever did. Together, ATCQ released six LPs - from their debut, People’s Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm (1990), to their last album, We got it from Here… Thank You 4 Your service (2016), released months after Phife’s untimely death from health complications. A fourth member, Jarobi White, participated in two albums. The group consisted of producer Q-Tip, a business-minded sample genius and beat-making professor his childhood friend and emcee Phife Dawg, the late-great five-foot-assassin who broke through microphones and their wingman Ali Shaheed Muhammad, the Gemini rapper, mixer, DJ, producer and designed mediator. Years later, they would be the founders of one of hip-hop’s most innovative collectives: A Tribe Called Quest.īorn in the late 80s in Queens, ATCQ pioneered hip-hop’s Afrocentric movement, a worldview which exalted traditional African values by infusing hip-hop with funk and jazz while revamping old breaks into contagious head-nodding beats. According to hip-hop lore, they met as infants. ATCQ’s story is a story of unity: unity between jazz and rap, unity between rhythm and rhymes, and unity between two friends - Kamaal Fareed, known professionally as Q-Tip, and the late Malik Taylor, aka Phife Dawg.
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