One Song - A Tribe Called Quest's "Scenario"

Episode Date: March 13, 2025

Here we go, yo, here we go, yo! This week, Diallo and LUXXURY unpack A Tribe Called Quest’s generation-defining posse cut “Scenario.” They discuss the sonic workings of Tribe’s engineer Bob Power, the show-stopping verse that changed the trajectory of Busta Rhymes’ career and LUXXURY unearths unused samples on the song, bringing you a version of "Scenario" you've never heard before. This is part one of a two-parter spotlighting the influence of Tribe’s most debated albums — Low End Theory and Electric Relaxation. Cancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals faster with Rocket Money. Go to RocketMoney.com/onesong today. Stop putting off those doctor’s appointments and go to ZocDoc.com/OneSong to find and instantly book a top rated doctor today. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/ONESONG and get on your way to being your best self. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello, this is your One Song's podcast. We'll be enhancing your appreciation of a tribe called Quest. This is part one, and a song off the Lowen Theory. Woo, today's song comes from a hip-hop group who's smooth and hard-hitting groups came to define the sound of 90s hip-hop and alternative hip-hop for generations to come. That's right, Tiala.

To say that they changed the game would be an understatement. These guys are music legends. They were inducted into. the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2024. And that's why we're diving into not just one, but two of their classic songs in a two-part episode. Today we're starting off with a certified gold posse cut that was featured on Times.

I repeat Times. One hundred best songs. Did not know. What's Time says it? I was keeping track of music. But listen, oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. We're talking about one song,

and that song is scenario by a tribe call quest. This episode is brought to by Nespresso. Hear that? That's your next obsession. Every coffee, a new world. Every sip, a new taste. This is the new Nespresso. One touch, endless possibilities. Iced, flavored, long, short. Because some days call for that espresso kick. And sometimes, a smooth, silky latte just wins. It's exceptional, but effortless. Like actually effortless. Simply press, brew and explore. Nispresso, what else? Keep exploring at nespresso.com. I'm actor, writer, director, and sometimes DJ Diallo Riddle.

And I'm producer, DJ songwriter and musicologist Luxury, aka the guy who whispers, And if you want to watch one song, please go to our YouTube channel and watch this full episode. And while you're there, please like and subscribe. This is one of those songs that I know every lyric to. It's like just ingrained in my brain. And I get so hyped up when, like, we literally just played a little snippet in the room to set it up. And like, I'm already hyped.

My energy level just tripled. So, for real, when we were talking about doing this episode, we were like, there's no way that we can get everything we want to say about these two songs and this group into one episode. We could not fit it into one episode. So here we are. You get ready for a two part of everybody. Can I just say for my part, I got into Tribe Call Quest very early. I've said many times on this show to the shock of many that I was a nerd and I needed hip hop that spoke to me and my crew of people who wore backpacks proudly to school.

Before the term backpack hip hop existed We would like You know Wear a backpack You know take a Sharpie Draw all over it Put nicknames You know I had my little rap group

The Pound before the dog pound Came out We wrote rhymes that we'll never see the light of day What was your MC name or your DJ name? D dog Okay That's all right Not even the regular

It wasn't even that clever It's all right But to me You know Tribe Call Quest and Deala And these kind of groups Out of the name Like they seem more like me

More than the you know gangster rappers that were coming out of the West Coast, you know, Ice Cube and Ice Tea, and even more than like the groups that we really liked, we liked Public Enemy. You know, we liked X-Klan. We liked the groups that were coming out of New York, but this seemed like groups that were about our age, maybe a little bit older, but they seemed our age and they seemed like the kind of guys who finished their homework. So you felt like you could identify with the group. I felt like we could identify with it. Was it the look, the music, the lyrics, all the above?

It was the whole stoo. The whole package. And I'll tell you what I didn't know, and I don't want to jump ahead too much. But at the time, Tribe Call Quest felt like a group. I mean, tribe requires more than one person. It's already there in the group. But I think I've learned as we've been working on these episodes this week, is that a tribe called Quest is a lot of Q-tip. Behind the scenes, in terms of the people being pulled into the studio to work on stuff,

the people behind the day. Like, they all say, like, Q-Tips a genius. Yeah. They all say it. I will say, though, not counter to that, but interestingly, one thing I've learned is how much Ali Shaheed-Mohmed was a part of the production process. I didn't realize how, like, for example, of the songs we'll be talking about is an Ali Shahid production.

That's so true. That's so true. I didn't realize that Jerobe has more to do on the first album than Fife. Because I've always thought of Fife as being like, it was Al-CAS. It was like two guys. Right. And two other guys sort of like behind them a little bit. A little bit like that. You know, Girobi was just there for the vibes. He was the vibe check guy. But Jerobie has more to do on the first album than even the... They are truly a tribe and they truly were a group. Absolutely. That is why we're discussing them as a group and not as a solo project.

Now, I know how I got into Tribe. How did you get into Tribe? When I was in high school, I think I talked about this on the Metallic episode, I worked at the local college radio station. I was a DJ. So I got all this great free music and I'd get it early. So I got a cassette tape, which I still have to this day, of People's Instinctive Travels.

I always have to look at the name. People's instinctive travels and the paths of rhythm. And that was the soundtrack. Deona Apple levels of title going on there. When the Pond, what? I don't know, I give up. That was the soundtrack to my high school senior year trip to L.A. It's what we listened to the entire time down.

And by the way, I happened to go and see David Bowie live on that same trip. So it was Tribe Call Quest in the car, David Bowie on stage. It was this big musical moment for me. And it was just part of this era where because we talked about this song a little bit on our De La Soul episode, go back and listen to that, a nice sister companion to the tribe double that you're about to get. But De La and Tribe, it was also attracting me. I was hearing something in it that I could kind of relate. to in a way as well. It was hard to put my finger on.

So as we're going to talk about these albums today, we'll just see if we can nail that down a little bit. I want to point out your tie-eyed shirt would have gone well on that 1991 tribe. Honestly, I sat down and I'm like, oh, there's something a little bit, right? The sort of daisy age-ishness of the native tongues tribe, which they didn't like,

I know, the hippie associations they weren't crazy about, but that's a complete question. But it wouldn't have stuck out like a sort, though. It's true. But extra props to Razok Boykin, who works on the show, he's wearing a Marauder's shirt that is black and has the colorful colors on it that you'll see on the low-in theory album cover. I want to say a little bit about

where the group was when low-in theory came out. The year before low-in theory, the group had released this debut album that you still have on cassette tape called People's Instinctive Travels in the Pass of Rhythm. This album, just an instant classic with tracks like, I left my wallet in El Segundo and Benita Applebaum.

At this point, sample-wise, on that first album, they were all over the musical genre map. Like on the first album, there are obviously a lot of funk and disco samples. Rhythm devoted to the arts of movie But, samples Grace Jones, go ahead in the rain, samples the band Slave, a great song, if you haven't heard it, called Son of Slide. But even on this album, they were starting to sample jazz. Jazz artists like Donald Bird and Roy Ayers. Here's one of the samples Donald Bird.

It's footprints off of people's instinctive. And here's the part of the Donald Bird song that Footprint Samples. As I hear that song, by the way, it reminds me, it's like I'm preparing for this episode and these songs, I'm starting to maybe hear a little bit how Q-Tip hears some of his loop selections. Because what he has in common in a lot of these songs is like, these are loops that don't necessarily resolve very satisfactorily. Like we don't quite get to the one.

We don't get to the tonic chord in that loop. It sort of do-d-don-don-don. It sort of loops back in a way that feels like an Escher, Painting. Well, okay, so I'm going to, I think, A, I know exactly what you're referring to. I'm not going to co-sign on the word unsatisfactorily. In fact. That's a musical.

I just literally mean musically unsatisfactorily, the one resolve that takes you home again. I'm not throwing you under the Q-tip sampling bus. That thing comes right on time. No, that's one of the things I love about his type of sampling and the whole group's type of sampling, is that it doesn't resolve where you think it should. so it becomes like this twisted mind thing where like suddenly you're just like, whoa. You need to hear it again.

You need to hear the loop go again. Yes. Yes, we're going to talk about so many songs where the sample doesn't resolve neatly on the four. Or the one. Or the one. Or the fourth. Or the fourth click of the fourth beat.

That's the sub-dominant, the sub-dominant, the tonic. We often avoid these parts. But this is also, I just got to point out, like when Tribe came out with this, out not many people were sampling jazz like this. like, to quote, digible planets,

we were just babies. We were babies. We were babies, man. We were babies. When people's instinctive comes out and samples the way it does. So that's a lot of fun. I know you want to say something

about something that they famously sampled because they did. They sampled Lou Reed's take a walk on the wild side in, can I kick it? Here's a snippet. Is it so iconic when the beat drops? That's such a boom bat. The reason why I wanted to talk about this

is because that's a sample of Lou Reed's walk on the wild side from 1972. With that iconic double bass line, double-tracked, there are two, in other words, recordings of Herbie Flowers playing two different bass lines. Clearly, that forms no small part of a tribe called Quest's song, Can I Kick It?

But it's also part of the musical bass. There's a drumbeat, and there's an entire top line, which is completely new, the entire rap, all of the lyrics, everything on top of what is sampled. And this is really important kind of as a setup for maybe some of the rest of the tribe's story from this point, because unfortunately, Lou Reed demanded and got 100% of the publishing on the tribe called Quest's song. And again, just to be clear, they're only using the sample as part of a musical bed that includes other drumbeats and other elements.

And on top of all of that, if this were a songwriting session, 50% right off the top would be going to the lyricists, the singers. that didn't happen. This is an era where sampling is the Wild West. You're kind of at the mercy of your record label doing right by you and being good negotiators. Somewhere along the way, Drive Records drops the ball. And this is clearly the beginning of where Tribe starts to feel like the record industry may be shady along other things. This idea that we start hearing in their lyrics and in their stories about their young, they're only 18 at the time when they're signed. But unfortunately, those contracts are legally binding. And to this day, there's a lot of interviews

where Tip talks about how this moment is a seminal part of their music industry experience and gave them a really kind of heart and shell about like, man, this is not fair all the time. Well, the biz marquee decision which came down around this time in the 90s, really woke up a lot of people and definitely Tribe and De La

were some of the people who spoke out pretty adamantly like, this is messed up. It is definitely messed up. Grand Upright was the name of that decision. So before we get into low-end theory, I think we need to touch on Native Tongues. You can't really talk about the early days of tribe and not talk about this group. Can you tell us a little bit about Native Tongues? Yeah, we touched on this a little bit in our De La Sol episode,

so please be sure to check that episode out. But basically, Native Tongues was a collective of like-minded artists that were all coming up in New York in the late 80s to early 90s. I'm talking about Jungle Brothers, a tribe called Quest, De LaSoul, Moni Love, Queen Latifah. There were also groups that, you know, they weren't in the Native tongues,

but they felt like they should be. You know, one of my favorite groups out of this period is poor righteous teachers. You know, all of these artists were at the forefront of what we now call alternative hip hop. But it was heavily New York. I mean, like, when I say it was New York centered, it's so specific to New York, like, you've got the black Muslim culture and the nation of the gods of the earth, the five percenters. You've got people who are roughly the same age, so they're interpolating the R&B of the 80s

with the black consciousness of the public enemy era, you know, and you can hear all that on songs like, Word is Life, Rock This Funky Joint, and a personal favorite, Shaquilla by this group, the poor righteous teachers. Yeah, like poor righteous teachers, you hear it all. You hear the New York dance hall influences. You hear the nation of the gods in the earth. You hear the interpolation of the girl is mine by Michael Jackson and Paul McCartney.

It's just all there. And it just created this cohesive milieu of early 90s hip-hop culture. No, it's just interesting to hear. What year is this song? It's 91? Yeah. No, I love that because as I listen back, now with the benefit of history, you can kind of hear what was starting to happen.

And in that song, we sort of had moments where we heard the sample layered with the drum machine, but then the drum machine, probably in A-O-8, was isolated for a moment. And it's fun to kind of hear all of that deconstructed in the song like that. You get a sense of the history. Exactly. And I love how it's mixed like Jamaican dub. Yes, yeah. Really booming, very bass.

That was really when, like, if you go to a party in that, period, like, we were playing lots more dance hall mixed in with the hip-hop. It was all in, like, the low 90s, mid-90s BPM range. Well, it's funny you mention that because a big part of this episode in this song and the album that it's from, the low-end theory, is about bass, and it's about this frequency being something in recordings in a new way with sort of, because of technology and also just choices of the producers, you can hear bass more. That's the most simple way to put it, there isn't a case to be made that we had been hearing bass from Jamaica for many years, and that influenced the back and forth between hip hop and Jamaica is famously chronicled.

But it's reminding me of another thing. These outdoor dance hall sound systems, they really dialed in the base. That was in the mid-70s. That was a big part of what they were doing. I'm glad you bring this up because now's a good time to talk about one of the unsung heroes of this episode, which is Skeff Anselm. And I hope I'm pronouncing that right. It's A-N-S-E-L-L-M.

He says that the bass in particular on the low-end theory came for the fact that Q-Tip, coming out of people's instinctive travels, was trying to find something that would be basically like a through line for the next album. And he was listening to a lot of jazz. Yeah. Like, he's listening to a lot of jazz. And he's just like, and he lands on the stand-up bass. Yeah. He lands on the stand-up base. He does.

This is what I love. He's to hear Skeff said, Q-Tip could wax poetic about the bass being warm. And he was like, this is what NWA is getting. right. They're realizing that from the way that you mix it to the low ends that they're putting into their music, this is all leading to this thing, which will eventually become known

in the 90s as fat. You see all throughout the 90s. P-H-AT. But fat is like such a 90s term. And it all comes from the cross-pollinization of what Drey was doing on the West Coast Q-Tip hearing it, figuring out, oh, you know, it's that low end,

it's that base. And he's like, that's he brings Ron Carter into some of these low-end theory sessions, that bass is the through line of this album that we're talking about the low-end theory. It's interesting you're saying that you're making me wonder, I hadn't thought about what the low-end theory might be, but I think part of it is, and you're absolutely right to single out,

the upright bass as a core component. Is there a difference between stand-up and upright? No. There's just different ways of saying it. And before there were bass guitars, that's what bass was. It comes from the orchestra and then into jazz. On this record, you have a lot of songs.

The album opens with upright bass. It opens with upright bass. Wait, can we play a little bit of the opening of the opening? We got to. It was one of my favorite songs of all time. Here's a little bit of excursions. And that modal change is jazz. Right off in the first five seconds, we have a mission statement.

It's jazz, it's upright bass, and it's bass. Dude, the way this album opens up, it's absolutely a mission statement. It's one of my favorite openings to any album ever. that stand-up base just coming in hard, like, I'm coming for you. I will say that I was having a conversation with a member of System of the Down, and he was like, we loved the low-end theory. Of course you were. As one does.

As one does. We read an LASC game. Obviously, as one does. As one is. But he said they loved that baseline. He was like, to them, that baseline was like one of the foundations of new metal, which is what they sort of, he's like, it's a hardcore bass line. And he was, and I love the fact that, like, this group,

a Tribe Called Quest, had influence on groups so far removed from 90s hip-hop. Yeah, I can hear that now that you mention it. Well, I hadn't thought of that connection, but the system of it down makes sense. It doesn't stop there. I mean, like, bugging out also starts out with maybe a slightly 2% better baseline than the first one. I mean, let's just listen just for a second. Right, you're right. And you know what we have in both of these.

But a sassant with the roughneck business. I think what these songs have in common. If we're trying to find what the low-end theory might be, I think it's clearly got something to do with upright bass. It's the stand-up bass. In this new era, with 808s and with sample drums, and with decisions on a very micro-level about how things are being acute, et cetera, there's something interesting about the fact also that I mentioned before,

the chord changes. There's a lot of jazz modal chord changes. There's a lot of things that are kind of keeping you surprised. and in everything they're hearing already on this record, on this few snippets that we've been playing, it really is a mission statement that's fairly consistent throughout the record. We're going to give you jazz in a new context within hip-hop, starring the upright bass.

Let's be clear, there are so many groups in this little period who aren't even native tongues who are also sampling jazz. Everybody from Pete Rock as Heel smooth to Gangstar to nice and smooth. Like, everybody is kind of doing it, but I think that what we have to point out is that when the low-in theory came out, it was such a big hit critically and within the hip hop community that it then influences, I would say, a large portion of the first half of the 90s,

everybody from the beatniks to DJ Mugs in Cypress Hill to funk dubious. And there are so many artists who then start really going at the stand-up base in a new way. You're nailing something that I've been trying to put my finger on, across this show. And I think it's the distinction between the first and the popularization of. And I think that's a really amazing. important line because trying to find the first is often a fruitless effort. And maybe not as important

as the fact that something became sort of culturally iconic that clearly we talked about in a recent episode that dun dun dun dun dun dun dun to it's a rhythm you can trace back to sing sing you can trace it back to Africa. You can trace it back a long ways. But there's no doubt in my mind that the Supreme's having a huge hit record with you can't hurry love popularizes that rhythm and becomes in the popular culture what people often think about first. Let's be clear. We would may never know the first of anything. That's right. But we can more accurately point to this is what made it really popular.

That's exactly right. So there's one more Native Tongues group I want to mention because they are featured on scenario. That group is none of the Long Island's leaders of the new school. I'm talking about Charlie Brown, Dingo D and Buster Rhymes. You might have heard their song, Case of the PTA. If you were hip-hop head, you knew that song. That was very popular at the time. my favorite leaders in New School song

was off of their second album, this is a snippet of, what's next? I mean, Bust is really obsessed with the Dundas and Dragons. He literally mentions dungeons there. And he's got that rhythm too. He's got those rhythms that kind of stand out in a sort of like obtuse way,

like an angular kind of Duh, uh. Another quite as funny as young Busta. Let's mention another unsung hero. What do you have to tell us about Bob Power? So Bob Power, as Questlove describes him, is the fifth beetle in both Tribe Call Quest and Dayless Soul.

And a big part of what he brings to both of those artists, in particular, this song and this album, is his background in, he's got a music theory background. He's specifically got a master's in jazz. And for the first decade or so of his life, he's doing, he's kind of making it as a musician, but not quite making it. And then he gets into composing for film and TV and jingles.

And what's interesting is that I found a story he tells about how he, for one of the, commercials he was working on, he decided to use a sample of like a shark sound, but the client thought it was too scary, so they wouldn't let him use it. A shark sound? How does a shark sound? I'm not sure what the ad was for. Shark sound like dungeon drink. But I thought it was interesting that at this early, this is the late 70s, early 80s. He's already thinking about, as I think sound designers and composers often are, outside of the like music, you know, jazz community, right? Outside of the like

rock production community, using. sample sources as viable audio tools. You can use lots of ways to get the music on tape. Yeah. And this is important because he talks about how when he first arrives in New York, and he first starts hearing about there are these hip-hop guys who want to do a session. He talks about how there's some snobbery about doing these sessions where samples are being used. No, I mean, the boomer white guys don't want to work with these hip-hop dudes. They're stealing. Not only that, and it also relates a little bit to how we talked about on the Donna Summer episode, there's a little bit of an attitude.

It's snobbery on the part of musicians for whom musicianship is instrumentalship. It's having theory knowledge. It's having capabilities on a guitar, on the drums, on the keyboards. And that, I think, by the way, persists to the state to a certain degree. But in this moment, Bob Power,

I think he describes it as being part of his jazz training where he goes, quote, he learned in jazz that, quote, if I didn't like it, I probably didn't get it. In other words, he learned to have a very open mind. Yeah. And I love that because, that actually isn't just about race.

That can go along age lines. Like I remember when Tyler the creator first came out, I didn't quite get it at first, but I saw a whole community of people who looked like younger me getting it. And so I just rode with it. And then eventually you start to understand it. And then you can contribute to it.

Well, it's funny you mention that because one of the bands he starts working with is Stetsasonic, who famously talk about that phenomenon and talking all that jazz, which is a song about this new generation. He's talking to older black musicians in that song about saying,

you know, James Brown, tell you the truth, James Brown was old. Tell you're right, so that sort of idea, you're right, it's not purely the white engineers and white musicians. Sometimes if you don't get it in this art, just ride with it and maybe you'll get it. So Bob Power has these open ears, but he also has engineering training,

which enables him to craft samples in a new way where, among other things, and we'll get into this when we get to the specific samples, he's able to craft, if Tip comes in or Ali Shahid comes in with, I want to use these samples. He's able to help them fulfill their vision by literally carving out using EQ, using volume, using panning, using all these methods to get their vision to cohere. But in a new clean way, and because of that, we're able to get the bass sound that they all have in their low-end theory vision brains.

And it's the work with Stetsosonic specifically on this song that I'm about to play that gets the attention of Tribe Called Quest. This is Ghost Stetsa, and this is the perfect part because it's the drum sound that he likes. So that's Ghost Stetsa I, and Q-Tip tells the story about how hearing that song is what made him want to work with Bob Power

to get that drum sound that he had heard in that song. Before we play the stems, I want to get into a little bit of the personnel that's involved on this album. First off, I was shocked to realize that Fife is only on four out of the 14 songs on people's instinctive. He comes into his own.

on this album. And he's the guy who starts off scenario, which is amazing. When Skeff talks about the recording session, he says, you could tell right away that scenario is going to be big. Yes, they all felt it. They all felt it. There are verses that didn't make the cut. Chris Lighty, their label has a verse that didn't make the cut. There's a verse by Posdenous who didn't make the cut. So everybody's trying to pull in. Apparently, too. Yes. Yes. I wonder if whoever get to hear those. Maybe they're already out on a, you know, B-Sides album that we don't know about... I heard him on an interview say that Pasta Nuse

famously has a big archive where he keeps everything ever in his life. So we might hear it. Maybe we'll hear it. So maybe we'll hear it. But this is just a special time for the group. Like, you know, Fife is coming into his own. Jerobe is actually taking a bit of a take off. Yeah, he's like a back... He's apparently just coming into the studio for vibes and like silly jokes, which is perfectly good for Jerobe. Yeah, you need that. But they're putting together a classic album and Bob Power in particular says,

in a way, this is a quote, in a way, it's the... Sergeant Peppers of hip-hop. It's a record that changed the way people thought about putting music together. Again, referring to the fact that Q-Tip and Ali would sometimes arrive already knowing in their heads how they wanted to layer the samples. But I love that analogy because if the low-in theory

is one Beatles album, and he's saying it's the Sergeant Peppers, I would actually argue that this album is the Revolver. Yeah, I like that. The next album, Midnight Marauders, is Sergeant Peppers, if only because so much had happened in the beetle fandom and hippie culture from the time that Revolver was released and Sergeant Pepper's release,

we're going to make the case that so much had changed in hip-hop between the time that the low-in theory is released. What does that make people's instinctive travels then? Is that like Rubber Soul or... Yes, Rubber Soul. Meet the Beatles. Probably Meet the Beatles. So we're going to take a quick break.

And when we get back, we're going to unveil the sample supergroup behind the beat. We'll explain what that means. We will listen to isolated bars. And I'm very excited about this. Scenario has some samples that were not used in the album version. We are going to restore those samples. And you're going to hear scenario like you've never, ever heard it before. I don't know how many years you've been listening to hip-hop.

When we get back. Welcome back to one song. Before we get into the stems, as we do, let's talk about the splits. So the splits are pretty simple. It is pretty much all the lyricists on this track. are cut in. So we have... That's great. Yeah, it's good news.

70% is the three tribe called Quest members. And 30% for leaders of the new school. That's about right? Trevor Buster Rhyme Smith gets 10% as do James Jr. Jackson, aka Dinko D. Ah, Dingo D. And Brian Higgins, aka Charlie Brown. Love Charlie Brown.

Charlie Brown, unsung hero of the leaders of the new school. Absolutely. My presumption, having learned that, and from what we discussed with the Lou Reed situation, I can only assume because it's not in the public records. that it's very likely that the label properly cleared the samples that we're about to be talking about. Yeah.

So bringing back to Bob Power, we mentioned earlier that he talks about how part of the genius of Hew Tip and Ali Shaheed. And to be clear, this is actually an Ali Shaheed track. Yeah. Is their ability to, quote, hear combinations of things in their head that were pieces of different things,

samples in other words, that no one had ever really thought about putting together in that way before? And let's just be very clear. Ali Shaheed Mohammed gets the producer credit on scenario. And I think that's important to point out because for all the times that we were tribe fans at the time and the moment,

I sort of assumed, as did many people, that Alicia Heid Muhammad's role was producing all these tracks. I think when we found out the Q-Tip was producing as well, it's easy to then go back and give him all the props on producing, but we shouldn't do that. Let's be sure to make it clear that Alicia Heimahma, but also sampling genius, sampling legend icon, all that. And I also think, to be clear, in the studio, we weren't there.

And in the telling 30-plus years later, as Bob Power and some of these other people talk about the making of this track, sometimes the memories are a little fuzzy. And I would assume that there's probably a lot of collaboration happening. There may have been like, oh, let's use the snare from this, coming from one of the other members of one of the other bands. A lot could be happening in the mix-up. It takes a tribe to raise a child and to produce the low-in theory.

And it takes a nation of millions. Wait, that's a different band. So Bob Power helps bring sample craft into the modern day with a lot of things. One thing he does is he takes the Q-Tip and Ali Shahid visions of like, I want to use these samples together. And he helps them find room in the mix quite literally by doing things. A lot of engineers were figuring out techniques at the time. So not to say that he necessarily was the first to think of these,

but he's certainly among the first to be crafting samples by saying, oh, Q-Tip wants to use the sample. But what he wants from it, for example, is just the base. The rest of it, I can EQ out. I can take out the high end if it's just the baseline, for example. Or sometimes things are panned a certain way so you can fit them together. Part of what he's doing is he's bringing this shaping of sample craft into hip-hop in general, but certainly to this record, a big part of it. Tell us a little bit about how scenarios made. There's something interesting thinking about when you hear a drum loop and then you hear a keyboard or a baseline loop.

You're actually hearing performances by musicians. And in a sense, the underlying instrumental of this track It's a little bit like a musical supergroup performed by musicians from different bands and different eras in different genres, right? Yeah. So let's talk for a second about how sampling is changing the techniques. Leading up to this moment, the late 80s into the early 90s, the main ways that you would get samples

on a record would be, one, cutting the vinyl. Like you might have two turntables, like a turntabist would be doing live with an MC in the early days. You would literally record from one record with the breakbeat to the next record with that same breakbeat, and you'd try to get the timing as well as you could because there wasn't a lot of leeway in the pre-computer era with having things line up perfectly to sound like a loop.

So one way would be two records. Another way might be using a sampler which at the time had very short sampling times. So you'd have to be clever about what would fit into that one, one and a half seconds, maybe less. You might do half of the bar and then the other half of the bar on a second track and sort of merge those together.

A lot of work basically goes into this. And one last way to do it, which you sent me a moment, video of, which I didn't even know as an option until recently. Yeah, I think the video's captioned is something like, Q-Tip blows Kanye West's mind with a needle drop. And it's just them in the studio. And Q-Tip is doing this very old-school style, calling back to the early B-Boy Day, it's very old-school style of sampling, where he literally has like a record player in his lap. And he's lifting the needle and dropping it and lifting

it and dropping it to get it to loot. But it's a single record player. That's the part that blew my mind. That's what I'm saying. It's a record player in his lap. That's some grandmaster blast stuff. And he's lifting and dropping the needle so that it sounds like a loop. And it's just such an inaccurate way to loop.

But it's so beautiful. And you can tell that this is a skill that Q-Tip has. All this to say that a lot of work goes into lining up samples in the pre-computer era. and what Bob Power helps do, both with the crafting of each individual sample, what they sound like, what piece of the music it is, and also like how they all fit together is part of the magic of this record

and part of the magic of this song. All right, let's get into some music. You know, the drums on scenario are so distinct. I can't wait for you to walk us through. Where do they come from? Okay, there's a couple of layers in the stems where the drums come from. One is a loop from Jimmy Hendrix's Little Miss Lover, 1967.

Here it is, the mix and again, this is a sample loop. So you're going to hear one bar repeated. And then I'll play where it comes from and then I'll start building how all these drums interact and all the samples interact. So that's the one bar loop that comes from this. Jimmy Hendrix, Little Miss Lover, 1967. Okay, so this is where we get into the supergroup thing. What you're hearing is in what was sampled from that. It's just that first bar of drums, just a kick, a snare, and a crash. And that is performed by legendary drummer Mitch Mitchell from the Jimmy Hunter's experience. And what's interesting to think about is how on this track, as I'm building these characters, you know,

think of it as being a band playing this song with the leaders of the new school and tribe in the studio, rapping on top of it. To me, that's a really fun image to have. That is great. By the way, fun fact, that was recorded in Olympic Studios in London, the same place they recorded a whole lot of love. Go back to our led's up on episode for that. There is a mysterious second drumbeat somewhere in I'm hearing. One Song Nation, we need your help on this one. Like, I was not able to find the sample source for this other breakbeat. I'll play it for you isolated.

People can get their ears ready. Here is the mysterious second breakbeat on the song's scenario. Guys, help us out. What is this? We don't know. We don't know. Listen to that kick. That's pretty distinctive.

Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Dude, is that Melvin Bliss synthetic substitution? Let's listen and decide in the room. Different kick drum. Yeah, you're right. Play yours again? Totally different. I think it is one of those classic hip-hop breaks, though.

It's probably a classic break. I feel like I know this from some other song. But if you know the answer, I think somebody out there does, please, please, please reply on TikTok, on Instagram. Help us out. Now let's put them together, and we'll get both beats. Listen to the kick.

Boom, boom, okay? It gives a little bounce. Because individually, remember, the break beat from Little Miss Lover is, it's simple and when you merge them it's boom boom pocah boom boca and when you put the two together that's where that bounce comes from I hear scenario yeah that's what's crazy um it's actually two drum samples

that's right neither of those beats have in the kick drum boom boom pocah one plus one has equal three which gives it the bounce absolutely 100% that's why we love sampling and we're two drummers and we love drums but I always get excited when we get to this next portion of the stems I want to hear what the keys is doing I want to hear the organ so what can you tell us about the organ? Because this is such a major part of the song. This is how they start the song.

This is, I want to hear about that. Okay, so remember what I said about building our supergroup underneath it? We've got two more members of this supergroup, both in this sample. So this is Obligetto from Brother Jack McDuff, 1970. And longtime listeners of the show may remember

Brother Jack McDuff from our George Benson episode. Well, that's right. Okay, so here is the loop in the mix on scenario, and then I'll play you the isolated source. From whence it derives. Nice. So I mentioned before that we want to just

sort of call out this supergroup idea. Actually, performing the organ is Jack McDuff. And on bass, another unsung hero, that baseline,

that key bass line is by Richard Davis. Electric bass, not upright, actually, interestingly, on this song. Not stand up. Not stand up on this song.

Electric bass, it's played by Richard Davis, who is downbeat's best basses for seven years running, 67 to 74. and he's played with Sarah Vaughan, Amad Jamal, Eric Dolfi. It's like a list of credits as long as your arm. He was on Van Morrison's Astral Weeks record.

So really eclectic, incredible studio musician. Live to the ripe old age of 93. Oh, wow. I don't know Obligetto. Can we hear some Obligato? I see. So they, it sounds like they like pitched it down. Yep.

They slowed it down, which obviously led to a pitch down. Again, because he's using record players probably. Some combination. it's indeterminate what sample came from what source. What do you think he's using? So Bob Power said that at the time of this recording, in his memory, this is around the time that Ali had a computer, but was he using it yet is unclear.

But he definitely had an Akai S-900 sampler. There you go. Q-tip, who, again, didn't put this track together, but just for the sake of the record, the public record had an SP-12. Oh, okay, SB12. That's right. Which are the techniques and devices we've discussed on this episode

are on this track, are not 100% clear. Yeah. But what's interesting to me is I don't think the samplers of that era, if you slowed it down, the pitch down happened. Yeah, that's what's crazy. Because now everybody's laptop, you can slow songs down. It doesn't change the key. When I first started to use Pro Tools and Ableton, when I first started doing music production, that was a magic trick that didn't exist prior to that. You could separate making something slower or faster from, did it go higher or lower in pitch as a result? I'm going to play for you what those three elements sound like just as samples in the mix. before a couple of other things were added. This is drums, bass and organ,

because remember, bass and organ are coming from the same sample, that brother Jack McDuff track. And here we go, all together now. So we're starting to build up the track, these ground layers. As I mentioned, I wasn't able to recreate the magic sort of, you know,

was it a cowbell, was it maybe a drum machine, the extra oomph that Bob Power added to the drums. So imagine that's also there. But at a certain point, they decided that there wasn't enough bass coming from the sample. So it's interesting. I found in the stems, there's a couple of takes of just bass that I believe are Bob Power playing the bass. So there is a live artist on the track. There is a live artist on the track by, you're absolutely right. There are two bass lines,

an octave apart. I'll play them isolated. It's not quite delight. Not quite delight. So I believe that's Bob Power playing a bass guitar. And then he does another take an octave above. And it's really interesting. Listen to how. how it rings out at the end? That's a choice, a deliberate choice they made to have that resonate after the note is over. Hang in there. It's almost like a nice little drone. When you listen to it, I'll build it up slowly. I'll put in the Jack McDuff sample next so you can hear how those two baselines beefed up that same baseline in the sample. First I'll play it isolated. This is what the sample sounded like. And here it is with the low one. And here it is with the low one. And here it is with

low and the high one. Just adding a little bit of beef. And here's the sample again. It's subtle, but again, with a sample craft, using these techniques and bringing together a lot of ways to enhance the sound and to isolate the important elements of it and to really bring them out is what part of the genius of Bob Power is here. By the way, there are some samples on this song that don't make the cut.

It's so fun. I found a couple in the multitracks. There were a couple sample loops. And by the way, just to be clear of what you're hearing, These are loops that go through the entire song. It's very interesting. Part of their process clearly, and I read an interview where Bob Power

explicitly calls this out, the mutes, where things come in and come out, where the drums drop and then come back, for example. That was one of the last steps. So picture this, as we're hearing everything, these loops go throughout the entirety of the song, and I think as they're singing, as we're about to get into the vocals,

they're hearing all of this all of the time. It isn't kind of stopping and starting and coming and going so much. Because, again, back to the technology of the day, that was a requirement. they weren't able to sort of make those micro decisions quite yet. I mean, can we hear the song with these unused samples in there? That means that, guys, we are hearing scenario in a way that you've never heard it before. You've never heard it this way because these samples didn't make the cut.

Maybe at the end we can do our own remix based on these unused samples. Okay, so this is in the multi-tracks. This is called Bouncy Loop. And I'm not really sure what the sources. Again, anyone recognize this? Let us know. So here's unused bouncy loop. I'll give you some drums.

and you can hear that if I add back the other baseline, it doesn't quite work. It's rubbing a little bit much. You have it really high in the mix, though, right? It could be that it would have been lower in the mix. It could have been that what we heard as a full loop. Bob Power might have done is magic to find just the thing necessary. Maybe it's just the latter half of it or something like that.

It's unclear what the goal for that sample was, but they didn't end up using it in the final. Or it's super, super, super, super barring. It might be just a little bit low. What is another sample that did make the cut? And then the other sample that I personally don't hear in the final mix might be there to your point. I doubt it though.

And then with the drums... That is hard. I like that. I like this one too. And let's hear it with the other on you sample. I mean, this is its own good enough song. Maybe they saved it for another track. Let it ride for a little bit.

Should I put in some vocals? Well, I was going to do this. Hold on. Do that, do that. Let it ride without the vocals for a second. Stop it. If you, some member of the one song nation, want to put your vocals,

tribe vocals, Mary J. Bly, J. Bala's, our vocals, over that beat and just send it into us, we will reposted on our socials. I think that is freaking phenomenal. And that does not exist. That beat, wow, that sounds like some early 90s hip-hop that I would have absolutely loved.

Maybe it's a tribe B-side or something that they never used. But that is, that's, that's, usable. That's good. I liked that. But it's Alicia Hid Muhammad Genius that we've never heard before. You heard it here on this show first. And now, before we go any further, can I just hear all of the elements with those elements added

in just to hear what scenario could have sounded like? We've never heard this before. We're hearing this for the first time with you guys. And maybe turn down that chime just a little bit so it doesn't overpower the base. Here is what's likely to be quite the cacophon. The world premiere.

Bapha Bapha. Scenario Cacophony Mix. Can't wrap over that. No, he can't. That's very hard to wrap over. That was fantastic. That was pretty cool, though. I did not know that's what scenario could have sounded like.

I'm so, no pun intended, jazzed to hear that. That is insane. That was really cool. I'll allow that pun. Let's talk about the lyrics. You can't talk about hip-hop without talking about the lyrics. These lyrics are fun. I don't even know where to start because I personally know every lyric.

There's one of those rap songs just because of who, you know, my age and where I was in life, I don't almost need to look at most of the lyrics. I know them by heart. But there were some lyrics that jumped out to me along the way. Where do you want to start? Let's start with the gang vocals. The Here We Go Yo. The Here We Go Yo.

We have leaders of the new school. We have Tribe Called Quest. And we probably have a lot of other people in the mix here. I don't know how many people are in this vocal with the Here We Go Yo scenario. Oh, because positive is that some people have their verses cut could still be in the chorus. And importantly,

So what's the scenario Here we go, yo Here we go, yo So what's the scenario Here we go, yo Here we go, yo Four minutes straight of that So it's not a loop

Nope That's awesome Yes, it is awesome By the way I know these groups well enough Obviously Fife is way up in the mix I hear Busta up in the mix I'm pretty sure that guy is like

is Charlie Brown Okay That sounds like Charlie to me It might be Dinko D actually But it's one of the leaders It is funny to hear it isolated like that you can... But they do that for four straight minutes.

They do it for four straight minutes. Can we hear towards the end? I want to just see... When they get tired? I want to see who... They start dropping out. It's petered out. And they do.

You can even see in the waveform. It's a little bit less. Yeah, let's hear it. Here we go, yo. So what's the scenario? Here we go, you. Here we go, you. So what, so what's the scenario?

You know, it beats... Weatherweather is like a way to, like, wake up your voice as an actor. I might just start going, here we go, yo, in the mirror for like five straight minutes just to wake up the vocal. Or in Buster's case, it gets that kind of raspy thing going. It gets raspy, yeah. You clearly still hear Busta, and I think it's either Charlie Browder or Digo D who you still hear in the mix there. But that's really interesting because they've definitely dropped off.

Yeah. It got less towards the end. Here we go, you. Oh, my gosh. How are we gone yet? Did we go? I don't know anymore. Tommy Vatollum is on the song.

He's on everything. He's on everything. So let's get into the meat of the posse cut, the verses. Let's do it. I want to start with Fife. Again, he was coming into his own on low-end theory, and he opens up the ultimate posse cut. So let's hear Fife's beginning on scenario.

Hey, yo, Bo knows this and Bo knows that. But Bo don't know Jack, because Bo can't rap. Well, what do you know? The didog is first up to bat. No batteries included and no strings attached. This man watches a lot of sports. They say that when you would come into, you know, when you come into the world of Tribe,

called Quest. I was usually either playing video games or watching sports while he was trying to come up with his verses. Oh, really? And he starts off, Bo knows this and Bo No, No. Like the Bo of it all is hilarious to me because- Explain to our younger audience who that is. Yeah, well, Bo Jackson was, hey, they had a whole Nike campaign where they were like, Bo knows this. You know, Bo knows that. He's Bo Jackson, right? Yeah, as Bo Jackson, he played two sports. He was at the time he was playing baseball and football. And so they launched this whole campaign called Bo Nose. So once again, calling upon what was happening in the culture at that time. Five comes into on the song saying Bo knows this and Bo knows that, but Bo don't know Jack,

because Bo can't rap. But not the only sports reference, because then he mentions Broadway Joe, which is a Joe Neiman. Right. Exactly. No holes born. No time for move faking. Got to get deluxe so I could bring home the bacon. Brothers front.

They say the tribe can flow, but we've been known to do the impossible like Broadway Joe. So this is a man who just loves. sports. I just, I like it when you find out like, oh, Fife is a sports, you know, he's a sports head. But on top of that, there's one line in there that really jumps out to me. Now that I know that he wasn't as much

a part of the group on the first album, it's this one line, maybe you can play it for us real quick, about him paying his dues. I'm all that and then some short doc can have some bust another inside your eye to show you where I come from. I'm vexed. That's disgusting. I got it up to here. My days of paying dues are over. Acknowledge me is in there.

Yeah. I mean, like that sticks out. My days of Pandoos are over. Acknowledge me as in there. You know, like, it's a great line. And it's basically, and everybody in the course is like, yeah. You know, like, everybody's like, you hear, Fife. Oh, can we hear that isolated? Yeah.

Let's hear the isolated, yeah. Yeah. I think every time you accomplish anything in life, that sounds should play. You should play. You should just bring this around with you on a little dictaphone. Yeah. Absolutely. That was easy.

I love the Charlie Brown verse in this song. You know, he's, to me, Charlie Brown always sounds. sounded like if Chuck D from Public Enemy had a younger brother. You know what I mean? Like he had a great voice. And he usually rap like this, which was like, you know, the style at the time. Love that. Love Dingo D.

Q-tip, you know, great verse on this song. You know, it's a leader quest mission and we got the goods here. Sort of calling out the fact that no paws may not make the cut on this one, you know? Because it writes his good ear. Is there some story behind the right being his good ear? Do we know about this? You know what's funny? I'm going to give credit.

It's like, it's a wonderful life. I'm going to get credit. It's actually a Julius Caesar reference. Okay. It's according to what I saw online, when speaking to Anthony in act one, scene two, Caesar tells him, come on my right for my left ear is deaf.

Interesting. Okay. Did not know this. You can take it up. I don't know if you disagree. Did not know this. But I like the Q-Tiff says, it's a leader quest mission because there are some people who left out of this and it was almost like he made it a decision

to be like, this is just going to be a tribe called Quest there's a new school song. So he sort of lays that out. But then we get to a place about halfway through Q-Tip's verse where things change. And it becomes a back and forth

with him and Busta. And lives change as a result of things changing. Absolutely, absolutely. And I think you told me Q-Tip wrote Busta's part of that verse. Yeah, Busta talks about how, you know, to quote him, he says, Tip wrote that I heard you rushed

and rushed and attacked, etc. He had his rhyme written and he told me to say his part. And he did it. So basically, the opening lines of Busta's verse were written by TIP. And TIP had in his mind that there'd be a little bit of a setup,

a little bit of a tease, then TIP would come back and then Busta. Yeah, exactly right. So don't violate or you get violated. Exactly. And apparently he quote did it in a Buster Rhyme style. So he did it. So Tip was imitating Buster Rhymes.

I always say all those verses that Prince wrote for other people somewhere in those Prince vals are Prince singing all those songs. He wrote for Vanity and Appalo. Trying to sound like probably vanity. Yeah. And then after Q-Tip comes back, he says, here's Buster Rhymes with the scenario.

And then we get this bit of musical history. Watch as I combine, all the juice from the mind. Heel up, wheel up, bring it back, come rewind. Powerful impact, boom from the cannon. Now, again, try to read my mind. Just imagine. Every single line of Bust's verse feels like it could be like the chorus of something completely said. Like you feel like you could pick off, you know, oh, my.

my gosh, oh my gosh, you feel like you can pick off, you know, powerful impact, boom for the better. And indeed, a lot of samplers and a lot of DG's and producers. A lot of people have used those little snippets that all sound like individual thoughts. They've used those in other songs. I want to call out a few lyrics real quick that jump out to me. One is eating at all stew, like the one Petra Tosh. Another Jamaican reference. Did not know what he said there.

Vegetarian. When I was a kid. Healthy food. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. Goss eating, I two, stew like the one piece of tush. All over the track, man, oh, pardon me, as I come back.

It's a, it comes from vital. It's stew without meat or salt. So that one really jumps out to me. Also, I thought he said, having you smelling rank at the most stale urine. That's the rankest, rankest lyric literally. Trying to step to this, I will switch you in a turban and have this smell like some old stale urine. But apparently he says like some old stale urine.

And then, you know, we got to talk about... The dungeon dragon of it all. We got to talk about the dungeon dragon of all. I said it before. I don't know why a dungeon dragon would go rah, rah, rah. We did talk about this on the day-lostle episode. I think you were right to point out that it probably would not sound like rah-r. But have you thought since then about what it might sound like?

I don't know, but I did find out recently that two things. One, all of the monster roars that we hear in movies are usually manipulated lion roars. So even whether it's a dinosaur or King Kong or whatever, it's usually a manipulating lion war, but here's the irony, the MGM lion that comes on at the beginning. You're not going to tell me it's not a lion? Oh, it's not a lion. It's not a lion.

You're breaking my brain. It's actually a tiger. They changed it in the 80s because they went from in the earliest days of that lion. That's insane. It was an actual lion that they recorded. Are lions and tigers related? No, they never cross. What?

They never crossed. Tigers never made it to Africa. There's no tiger in Africa. Here's what's even crazier. They say lions and tigers and bears. I'm not sure there's one continent that has all three. What? Well, that's a wizard of all.

It makes sense because they're an Oz. That's an Oz thing. Yeah, we'll do it a wicked. We kind of did a wicked episode. I digress. One of the greatest verses of all time. Anything you want to say about Busta Ryan? I've just been struggling to figure out what my favorite lines are.

Here's, I've narrowed it down to my top five. I'll start from least to best. Peter Tosh. I like the Peter Tosh line. It's exciting to me. I'll recite it out loud. The pants are sag in line. It's like surprisingly up there.

the change your little drawers because your pants are sagging. Wow, like a dungeon dragon. Change your little drawers because your pants are sagging. I mean, I think he's saying that I scared you. Yeah. And now you've pooped your pants and your drivers are just like sagging. That's worse than the urine line. No, he's obsessed.

I haven't even thought about it. There's so many bodily fluids in this verse. Because I'll tell you. That, uh, uh, uh, all over the trackman, uh, pardon me, uh, as I come back. Stop it. Sorry. You're destroying me. How else am I supposed to take that?

I know he's like punching in the video. My innocence is lost forever. You know, I will say this. Scenario is one of those great, great posse cuts. I don't think anybody can ever put that past. And we talk about posse cuts on the De La Sol episode. But I also say it's the last song on the low-end theory. What better way to end an album that, you know what I said,

Joe Power says it's the Sergeant Pepper's. Yeah. I think it's the revolver. And here's my case for that. Because Revolver ends with Tomorrow Never Knows, a psychedelic epic opus of a song that presages where they're going to go on their next album, which is Sergeant Pepper.

And so I feel like scenario... By the way, like six months later, not two years later, like... But things were moving fast from the Beatles and the culture in the 60s. To me, Senaro is the perfect ending for this album because it does set up what I think is actually their Sergeant Peppers. Right down to the fact that both

Sergeant Pepper's and Midnight Marauders have pictures of people all over the thing? Absolutely, yes. Like sort of saying like the Beatles were like, this is the concert that we want to perform. And you get the sense that with the cover of Midnight Marauders, Kutips, like these are our compatriots and our friends and our fans from Jazzy Jay to the far side. I'm totally with you on that. And I'll add two more things.

One, I agree with you for two reasons. First of all, Revolver to Sergeant Pepper. I have an unpopular opinion. I love both of those records for the Beatles. I also love low-end theory and midnight broad but I have a slight preference for Revolver, and I also have a slight preference for low-end theory. Interesting.

Yeah, so, like, you know, contrary to maybe popular opinion on both of those, but they like to me. I actually don't, I don't love to choose. I know that seems like a cop-out. I do prefer, I will say, I do prefer Sergeant Peppers to Revolver, but that's because Sergeant Peppers had such an effect on me. To this day, one of my favorite songs of all time

is for the benefit of Mr. Kite. I think it's an amazing song. I loved it as a kid. I loved it as a guy in my dad. 20s. And I'd also hold, as much as I love Tomorrow Never Know's, I would put up against that within or without you. I think those songs

are both psychedelic and great. If I can just pause on that moment, because both of those songs are also relevant to these records, because those are both proto-sampling songs. In the earliest days of sampling, Tomorrow Never Know is famously has like the those interesting sounds, because they all went home with these little tape

recorders and found some just isolated sound, like random sounds in the world, recorded them, brought them back. And George Martin not unlike Bob Power on this record. Found a way to integrate that musically and to do, I mean, back then you wanted to line up a loop, it's not going to happen. Like, Toronto never knows that

what, want to sound never quite loops, you know, by two or four bars. But it's in there as an early version of sampling, one of the first sampled records in history, but also not everyone knows this. Benefit of Mr. Kite, there's that calliopee solo towards the end and it gets really fast and speeds up at the very end.

They famously took the tape. I think they threw it up in the air so that it was randomized. Like they chopped up all the notes, threw it up in the air so it was a random series of notes and then put that back together. That my friend is sampling.

So both of those records have a lot of parallels with these two records. And Q-Tip is actually a big Beatles fan. I know that for a bettive. And he would have known that. There's footage of him online seeing come together. Before we move on from the low-end theory,

I do want to point out that Senara has a great remix and like so many remixes in the 90s, to call it a remix, it's kind of bizarre because other than the title and a few references to the lyrics Totally different song. It's a different beat.

They actually have a slightly different roster of rappers on there. No, I don't think there's any two, like, lines that are the same on both. No, it's a different song. It's a different beat. They're different lyrics. They're different people rapping. It's one of the things I love about the 90s. They were just like, yeah, we'll call it a remix.

It'll be a completely different song. All right, guys. Well, next week is part two of our Tribe Called Quest conversation, and we're going to do a deep dive into electric relaxation from their third album, Midnight Marauders. Yeah, you really can't talk about low-in theory and not mention Midnight Marauders. These albums are released two years apart, but they were released into worlds that were exceedingly different. Between 1991 and 1993, the rules of hip-hop had changed. Fundamentally, that's why we're going to dive into what makes Midnight Marauders a very different kind of classic tribe called Quest

album. All right, Luxury. Help us in this thing. I'm producer, DJ songwriter, and musicologist Luxury. actor, writer, director, and sometimes DJ Dea O'Reynall. And this is one song. We will see you next time. This episode was produced by Melissa Duanez and Casey Simonson. Our associate producer is Jeremy Bimbo. Engineering from Marcus Homm and Eric Hicks. Additional production support from Razak Poykin.

The show is executive produced by Kevin Hart, Mike Stein, Brian Smiley, Eric Eddings, Eric Wael, and Leslie Guam.