Originally released November 9, 1993
BMG
1xLP
Before MF DOOM donned a mask and cursed the industry that deformed him, before Andre 3000 and Big Boi rolled on vogues, before Stones Throw Records’s vinyl weighed a ton and well before Kendrick Lamar ever met Sherane, A Tribe Called Quest forged a path forward for any brainy outsider looking to make hip-hop on their own terms. Midnight Marauders mined from a war chest of lost 70s jazz, soul and funk samples, producer/MC Q-Tip’s god-level talent at programming drum sounds and whatever random jokes and observations happened to be on the mind of Tip and fellow MC Phife Dawg on any given day to create an album that made their jazzy take on hip-hop a fixture on the charts and enduring touchstone in the genre nearly 30 years on.