I'm on a lil nostalgia trip through albums I grew up on and loved even though they got killed my critics/bad sales

Arrested Development (best known for "people everyday" off they successful debut) had a spark when they started until they hit that sophomore slump. Which as a kid, I never understood cause I loved this album growing up. Some of Speech's best production was on here.

As I get older, I think I get some of the criticism

(one of their singles)

I always love this song but I was also raised in a very afrocentric household so I'm 110% biased. Looking from the outside perspective I can see some of that "these dashiki negroes think they special." attitude being a reason for some folks to be like

The biggest thing working against the album is there's some songs that just go on from way too longer than they should (e.g. Shell has a boring hook that goes on for a whole minute and a half) and you could've cut 2-3 songs from this album.

including the anti-abortion hotep classic

after I scold you
I hope I can mold you
to share your truths with me conscious niggas be funny dawg lol.

The worst part is this is like the hardest beat on this album. He shoulda gave this to like Ice Cube or one of them west coast niggas to help bridge the gap that rappers over there had about their group (Ice T did NOT f*** with them niggas )

All in all, this album I'll confidently say is definitely a fall from their debut album (which just had a lot more focus tbh) and when you already got outside criticism from folks about you being preachy/judgemental about "niggas" the audience doesn't give you a lot of grace if your next hit is seen as "mid"

These still some of my favs:

comes off kinda generic or "blends together" but i think thats more to do with hindsight/future bias

its fine tho

"blends together" is the perfect term for it tbh.

I also don't think it was bad enough to cause the whole group to breakup and people to retroactively forget that these niggas RAN the world for a good 2 years when they debut came out.

a lot of these type type of rap groups are really forgotten now and buried besides a very few like Diggable Planets - even in 90s and 90sin depth rap talks and retrospection - but they had a lil hot streak in manstream and we're still around for years after

sad what time can do

"backpack" rap kinda erased and took the lane over with having more straight up rap senisibilites

@Aquilla

Blowout Comb was a far superior album than its debut in every facet tho. I can stand on that. Personal issues contributed to them breaking up frfr.

I put Arrested Development and Black Sheep in a similar category of sophomore slump got the better of them.

Thanks for entertaining my “procrastinating taxes” thread btw lmao

I was never a big on these guys ngl. So I can't answer this one but @op this is a good topic tho.

Especially when it comes to sophomore slumps

Agreed, they're the top and never had a falloff that left on their own conditions that reinforced their ideals and image even more.

Just wild how a whole era can get sweeped up so fast in general - you really do only see "the top" of the pile in music in general underground and mainstream 5 to 10 years removed any genre, unless you really actively search for it, grew up with/in it or are apart of whatever it evolved into in your current day if it was able too.

No problem lmao

I don't imagine there is many people that could even talk on this topic at all, most that I could think of are banned or not active anymore so I had to show out a lil for the gang

FAIRLY shocked you wasn't into these guys

you found them preachy? they musically helped put the town on the map before the 'Kast did.

I aint even know if there was any Arrested Development fans periodt lol.

And the tea with Blowout Comb was that white critics wanted another Cool Like Dat/jazz rap Reachin' album again so they aint know how to react to all the funky basslines and militant 5 percenter speak they was talking.

FOCK em.

Wanna do a thread on Blowout Comb and New Danger (I'm forever a New Danger believer, that album was not bad at all)

blowout comb and their award speech is truly one of the few rare time where fans and the artist(s) won and went against all odds

financially successful too

THEN left on their own terms with all their principles, message and ignity in taqct while have a back to back classic run

would have been cool to see where else they could take and perhaps do a label of their own, but so crazy that it happened and perhaps for the best it did end so perfectly and so in tuned with their art and image and just them asactual people

said what they had to say, change what they wished to change, implanted seeds, then dipped with all their moral, artistry and movemennt in tacted

ive s***ted on de la before here (their music is fine to good moreso about their attitude) especially due to their attitude and poisoning the well of what "gangster rap"/west coast means and their false sense of why it exist - but diggable is what they "were" that 2010s and internet rap nerd never been outside sheltered culture props de la to be. true mesaage, while being respectful n understanding of others plights and art while even bigging it up as well. they attacked the actual industry fully and the socio n economic issues that forced rap to exist in the first place and understood it throughly and even collabed outside their scope/lane like jeru and gangstarr.

truly about unity and uplifting and improvement while still having attitude and edge and not afraid to punch someone that is punching them.

s*** is so perfect.

Yea I did lol. Which is saying a lot considering KRS One and Public Enemy had the same complaints but those guys were much more real.

I felt like Arrested Development was all over the place and don't get me started on that "homeless man" song

aye f*** you I loved that song

you'll LOVE this video then

8:55 - mr wendal retrospection

(he was fairly respectful as a c***with his a***ysis of the album. He even uncovered a interview they did with VIBE that showcased there was already inner turmoil within the group before the 2nd album dropped )

my main issue is how their sound is very samey and really blends together without much sticking out and it becomes very background or monotonous - the production is average for the lane and even sub par compared to the genral rap scene

perfect example of a good message/idea/intentions can get lost without interesting music

they have a few songs but overall just comes off "meh", or that you dont really think about it much after the song it over

theyre not insulting or terrible tho overall

Kneelin At My Altar my fav song from them easy

I've seen that one

Those guys just felt inauthentic but I do appreciate that they showed that the Daisy Age styled aesthetic could be mainstream

their history is really interesting and personally what catches my attention more than the actual music itself

i can def see it being a fav or just something someone would listen to from time to time if they grew up with it, or were really into the scene right when it was happening

like us 2010s kids with our still few fav but now overlooked n forgotten or not mentioned mixtape datpiff artists

True. They really didn't have interesting music tbh.

People Everyday was shocking tho. Thought they could have leaned more into that but that might’ve been a flash in the pan moment

aye bro chill with the de la slander man we still mourning Trugoy

Don't fall for the 2pacaganda (who tried to beef with them twice over legitimate misunderstandings. Ego Trippin music video has nothing to do with Pac/west coast)

that being said, they did for a minute have that elder look but also stakes is high was them opening up the gates for more diversity into the camp. Remember De La Soul is how we got introduced to Mos Def and Common both

can't say that when Tennessee existed right there

shoutout to Dionne Farris (the singer at the end, she got a record deal off that s***) an underrated legend with a classic debut I made a tiktok video about.

that first album was fully deserving of its praise (even if at times, white America was definitely using them as they "token blackie" against the meanie gangster rappers at that time)

nah it morso the ethos it created and the conspiratorial "gangsta rap is cia" or whatever that felt embolden by it that trickled into backpack rap and internet nerds

when gangsta rap wasnt even called "gangsta rap", that was a poltician thing that then the labels would label it as for free marketing, but we actually called it "reality rap" - because it was (and still is) our legit reality and what was legit happening. to the point the govt and media would ACTULLY try to (and successfully did for some time) smother our sound n movement and keep it banned.

till eazy's first solo album and ice t's first album blew up huge in the state that led to nwa first album that was finally given a chance with a decent label due to the success of those two - which then nwa had a s***ton of issues even tho their music video for straight out is what popped them off - including the FBI literally stalking, threatening and stopping them and concerts etc. - we fought hard for this reality, that was being covered up by newspapers and ignored by news stations, to be heard and revealed.

the villainizing and ignorance of "gangster" rap is what they gave huge legs too. and that was also 2pac's major point (along with his own frustration and hurt feelings of being an ex fan of course lmao).

which CA and philly was trying to make heard such as too short from ca and schooly d from philly before anything popped. way, way before nwa. or eazy or ice t.

which dumbass nerds thing the s***g was randsomly created with nwa too, and just ca.

and lets not forget kool g rap in ny lol. or 8ball n mjg in the south. all before nwa along with too short and schooly d.

this is a real life issue that was being suffocated and drowned. it is reality. and the only way to fix n make that reality go away is by fixing the socio and economic/political issues at the core that caused that reality to exist.

but instead idiots wanna blame the reaction and outcome, not the source and why - that ignores and brushes over real peoples plights and reality all while doing nothing to help. and diggable understood this.

Fair, there are a lot of slick subs to the beef heavy landscape of rap at that time on Stakes is High (and not just the title track you have the "baby baby baby baby" song and itsoweeze with them talking bout rappers trying to be like Italians when they don't really f*** with them (which I dont think was a bad critique, if anyone can tell rappers how the Italians everybody from the mafioso type of rap wanted to be like, it's niggas that grew up in Long Island)

What I will say is, look at it from their (and a LOT of rappers, it wasn't just de la/east coast niggas that aint like where rap was at in '96. That same Ice T told Pac personally that Hit em Up went too far and he needed to chill) perspective.

Rap at that specific time Stakes is High came out was very intense and violent. And this was before tragedy striked. I can see how that can cause disillusionment and anger to folks that were around before niggas started f***ing other rappers' wives. Even Tribe Called Quest' Beats Rhymes And Life didn't escape the anger-filled disillusionment of the times, they had f***ing Consequence on every other track man the landscape of rap was kinda f***ed up in a way.

Calling only that type of rap"reality rap" is a broad brush because you make it sound like every melanated person grew up in that type of environment which isn't true either. The same way AD was lame for calling their music "life music."

de la soul had a song about incest/child abuse. My theory is media/CIA/Powers that be muddied the waters on both sides of the spectrum and took away any nuance, them niggas could get dirty and grimy with their content too. They personally hated the fact that people called them hippies (it's why they 2nd album personally their best album in the catalog)

People Everyday (I think a lot of folks didn't really listen to the lyrics) was about an everyday situation that my folks that got conscious at HBCUs could relate to as well. Is the topic of catcalling/sexual harassment resulting in violent confrontation also not "reality rap" as well?