Amplified (Q-Tip Album)
''Amplified'' is the debut studio album of American rapper Q-Tip, released November 30, 1999, on Arista Records. It became his first solo release after the disbandment of his former group A Tribe Called Quest in 1998. The production was primarily handled by Q-Tip and Jay Dee of the Ummah. The album spawned the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 hits " Vivrant Thing" and " Breathe and Stop". The album debuted at number 28 on the ''Billboard'' 200, and on January 5, 2000, it was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America, for shipments of 500,000 copies in the United States. As of July 2008, ''Amplified'' has sold 675,000 copies in the US. It received generally positive reviews from music critics. Background Recorded after the dissolution of Q-Tip's former group, A Tribe Called Quest,Harrington, Richard.A Tribe and True Approach; Q-Tip Shed His Quest but Held On to Its Upbeat Jazz-Rap Sound. ''The Washington Post'': G.14. December 5, 1999. ''Amplified'' marked a stylist ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Q-Tip (musician)
Kamaal Ibn John Fareed (born Jonathan William Davis, April 10, 1970), better known by his stage name Q-Tip, is an American rapper, record producer, singer, and DJ. Nicknamed the Abstract, he is noted for his innovative jazz-influenced style of hip hop production and his philosophical, esoteric and introspective lyrical themes. He embarked on his music career in the late 1980s, as an MC and main producer of the influential alternative hip hop group A Tribe Called Quest. In the mid-1990s, he co-founded the production team The Ummah, followed by the release of his gold-certified solo debut '' Amplified'' in 1999. In the following decade, he released the Grammy Award-nominated album ''The Renaissance'' (2008) and the experimental album '' Kamaal the Abstract'' (2009). As an actor, Q-Tip has appeared in various films, such as ''Poetic Justice'', '' She Hate Me'', and '' Prison Song'', the latter of which he co-wrote and played the lead role. As a DJ, he has hosted the Apple Music ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Kembrew McLeod
Kembrew McLeod is an American artist, activist, and professor of Communication Studies at the University of Iowa. He is best known as a performance artist or "media prankster" who filed an application in 1997 to register the phrase "Freedom of Expression" as a trademark in the United States. This phrase was the name of his zine and artist book series, and on January 6, 1998, McLeod was granted registration no. 2127381 in Class 16 (for "booklets in the field of creative writing"). McLeod received his PhD from University of Massachusetts Amherst, an MA from the University of Virginia, and a BS from James Madison University. Dispute with AT&T McLeod sought registration of the phrase "Freedom of Expression" as a reflection on the use of intellectual property law to restrict cultural expression in U.S. society. In 2003, McLeod sent AT&T a cease and desist letter in response to an AT&T advertising campaign in college newspapers promoting a new long distance plan which used the phrase ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pop Rap
Pop rap (also known as pop hip-hop, pop hop, hip pop, melodic hip-hop or melodic rap) is a genre of music fusing the rhythm-based lyricism of hip hop with pop's preference for melodic vocals, catchy hooks, and positive lyrics on pop-like productions and structure. This genre gained mainstream popularity during the 1990s, though the influences and roots of pop rap can trace back to late-1980s hip-hop artists such as Run-DMC, LL Cool J, and Beastie Boys. Characteristics AllMusic describes pop rap as "a marriage of hip hop beats and raps with strong melodic hooks, which are usually featured as part of the chorus section in a standard pop-song structure." Pop rap also tends to have less aggressive lyrics than street-level rap music. However, some 1990s artists fused pop rap with a more aggressive attitude to defuse backlash on their own accessibility. Music journalist Wilson McBee has strongly criticized pop rap, "A pop rapper is assumed to be a sellout – someone who has co ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of the longest-running newspapers in the United States, the ''Times'' serves as one of the country's Newspaper of record, newspapers of record. , ''The New York Times'' had 9.13 million total and 8.83 million online subscribers, both by significant margins the List of newspapers in the United States, highest numbers for any newspaper in the United States; the total also included 296,330 print subscribers, making the ''Times'' the second-largest newspaper by print circulation in the United States, following ''The Wall Street Journal'', also based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' is published by the New York Times Company; since 1896, the company has been chaired by the Ochs-Sulzberger family, whose current chairman and the paper's publ ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Jon Pareles
Jon Pareles (born 1953) is an American journalist who is the chief popular music critic in the arts section of ''The New York Times''. ''''. Early life and education Pareles was born in . He played jazz flute and piano, and graduated from[...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Exclaim!
''Exclaim!'' is a Canadian music and entertainment publisher based in Toronto, which features coverage of new music across all genres with a special focus on Canadian and emerging artists. The monthly ''Exclaim!'' print magazine publishes seven issues per year, distributing over 103,000 copies to over 2,600 locations across Canada. In addition to music, the magazine also covers film and comedy. History ''Exclaim!'' began as a discussion among campus and community radio programmers at Ryerson's CKLN-FM in 1991. It was started by then-CKLN programmer Ian Danzig, together with other programmers and Toronto musicians. The goal of the publication was to support great Canadian music that was otherwise going unheralded. The group worked through 1991 to produce their first issue in April 1992, with monthly issues being produced since. Ian Danzig has been the publisher of the magazine since its start. The magazine had no official name for its first year of operations, with only th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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AllMusic
AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Musical ensemble, bands. Initiated in 1991, the database was first made available on the Internet in 1994. AllMusic is owned by RhythmOne. History AllMusic was launched as ''All-Music Guide'' by Michael Erlewine, a "compulsive archivist, noted astrologer, Buddhist scholar, and musician". He became interested in using computers for his astrological work in the mid-1970s and founded a software company, Matrix, in 1977. In the early 1990s, as compact discs (CDs) replaced LP record, LPs and cassette (format), cassettes as the dominant format for recorded music, Erlewine purchased what he thought was a CD of early recordings by Little Richard. After buying it, he discovered it was a "flaccid latter-day rehash". Frustrated with the labeling, he res ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Contemporary R&B
Contemporary R&B (or simply R&B) is a popular music Music genre, genre, originating from African Americans, African-American musicians in the 1980s that combines rhythm and blues with elements of Pop music, pop, Soul music, soul, funk, Hip-hop, hip hop, and electronic music. The genre features a distinctive Record producer, record production style and a smooth, lush style of vocal arrangement. Electronic music, Electronic influences and the use of hip hop or electronic dance music, dance-inspired beat (music), beats are typical, although the roughness and grit inherent in hip hop may be reduced and smoothed out. Contemporary R&B vocalists often use melisma, and since the mid-1980s, R&B rhythms have been combined with elements of hip hop culture and music, pop culture and pop music. Precursors According to Geoffrey Himes speaking in 1989, the progressive soul movement of the early 1970s "expanded the musical and lyrical boundaries of [R&B] in ways that haven't been equaled since" ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Its roots are in blues, ragtime, European harmony, African rhythmic rituals, spirituals, hymns, marches, vaudeville song, and dance music. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major form of musical expression in traditional and popular music. Jazz is characterized by swing and blue notes, complex chords, call and response vocals, polyrhythms and improvisation. As jazz spread around the world, it drew on national, regional, and local musical cultures, which gave rise to different styles. New Orleans jazz began in the early 1910s, combining earlier brass band marches, French quadrilles, biguine, ragtime and blues with collective polyphonic improvisation. However, jazz did not begin as a single musical tradition in New Orleans or elsewhere. In the 1930s, arranged dance-oriented swing big bands, ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The Love Movement
''The Love Movement'' is the fifth studio album by American hip hop group A Tribe Called Quest, and their last album released during group member Phife Dawg's lifetime. Released on September 29, 1998, by Jive Records, it is a concept album, exploring the lyrical theme of love. Musically, it is a continuation of the group's previous album, ''Beats, Rhymes and Life'', featuring minimalist R&B and jazz-oriented production by The Ummah. The lead single, " Find a Way", charted on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 and was followed by a second single, " Like It Like That". The album debuted at number three on the ''Billboard'' 200 and was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on November 1, 1998. The group announced its disbandment a month before the album's release. Background The roots of ''The Love Movement'' trace back to 1997, when Q-Tip produced a beat intended for The Notorious B.I.G.'s album ''Life After Death''. [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Beats, Rhymes And Life
''Beats, Rhymes and Life'' is the fourth studio album by American hip hop group A Tribe Called Quest. Released on July 30, 1996, by Jive Records, it followed three years after the highly regarded and successful '' Midnight Marauders''. Produced by The Ummah, the album is a departure from the joyful, positive vibe of the group's earlier albums and is regarded as their darkest album in content. It debuted at number one on the ''Billboard'' 200 and was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on October 27, 1998. Background In September 1993, shortly after the recording of '' Midnight Marauders'' had concluded, Phife Dawg moved to Atlanta.Beats, Rhymes And Life was A Tribe Called Quest’s comme ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The Ummah
The Ummah was a music production collective, composed of members Q-Tip and Ali Shaheed Muhammad of A Tribe Called Quest, and the late Jay Dee (also known as J Dilla) of the Detroit-based group Slum Village. Occasional members included Raphael Saadiq, and D'Angelo. In addition to producing nearly the entirety of A Tribe Called Quest's fourth and fifth albums, the Ummah provided backing tracks and remixes for a notable array of hip hop and contemporary R&B artists, including Busta Rhymes, Whitney Houston, Keith Murray, the Brand New Heavies, Michael Jackson, Janet Jackson, and Jon B. The group was so named because two of its members (Tip and Ali) are devout Muslims. The word "ummah" is Arabic for "community", "nation", or "brotherhood". Generally, the term refers to the global Muslim population. Biography Background The collective took shape around 1995; veteran keyboardist Amp Fiddler introduced Jay Dee (who at the time was shopping for a deal for his group) to Q-Tip dur ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |