Go Ahead in the Rain: Notes to A Tribe Called Quest (American Music Series)

by Hanif Abdurraqib

here is the story of how, even without our drums, we still find a way to speak to each other across any distance placed between us.

Sampling created a dialogue between past and present and helped bridge a gap between the music a rapper was first introduced to and the music they desperately wanted to share with the new world.

The often-untold story about Otis Redding’s death is all about what it is to be unable to save the people you love, even though you want to. It’s a question of choosing to save yourself first over choosing to save everyone else.

to be brilliant. Everyone wants the genius to eventually fall apart as a penance, some punishment for getting too close to the sun.

I no longer determine genius by how much pain someone can endure,

To stay angry at someone you know will forgive your anger is a type of love, or at least it is a type of familiarity that can feel like love.

love them after they are gone, sure. But may we love them even when they fill us with rage, or even when we don’t speak to them for years, or even when we close our fists and our eyes and swing in their direction with all we have.