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Dave Jude Jolicoeur (left), Kelvin Mercer (center) and Vincent Mason (right) of De La Soul attend the A3C Festival & Conference on Oct. 10, 2015, at Loudermilk Center in Atlanta. Photo by Paras Griffin/Getty Images
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New De La Soul documentary

from ‘Mass Appeal’ chronicles the group’s long journey

Clinton Yates @clintonyates
Topics:
All Day Music Hip-Hop De La Soul

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    5:18 PM

    When it comes to lessons on how to stay not only relevant, but successful, there’s no better example in hip-hop than De La Soul. When the three kids from Amityville, Long Island, New York, burst on the scene back in the late 1980s, they were a completely different look and sound from what most of the game was doing in that era. Lazily categorized as rap hippies, their career has spanned four decades.

    Personally, Buhloone Mindstate is my favorite album of theirs, but Stakes Is High probably ranks as the best. Anyway, their journey has been legendary, and with the help of Mass Appeal they now have a documentary to show for it. The half-hour film has a lot of great moments for older heads who remember how the group’s identities were always being tested. There’s a great appearance from then music A&R Dante Ross and, of course, the group itself, along with Prince Paul, is a big part of the film.

    Perhaps the most interesting footage is of both Paul and Maceo making beats. Those clips have the feel of Rhythm Roulette, the feature that the site does featuring random producers plying their trade after a trip to the record store. Anyway, it’s worth noting that when De La Soul tried to crowdfund a record, the group asked for $110,000. Their fans chimed in with more than $600,000.

    Indeed, De La Soul is not dead.

    Clinton Yates is a tastemaker at Andscape. He likes rap, rock, reggae, R&B and remixes — in that order.