There are some great moments in the new documentary Beats, Rhymes & Life: The Travels of A Tribe Called Quest: Q-Tip revealing the drums he sampled for “Can I Kick It?"; Black Thought of The Roots clowning Tribe’s early fashions (“They were wearing some real questionable-type shit,” he said, referring to their dashikis); and Busta Rhymes’s smile when reminiscing over “Lyrics to Go,” his favorite Tribe song. There is also a slew of rare archival footage from the late '80’s and early '90’s. (Check out the mullet on Dennis Miller!) Even though the documentary occasionally sinks into VH-1 "Behind the Music" territory, the director Michael Rapaport did a fine [...]

There was a benefit concert at the Knitting Factory in Brooklyn last night to raise money to help A Tribe Called Quest MC Phife Dawg, who has diabetes, pay his medical bills. At the end of the show, Phife's old partners Q-Tip and Ali Shaheed Muhammad joined him onstage to perform a string of songs from 1993's Midnight Marauders album. Here's "Oh My God"-during which Q-Tip mimes the act of giving Phife dialysis-and "Award Tour." Pretty joyous.

Wow. Judging from the trailer, Beats, Rhymes and Fights: A History of A Tribe Called Quest, which will premiere next month at the Sundance Film Festival, will be thrilling and fascinating and celebratory and very emotional. And, needless to say, it will include some of the very greatest hip-hop music ever recorded. Unfortunately, one of the principals, Q-Tip, is not at all happy with it. "I am not in support of the a tribe called quest documentary," he said on his Twitter account yesterday, referencing the fact that director Michael Rapaport did not honor requests the band made about the film. (I'm guessing those requests were regarding [...]

How rap builds itself on itself: Brooklyn MC Red Cafe has a new song out called "I'm Ill." I like it. But not everyone does. (The Pigeons and Planes website says "This track might be Mr. Marty Mediocre's favorite new song." Ha! Marty Mediocre must hang out with Plain Jane McLame and Norman McNormalson.) The song is interesting, though, at the very least, as a study of how production trends work. The beat is built around a vocal sample of Jay-Z saying "I'm Ill" on a record he released last year called "A Billie." "A Billie" featured Jay rhyming over the beat from Lil Wayne's hit "A [...]

Now available for (slow) download: DJ Jazzy Jeff and Mick Boogie's 49-track beat-the-heat mix, which incorporates some of the greatest sunshine jams ever (including a remix of the title track). [Via]