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Arrested Development

An Atlanta hip-hop group built around Speech that answered the gangsta rap of 1992 with a debut about spirituality, peace and love, and won the Grammy for Best New Artist.

Origin
Atlanta, Georgia, United States
Years active
to 1996, 2000-present
Genres
hip hop, conscious hip hop, alternative hip hop
Labels
Chrysalis, Vagabond Records and Tapes

Atlanta

Arrested Development formed in Atlanta around Speech, a rapper and producer born Todd Thomas in Milwaukee, and the turntablist Headliner. Speech had met Baba Oje at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where both were students, and asked him to join a hip-hop group. Baba means father in Swahili. Speech said he wanted an elder in the band after seeing older and younger people spend time together in Jamaica, and that Baba agreed once it emerged that he had been best man at Speech's parents' wedding. The line-up grew to include the vocalist and stylist Aerle Taree, the drummer Rasa Don and the dancer Montsho Eshe.

The group offered an Afrocentric, socially conscious alternative to the rise of gangsta rap. Speech wrote and produced, and said he usually began with a melody and a beat before the words came. He made Tennessee in a studio in his bedroom, before the group had a label.

The debut

3 Years, 5 Months and 2 Days in the Life Of... came out on Chrysalis on 24 March 1992 and takes its title from how long it took the group to get a record deal. It spawned three American top-10 singles, Tennessee, People Everyday and Mr. Wendal. Speech said the album reached number three on the pop chart, and it was certified platinum. It was reported to have sold more than six million copies worldwide.

Critics rated it highly. It topped the Village Voice Pazz and Jop poll for 1992, and The Wire named it record of the year. Entertainment Weekly gave it an A+ and called the group the anti-gangsta. Robert Christgau was not convinced and rated it a dud, though he later singled out Tennessee as a choice cut. Spike Lee asked Speech for a song for his film Malcolm X, and the group wrote Revolution for the soundtrack. On 17 December 1992 they were recorded for MTV Unplugged at the Ed Sullivan Theater in New York, and the performance was released as Unplugged. In 1993 they won two Grammy Awards, Best New Artist, the first for a hip-hop act, and Best Rap Performance by a Duo or Group.

Split and return

Zingalamaduni, released on 14 June 1994, took its title from a Swahili phrase meaning the beehive of culture. Its lead single, Ease My Mind, was nominated for a Grammy, but the album peaked at 55 on the Billboard 200 and was a commercial disappointment next to the debut. The group broke up in 1996, and Speech began a solo career with an album for Chrysalis the same year.

They reunited in 2000 and released records through Speech's Vagabond Productions. Aerle Taree did not return. In November 2003 the group sued the Fox network over the name of the television show Arrested Development. In June 2005 they won the first round of the contest show Hit Me, Baby, One More Time with Tennessee. In 2008 they visited and sang with Debbie Peagler, an incarcerated survivor of domestic violence, and the gospel choir she led at a California women's prison.

Later years

In January 2011 the group played the Sydney Festival with Emmylou Harris to a crowd of 50,000. Their 2012 album Standing at the Crossroads was recorded entirely on a laptop and given away free from their website. Baba Oje died on 26 October 2018, aged 86. Speech called him the oldest member of any hip-hop collective. The group released the album Craft and Optics that year, received an award from Black Music Honors in 2019, and in December 2023 issued Hip Hop Saves Lives with Chuck D and Grandmaster Caz.

The critic Steve Huey later wrote that the debut was a major influence on a new breed of alternative Southern hip-hop, naming Goodie Mob, Outkast and Nappy Roots. Spin noted that when the group arrived with its Afrocentric clothes and philosophical lyrics, Outkast's first album was still two years away.

Members

Records

Songs

Sly and the Family Stone, Outkast, Goodie Mob, De La Soul, Prince

Where to go next

Reference

Writing and criticism

Interviews

Sources

  1. Arrested Development (group), Wikipedia
  2. Speech of Arrested Development, Songfacts (2008-02-27)
  3. Arrested Development's Speech on Tennessee, Spin (2024-07-25)
  4. Baba Oje of Arrested Development Dead at 86, Pitchfork (2018-10-30)
  5. Speech (rapper), Wikipedia