“3 Feet High and Rising” by De La Soul

Celebrating the 35th anniversary of this sterling debut.

Hello! 😊👋

Welcome to a new edition of the Best Music of All Time newsletter!

Today’s music pick celebrates the upcoming 35th anniversary of one of hip-hop’s most original debuts.

Genre: Hip-Hop, Experimental

Label: Tommy Boy

Release Date: March 3, 1989

Vibe: 💖💖💖

To understand how radically different 3 Feet High and Rising, De La Soul’s delectable full-length debut, sounded in 1989, you need only look at hip-hop’s release calendar in the preceding 12 months.

Career-defining releases from Public Enemy, N.W.A., Big Daddy Kane, and the D.O.C. positioned the genre as reserved for the hardest thugs and the most militant social justice advocates. The gangsta rap boom at the dawn of the 90s meant that, artistically as well as in the public discourse, hip-hop was considered many things, but “fun” wasn’t always one of them. 3 Feet High served as more than just an era-specific market corrector. With endlessly influential, sample-heavy production (an aspect that kept the album off streaming services for too long), tongue-in-cheek rhymes, and a psychedelic je-ne-sais-quoi, it’s one of those hip-hop records that pushed the boundaries of what artists, critics, and consumers alike thought the genre could be. In many ways, we’re still having those same conversations.

Beyond fun, “transcendent” is a term I’d use to describe this record, not simply in terms of its influence but, underneath the coy humor, also the profoundly human experiences the trio (Kelvin “Posdnous” Mercer, Vincent “Maseo” Mason, and the late Dave “Trugoy the Dove” Jolicoeur) embed in their lyrics. There are treatises on true love (”Eye Know”), the loss of innocence that perhaps comes hand in hand with that transformation (”Jenifa Taught Me (Derwin's Revenge)”), getting (ahem) physical (”Buddy”), and, remarkably, saying no to drugs (”Say No Go”). Along the way, Maseo and Prince Paul take an everything-and-the-kitchen-sink approach to production, including snippets from sources as wide-ranging as Steely Dan, Johnny Cash, Hall & Oates, and, on “Potholes On My Lawn,” yodeling.

Spawning several hits, including the infectious “Me, Myself, and I,” I’m not sure there’s been a rap album this weird that’s developed as significant a pop culture following as 3 Feet. It’s a testament to how idiosyncratic positivity still works, even when the marketplace may imply otherwise.

👉 Don’t forget to click the album image to stream the album on your favorite platform 👈