A Tribe Called Quest’s “We the People…” Is Necessary Now
A Tribe Called Quest recorded “We the People,” a ferocious and driving song about intolerance and fear, in the same fertile time they recorded all of We Got It From Here… Thank You 4 Your Service, the first new Tribe album in 18 years. It was a period of joyful reconnection for Q-Tip and the late Phife, galvanized by Tribe’s November 2015 performance on “Jimmy Fallon.” At that time, about four months had passed since Republican primary contender Donald Trump started promising his rally attendees that he would “build a great, great wall” separating the border of the U.S. and Mexico. The Paris attacks erupted the night Tribe did “Fallon.” And then came Trump’s proposition to temporarily ban all Muslims from entering the country. These currents must have swirled among Tribe as they sat to write and record.
Tribe are political rappers the way New Yorkers are political—matter-of-factly, and between and among the business of living. They love to talk, but they don’t love to hear themselves talk, a minor but massive distinction. “All you Black folks, you must go/All you Mexicans, you must go/And all you poor folks, you must go/Muslims and gays, boy we hate your ways,” chants Q-Tip sadly in the chorus, not sounding like a protester as much as someone on the neighborhood corner, repeating what they can’t believe they’re hearing.
Phife, meanwhile, reminds us all just who taught hip-hop to inhale swagger and exhale consciousness: “We got your missy smitten rubbing on her little kitten/Dreaming of a world that’s equal for women with no division.” The song, simply put, is a sliver-sized miracle, a crack of light illuminating the door in a dark wall. This is the function Tribe songs have always served—they point to a path through wilderness. As Tip said so many years ago: “Come and spread your arms if you really need a hug.” They are here now that we need them again.
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