People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm

Background

A Tribe Called Quest formed in Queens, New York in 1985. After establishing a friendship with hip-hop act Jungle Brothers, both groups formed a collective dubbed Native Tongues, which also included De La Soul.

Group member Q-Tip would have his first studio experience while recording with Jungle Brothers on their debut album Straight out the Jungle (1988). Although this was a learning experience, he acquired more recording and producing knowledge being present at all of De La Soul’s 3 Feet High and Rising (1989) sessions. Recording engineer Shane Faber taught Q-Tip how to use equipment such as the E-mu SP-1200 and Akai S950 samplers, and soon-after, renown producer Large Professor taught him how to use other equipment, for which he would expand upon on People’s Instinctive Travels.

Initially, record labels wouldn't sign A Tribe Called Quest due to their unconventional image and sound, but took interest after the success of 3 Feet High and Rising, which featured appearances from Q-Tip. The group hired Kool DJ Red Alert as their manager, and after shopping their demo to several major labels, they signed a contract with Jive Records in 1989.

Recording

Recording for the album began in late 1989, and finished three months later in early 1990, with "Pubic Enemy" and "Bonita Applebum" as the first tracks recorded.

The group chose Calliope Studios as their primary studio, as they were told no one who worked there would dictate how artists do things. Jungle Brothers, Queen Latifah and Prince Paul with De La Soul and Stetsasonic were all recording new music in separate rooms while A Tribe Called Quest recorded People’s Instinctive Travels. Q-Tip later commented "It was exciting. We were kinda left to our own devices. It was just a great environment, conductive for creating. We didn’t have cell phones, we didn’t have the internet, we didn’t have a bunch of things to tear at us. When we got to the studio, the specific job was to make music. There was no TV in there. It was all instruments and speakers. It was just music".

Q-Tip and Ali Shaheed Muhammad would listen to records several seconds at a time, and re-work them in relationship with other records that would fit. Ali played all live instruments, DJ scratches and programming, while Q-Tip handled everything else with production, including sampling and mixing.

Although claiming "we all helped put the album together", Q-Tip was the only Tribe Called Quest member present at every recording session. Group member Phife Dawg later admitted "I was being ignorant on that first album, that’s why I was only on a couple of tracks. I was hardly around. I would have rather hung out with my boys on the street and got my hustle on rather than gone in the studio. I wasn’t even on the contract for the first album. I was thinking me and Jarobi were more like back-ups for Tip and Ali, but Tip and Ali really wanted me to come through and do my thing".

Music and lyrics

People’s Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm has been described as "a celebration of bohemia, psychadelia and vagabondia", as well as "laid back". The Los Angeles Times described the album as consisting of "mostly happy hip-hop, featuring gently humorous, casual, conversational raps".

Much of the musical landscape on the album consisted of background noises such as a child crying, frogs and Hawaiian strings. The jazz, R&B and rock samples that were used were from artists that most hip-hop producers of the time ignored, or who were unfamiliar with. For the known artists that were sampled, Q-Tip and Ali used breaks that were unique for those artists, which turned out to be highly influential. Ian McCann from NME stated "They break beats from anywhere they want ... and deliver them in an easy, totally sympathetic setting." Entertainment Weekly’s Greg Sandow said the album "has a casual sound, something like laid-back jazz".

Regarding the album’s lyrics, Kris ex from Pitchfork said "The rhymes here are at once conversational and repressed, the topics concurrently large and small. The lyrics are 25 years old. But were they released today they'd seem right on time."

Critical reception

People’s Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm was met with positive reviews. Ian McCann from NME wrote that "A Tribe Called Quest put no feet in the wrong place here. This is not rap, it's near perfection". Entertainment Weekly's Greg Sandow commented that on the album, rather than "defining Afrocentric living", the group "more or less exemplifies it with no fuss at all". Robert Tanzilo from Chicago Tribune stated that the album "avoids the gimmickry and circus atmosphere" of the group's contemporaries, while "focusing solely on the music".

Writing for Los Angeles Times, Dennis Hunt called the album "fascinating" and wrote "These songs lope along in a quirkly, jazz-like pace. They're intriguingly non-linear and quite provocative, even though their meaning is somewhat elusive". In an enthusiastic review, The Source called it a "Completely musical and spiritual approach to hip-hop," and called it "a voyage to the land of positive vibrations, and each cut is a new experience". Chuck Eddy from Rolling Stone stated "the real pleasure on People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm comes from a detailed mesh of instruments and incidental sounds", but went on to say "the rappers of A Tribe Called Quest tend to mumble in understated monotones that feel self-satisfied, even bored".

Accolades

Since its release, People’s Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm has been included on several "best of" lists compiled by music writers and journalists. The following information is adapted from Acclaimed Music.

Track listing

All tracks written and produced by A Tribe Called Quest.

Personnel