High and Rising: A Book About De la Soul

A stunning achievement that weaves cultural biography with memoir, HIGH & RISING is the first book about De La Soul, the era-defining hip-hop trio whose alternative ethos defied classification, touched millions of lives, and changed rap forever. ?De La Soul burst onto the scene with the release of their groundbreaking 1989 album 3 Feet High & Rising , an “anything goes” hip-hop masterpiece rooted in the tenets of rap but powered by a wandering imagination that landed in outer space. Between their dusty drums and obscure samples, De La’s debut was received as a new masterwork from a bygone era of Black experimentation. Formed in Amityville, Long Island in 1988 by Kelvin "Posdnuos" Mercer, Dave "Trugoy the Dove" Jolicoeur, and Vincent "Maseo" Mason, De La Soul rebuked classification. De La was just De La, the friendly avant-garde trio that dared to be different. They didn’t portray themselves as gangsters like N.W.A, or smooth-talking ladies’ men like Big Daddy Kane or LL Cool J. Instead, De La appealed to the Black alternative, to those who liked rap but also jazz and punk, and maybe owned a skateboard or played in the school band. Their music was positive and psychedelic, their album art and music videos were full of flowers and pink peace signs. Theirs was a rap with a broad sonic palette driven by out-of-the-box sampling which would set a blueprint for artists like A Tribe Called Quest, The Roots, Pharrell, Kid Cudi, Kanye West, and Kendrick Lamar. But as quickly as De La ascended, they were faced with the pressures of an industry and record label that didn’t know what to do with them, legal battles around copyrights and sampling, and disagreements within the group about creative direction. Written by acclaimed New York Times jazz critic and author of The Butterfly Effect on Kendrick Lamar, High & Rising tells the whole story—the positive, the negative, the self-inflicted distress and eventual redemption of the band. In the process the book unpacks the birth of hip-hop and the evolution of alternative rap. Marcus also weaves in a deeply personal coming-of-age story about his journey through life and culture as a fan and young black man. HIGH & RISING is not just a hip-hop tale, it’s a triumphant book about staying the course, and how staying true to your integrity can lead to dynamic results.

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