Midnight Marauders CD

Third and last of the "classic" Tribe records it is arguably the group's most musically sophisticated album. The tracks balance jazz, soul, and even reggae influences with pure hip-hop to arrive at a completely distinctive Tribe sound, the logical evolution of the bop-inflected hooks which characterised Low End Theory. Production-wise, Tribe graduates from a cool school aesthetic to an electric jazz sound (reminiscent of fusion-era Miles Davis). Lyrically Midnight Marauders finds the group's abstract poetics in excellent form as usual, and Phife is miles ahead of the Mayor-Flavour rhymes of Can I Kick It.