On this date a quarter century ago, Big Boi and Andre 3000 came together to release their second album ATLiens on R&B icons’ LA Reid and Babyface’s LaFace Records. On this album, the Southern playalistic duo expands their subject matter from just their urban tales from the hood to explorations of extraterrestrial life on Planet Earth.
Outkast’s most recognizable aspect of their creativity is their hooks, which is almost a trademark for the entire Organized Noize family, but really took root as Big Boi and Andre 3 Stacks signature sound on this album, with songs like “ATLiens” and “Elevators(Me And You)” spearheading the success of this album.
The commercial success of the album was proof of the duo’s ability to relay their morphing sounds to their listeners, with the ATLiens project selling one million copies in three months and reaching double platinum in less than seven years.
Shout out to Andre 3000, Big Boi, and the rest of the Organized Noize crew for this timeless piece of Hip Hop History!
On this date in 1996, Big Boi and Andre 3000 came together to release their second album ATLiens on R&B icons’ LA Reid and Babyface’s LaFace Records. On this album, the Southern playalistic duo expands their subject matter from just their urban tales from the hood to explorations of extraterrestrial life on Planet Earth.
Outkast’s most recognizable aspect of their creativity is their hooks, which is almost a trademark for the entire Organized Noize family, but really took root as Big Boi and Andre 3 Stacks signature sound on this album, with songs like “ATLiens” and “Elevators(Me And You)” spearheading the success of this album.
The commercial success of the album was proof of the duo’s ability to relay their morphing sounds to their listeners, with the ATLiens project selling one million copies in three months and reaching double platinum in less than seven years.
Shout out to Andre 3000, Big Boi and the rest of the Organized Noize crew for this timeless piece of Hip Hop History!
Big Boi recently purchased the home that included The Dungeon Studio. In the basement of Rico Wade’s family’s house back in the early 1990s, OutKast, Goodie Mob, and other artists recorded some of their earliest music. Wade’s Organized Noize, with Sleepy Brown and Ray Murray, was at the helm, mentoring the young groups. By the mid-1990s, the Dungeon Family collective became a dominant super group within Hip-Hop, recording multiple classic albums through ensemble collaboration. Twenty-five years after Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik, Big Boi has those early days on his mind. For his latest tour, the OutKast co-founder is bringing Goodie Mob, Organized Noize, and K.P. The Great on the road with him. Goodie will include CeeLo Green. Tickets are currently available here. Big Boi Buys The Dungeon Studio That Birthed Early OutKast Albums The tour will begin in Chicago on April 14 and make its way through major market cities on the East Coast and the South before concluding on April 27 in Asheville, North Carolina. DATES/LOCATIONS: April 14 – Chicago, IL – House of Blues April 16 – Nashville, TN – Marathon Music Works April 17 – New Orleans, LA – The Fillmore New Orleans April 18 – Dallas, TX – Bomb Factory April 20 – Atlanta, GA – Fox Theater April 22 – Washington, DC – The Howard Theater April 23 – New York, NY – Terminal 5 April 24 – Philadelphia, PA – The Fillmore April 25 – Boston, MA – House of Blues April 27 – Asheville, NC – Salvage Station DJ Paul Gives The Secret History To UGK & OutKast’s “Int’l Players Anthem”(Video)Big Boi has been busy lately. He debuted his Atlien jacket at the Super Bowl during his performance (alongside Travis Scott and Maroon 5), which is now available at OutKast.com. He released new songs “Doin’ It” (featuring Sleepy Brown) and “Return Of The Dope Boi” (featuring Killer Mike and Backbone). “Doin’ It” also received the visual treatment. In 2018, Big Boi hit the road by himself extensively for his Daddy Fat Saxxx Tour to promote his then-recently album Boomiverse. Three years ago, Organized Noize starred in a Netflix documentary, The Art of OrganizedNoize, directed by QDIII. In 2017, the trio released an eponymous EP. Goodie Mob last released 2013’s Age Against The Machine album. Big Boi’s Tiny Desk Performance Is So Fresh & So Clean (Video)#BonusBeat: “Return Of The Dope Boy”:
Big Boi took the stage at the Super Bowl last night (Feb. 3) but that won’t be the last place you see him this year. Big Boi, the Goodie Mobb collective of Cee-Lo, Big Gipp, Khujo and T-Mo, Organized Noize’s Sleepy Brown, Rico Wade, and Ray Marry, along with KP The Great will tour for the first time in 25 years as the Dungeon Family. Unfortunately, Andre 3000 will not be apart of the tour.
The 2019 Dungeon Family reunion will take over the country this spring starting on April 14 in Chicago before wrapping up on April 27 in Asheville, North Carolina. Dates in New Orleans, Dallas, New York, Atlanta, and Washington D.C. and more are sprinkled in the middle.
Earlier today, Cee-Lo showed support for his Dungeon Family brother, Big Boi, who graced the Super Bowl half-time show stage on Sunday (Feb. 3). Big Boi followed up his performance with the release of his new singles “Doin’ It” and “Return of the Dope Boi.”
April 14th – Chicago, IL – House of Blues
April 16th – Nashville, TN – Marathon Music Works
April 17th – New Orleans, LA – The Fillmore New Orleans
April 18th – Dallas, TX – Bomb Factory
April 20th – Atlanta, GA – Fox Theater
April 22nd – Washington, DC – The Howard Theater
April 23rd – New York, NY – Terminal 5
April 24th – Philadelphia, PA – The Fillmore
April 25th – Boston, MA – House of Blues
April 27th – Asheville, NC – Salvage Station
D&D, Can-Am, Chung King. Hip-Hop has its fair share of famous recording studios. In Atlanta, few labs rival the notoriety of The Dungeon. This grimy, no-frills lair in Rico Wade’s mother’s basement in Lakewood Heights section of East Atlanta, Georgia would be a meeting place and breeding ground for some of Hip-Hop’s most talented voices. Notably, this early 1990s class includes OutKast, Organized Noize, Goodie Mob, Witchdoctor, Mr. DJ, and Big Rube, among others.
Today, OutKast co-founder Big Boi revealed that he purchased the home that once housed the basement studio. The Dungeon Family member confirmed the real estate venture on Twitter. He shouted out his D.F. team too.
Notably, OutKast recorded 1994’s Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik debut there, as well as 1996’s ATLiens and 1998’s Aquemini. Later in the decade, the pair would purchase Bobby Brown’s Bosstown lab, and reintroduce it as Stankonia. They named their third LP after the new home base.
Additionally, Goodie Mob made their Dirty South LP in the dank basement. The location was a focal point of the 2016 Flavor Unit documentary The Art Of Organized Noize. That works focused on Wade, Sleepy Brown, and Ray Murray’s chemistry, and their mentorship of local talent, especially Big, André 3000, CeeLo Green, and others.
D&D, Can-Am, Chung King. Hip-Hop has its fair share of famous recording studios. In Atlanta, few labs rival the notoriety of The Dungeon. This grimy, no-frills lair in Rico Wade’s mother’s basement in Lakewood Heights section of East Atlanta, Georgia would be a meeting place and breeding ground for some of Hip-Hop’s most talented voices. Notably, this early 1990s class includes OutKast, Organized Noize, Goodie Mob, Witchdoctor, Mr. DJ, and Big Rube, among others.
Today, OutKast co-founder Big Boi revealed that he purchased the home that once housed the basement studio. The Dungeon Family member confirmed the real estate venture on Twitter. He shouted out his D.F. team too.
Notably, OutKast recorded 1994’s Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik debut there, as well as 1996’s ATLiens and 1998’s Aquemini. Later in the decade, the pair would purchase Bobby Brown’s Bosstown lab, and reintroduce it as Stankonia. They named their third LP after the new home base.
Additionally, Goodie Mob made their Dirty South LP in the dank basement. The location was a focal point of the 2016 Flavor Unit documentary The Art Of Organized Noize. That works focused on Wade, Sleepy Brown, and Ray Murray’s chemistry, and their mentorship of local talent, especially Big, André 3000, CeeLo Green, and others.
Twenty-five years ago this season, OutKast released their first single, “Player’s Ball.” Big Boi and André 3000 had appeared on TLC’s remix to “What About Your Friends” as teenagers in 1992. Like that opportunity, “Player’s Ball” was birthed out of LaFace Records trying to cross-promote its fledgling Rap duo.
For the 1993 holiday, A LaFace Family Christmas would be one of many label compilations marketed to fans. TLC, Toni Braxton, and Usher were centerpieces on the 10 tracks, and rightfully so. On the cover with those three acts, as well as A Few Good Men, was ‘Kast, barely showing their faces under the big wreath graphic from Antonio “L.A.” Reid and Babyface’s imprint.
That was by design. Since the Tri-Cities High School students rapped before the run-out on TLC’s 12″, their label was reportedly not wowed by the group’s sound. “[L.A. Reid] was like, ‘Yeah, I think I like them, but I don’t think that they’re stars,” André 3000 recalled in the 2016 Netflix documentary, The Art of Organized Noize. Presumably, the Christmas compilation needed filler for the R&B ballads from buzzing vocalists. The label brass turned to ‘Kast’s producers to cook up something. As respected labels like Death Row, Tommy Boy, and Def Jam typically did, soundtracks were a place to test the waters, even if the prospects felt grim.
Veteran production trio Organized Noize was grooming OutKast, as they had been for some time. Ray Murray, Rico Wade, and Sleepy Brown were recording the teenagers’ vocals in Wade’s grandmother’s basement, affectionately remembered as The Dungeon. That’s when they got the call from LaFace. In 2012, Wade told Complex‘s Linda Hobbs, “[The] thing is, we don’t really f*ck with Christmas like that. That’s where we were at the time, we were on some, ‘Christmas is not one day out the year, it’s every day.’ For us, it was just about being realistic. People get caught up in the excitement of, ‘I got to buy this, I got to do this and that” and they lose they mind.” The hitmaker added, “I told OutKast, ‘We gotta do a Christmas, song but we’ll just talk about what we don’t do on Christmas, or what it means to us.’” He would later pinch a beat that partner Ray Murray had been work-shopping for a group called The Drip Drop to bring what Dre and Big wrote to life.
High Snobiety aggregated a MySpace interview back in 2016 that captured the reluctance in the studio. Wade says, “I thought, ‘How the f*ck are we gonna do a Christmas song? We’re a Rap group! How are we gonna get any respect?’” They did, simply by refusing to compromise.
As legend has it, a straightforward Christmas song called “Socks & Drawz” evolved into a present for what was to come in the form of “Player’s Ball.” The song made the Christmas compilation, as did a 55-second “Joy All Day” interlude oddly credited to the duo, despite its lack of a clear-cut connection to the group.
Although it holds back the red-and-green socks, scarves, and any mentions of mistletoe, “Players Ball” is a Christmas record at its core, especially on the compilation verse. One can hear it in the sleigh bell percussion of the song, and the opening line, “It’s beginning to look a lot like wha—.” The line is a sardonic contrast to the fairy-tale winter wonderlands and the Dirty South reality. That attitude holds through 3 Stacks’ verse, which references snow, “tis the season,” and “Silent Night.” He closes with that mantra, “You thought I’d break my neck, to help y’all deck the halls? / Oh naw, I got other means of celebratin’, I’m gettin blizzard at HoJo, I got that hoochie waitin’ I made it through another year can’t ask fo’ nothin much mo’/ It’s OutKast for the books I thought you knew so now you know.”
The Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik version finds ‘Dre stuttering and covering up some of the seasonal cues, as well as the mention of Christmas Day and chimneys in the chorus to prevent an excellent song from being pigeonholed.
In the second verse, Big Boi references the lack of a Christmas gift wish-list in his cold reality, after opening the bars with “Hallelujah, Hallelujah,” broken down into syllables. OutKast took an assignment and made art out of it. Big and ‘Dre did not do what so many rappers in their position would have—just tried at another come-and-go record to appease the label and built-in fanbase. Instead, they went big and bold. They stayed true to the notion that not all Christmases are white, plentiful, and happy. This realness resonated, in a way that made a Christmas record sound hot in the middle of an Atlanta summer.
The song, serviced as a single in November of 1993, would take on a life of its own. The record superseded filler on a predictable label compilation and became the first taste of a game-changing 1994 album, Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik. Puff Daddy directed the video that left the Santa hats and wreaths at home. That release began an album-run as historic as any in Hip-Hop.
Twenty-five years ago this season, OutKast released their first single, “Player’s Ball.” Big Boi and André 3000 had appeared on TLC’s remix to “What About Your Friends” as teenagers in 1992. Like that opportunity, “Player’s Ball” was birthed out of LaFace Records trying to cross-promote its fledgling Rap duo.
For the 1993 holiday, A LaFace Family Christmas would be one of many label compilations marketed to fans. TLC, Toni Braxton, and Usher were centerpieces on the 10 tracks, and rightfully so. On the cover with those three acts, as well as A Few Good Men, was ‘Kast, barely showing their faces under the big wreath graphic from Antonio “L.A.” Reid and Babyface’s imprint.
That was by design. Since the Tri-Cities High School students rapped before the run-out on TLC’s 12″, their label was reportedly not wowed by the group’s sound. “[L.A. Reid] was like, ‘Yeah, I think I like them, but I don’t think that they’re stars,” André 3000 recalled in the 2016 Netflix documentary, The Art of Organized Noize. Presumably, the Christmas compilation needed filler for the R&B ballads from buzzing vocalists. The label brass turned to ‘Kast’s producers to cook up something. As respected labels like Death Row, Tommy Boy, and Def Jam typically did, soundtracks were a place to test the waters, even if the prospects felt grim.
Veteran production trio Organized Noize was grooming OutKast, as they had been for some time. Ray Murray, Rico Wade, and Sleepy Brown were recording the teenagers’ vocals in Wade’s grandmother’s basement, affectionately remembered as The Dungeon. That’s when they got the call from LaFace. In 2012, Wade told Complex‘s Linda Hobbs, “[The] thing is, we don’t really f*ck with Christmas like that. That’s where we were at the time, we were on some, ‘Christmas is not one day out the year, it’s every day.’ For us, it was just about being realistic. People get caught up in the excitement of, ‘I got to buy this, I got to do this and that” and they lose they mind.” The hitmaker added, “I told OutKast, ‘We gotta do a Christmas, song but we’ll just talk about what we don’t do on Christmas, or what it means to us.’” He would later pinch a beat that partner Ray Murray had been work-shopping for a group called The Drip Drop to bring what Dre and Big wrote to life.
High Snobiety aggregated a MySpace interview back in 2016 that captured the reluctance in the studio. Wade says, “I thought, ‘How the f*ck are we gonna do a Christmas song? We’re a Rap group! How are we gonna get any respect?’” They did, simply by refusing to compromise.
As legend has it, a straightforward Christmas song called “Socks & Drawz” evolved into a present for what was to come in the form of “Player’s Ball.” The song made the Christmas compilation, as did a 55-second “Joy All Day” interlude oddly credited to the duo, despite its lack of a clear-cut connection to the group.
Although it holds back the red-and-green socks, scarves, and any mentions of mistletoe, “Players Ball” is a Christmas record at its core, especially on the compilation verse. One can hear it in the sleigh bell percussion of the song, and the opening line, “It’s beginning to look a lot like wha—.” The line is a sardonic contrast to the fairy-tale winter wonderlands and the Dirty South reality. That attitude holds through 3 Stacks’ verse, which references snow, “tis the season,” and “Silent Night.” He closes with that mantra, “You thought I’d break my neck, to help y’all deck the halls? / Oh naw, I got other means of celebratin’, I’m gettin blizzard at HoJo, I got that hoochie waitin’ I made it through another year can’t ask fo’ nothin much mo’/ It’s OutKast for the books I thought you knew so now you know.”
The Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik version finds ‘Dre stuttering and covering up some of the seasonal cues, as well as the mention of Christmas Day and chimneys in the chorus to prevent an excellent song from being pigeonholed.
In the second verse, Big Boi references the lack of a Christmas gift wish-list in his cold reality, after opening the bars with “Hallelujah, Hallelujah,” broken down into syllables. OutKast took an assignment and made art out of it. Big and ‘Dre did not do what so many rappers in their position would have—just tried at another come-and-go record to appease the label and built-in fanbase. Instead, they went big and bold. They stayed true to the notion that not all Christmases are white, plentiful, and happy. This realness resonated, in a way that made a Christmas record sound hot in the middle of an Atlanta summer.
The song, serviced as a single in November of 1993, would take on a life of its own. The record superseded filler on a predictable label compilation and became the first taste of a game-changing 1994 album, Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik. Puff Daddy directed the video that left the Santa hats and wreaths at home. That release began an album-run as historic as any in Hip-Hop.
