Bend Me, Shape Me #4: 3 Feet High and Rising

"Let me introduce myself, I'm Mr. Monkey"

De La Soul's debut record 3 Feet High and Rising was released on Tommy Boy Records 19 years ago.

They cultivated, then rejected their early "hippie" image

Dayum.

This is one of the very few records that I loved immediately (many of my all-time favorites took several listens to warm to), never got sick of, and believe sounds as good today to my 36-year-old ears as it did to my 17-year-old ears when it was released.

Rare is the debut that instantly changes an entire genre, but that is exactly what happened to rap* when Long Island, NY teenagers De La Soul (Kelvin Mercer/"Posdnuos", David Jude Jolicoeur/"Trugoy the Dove" and Vincent Mason/"P.A. Pasemaster Mace", plus producer Paul Huston/"Prince Paul") first hit the record stores. I imagine it's what rock and roll fans felt when Jimi Hendrix released "Are You Experienced" in 1967... things would never be the same (and in a good way!).

*I say "rap" because nobody called it hip-hop back then. Well, at least nobody in North Carolina.

Native Tongue in tha house

Before 3 Feet, I had no idea what sampling was. Their sampling, like in most of my favorite hip-hop records, not only gave you instant listening pleasure but also served double duty as a "heads up" on semi-obscure records containing the funkiest of drum breaks, horn sections, and contextually relevant lyrics.

There's no counting how many records I've dug up because at some point I recognized a De La sample in a song on the radio or wherever, but here are some of my favorite discoveries:

"Rock Creek Park" by The Blackbyrds on "Ghetto Thang"
"Five Feet High and Rising" by Johnny Cash on "The Magic Number"
“I’m Chief Kamanawanalea (We’re the Royal Macadamia Nuts)” on "Say No Go" and "You Showed Me" by The Turtles (from the underrated concept album The Turtles Present the Battle of the Bands, the usage of which cost De La many dollars)

not to mention

"School House Rock" fave "Three is the Magic Number by Bob Dorough (on "The Magic Number") which was one of the first and most/mos deft/def) instances of applying positive Gen-X childhood memories to elicit a pleasure/purchase response.

These fellow music nerds were made cool(er) when De La used "Peg" in "Eye Know"

For me, one of the great joys in listening to/absorbing so many great hip-hop albums from the late 80s to the mid 90s is the constant process of discovering samples and influences in the music I continue to hear/buy today. When I pick up a top-shelf funk compilation like The Mighty Mellow or The Sound of Funk, I can count on a few "ah HA" moments when I finally match a song with a favorite sample usage.

Guys loved 3 Feet High and Rising. Girls loved 3 Feet. Rap fans, pop fans, dance music fans, soul fans all loved it. The stoned and the straightlaced. Hip-hop heads and hip-hop haters.

"Mmm when a D.A.I.S.Y. grows in your mind."

In the calendar year containing early 1989 thru early 1990, 3 Feet, Paul's Boutique by the Beastie Boys and Fear of a Black Planet by Public Enemy were all released, and for that moment all other genres of music seemed obsolete by comparison. A full album (i.e. not just a single) has rarely been as much fun to listen to alone, with friends, or with hundreds of fellow dancers as 3 Feet. It has it all- a booty, a funny bone, a mind, a conscience, a soul.

"De la Soul, from the soul"

**If you're new to the site, the goal of the Bend Me, Shape Me series can be found here.**

Word Salad Surgery

I used to love hip-hop, and I still have a great deal of fondness for the decade 1985-1994 when hip-hop albums still ran the gamut from cheeky party music (Slick Rick, Biz Markie (whom we also have to thank for the exclamation "Oh Snap!")) to philosophizin' booty-shakers (Public Enemy, De La Soul) to simply the illest (Paris, Eric B & Rakim). For an already-devoted reader, obsessive music fan, and fledgling writer, that period's liner notes provided a wealth of lyrical inspiration... a new album could take the whole afternoon to listen to properly.

"steadily the melody plays"

People have been frontin' that they're hard and/or down for as long as hip-hop has existed, and though I never (OK, rarely) perpetrated that I was from the mean streets, I did adopt many words into my personal lexicon taken from the lyrics and worldview of my preferred era of hip-hop.

A personal favorite that I still use today (and may or may not earn me snickers behind my back) is "word". Word is such a malleable word, and with the proper inflection it can be used in many situations when belaboring the point just isn't the right call.

Here's a decent definition stitched together from multiple entries at urbandictionary.com.

A versatile declaration, originating (more or less) in hip-hop culture. "Word" has no single meaning, but is used to convey a casual sense of affirmation, acknowledgement, agreement, or to indicate that something has impressed you favorably. "Word" is the shortened form of the phrase: "my word is my bond" which was originated by inmates in U.S. prisons. The longer phrase was shortened to "word is bond" before becoming "word," which is most commonly used. It basically means "truth." Or "to speak the truth." Can also be used as a question, meaning "really?"

Word.

I'm down with Cameo, but I prefer dropping the "up"

Word can also be a surprisingly evocative modifier, as these medical terminology uses attest:

word salad : noun : a confused or unintelligible mixture of seemingly random words and phrases, specifically • (in psychiatry) as a form of speech indicative of advanced schizophrenia. • as a means of bypassing a spam filter for e-mail.

word blindness : noun : less technical term for alexia , or (less accurately) for dyslexia .

word deafness : noun : an inability to identify spoken words, resulting from a brain defect such as Wernicke's aphasia.

Here's one you don't hear often but that I nominate for reconsideration:

wordage: noun : words collectively • quantity or amount of words • verbiage, wordiness

please don't get me this for my birthday

Which of course makes us appreciate the awkward (awkword?) word "wordiness" and makes me start humming Tom Tom Club's oft-sampled 1981 namechecker "Wordy Rappinghood".

You know what I like about blogging? Stream of consciousness writing. Faulkner would have been a helluva blogger.

The list of phrases that word is used in is too long to even consider playing favorites with, but if I must I'd pick "have a word with". Has anything pleasant ever resulted in a conversation that opens with "Can I have a word with you?"

I'm just trying to keep the "Word" in The Word Player. Knowhaimsayin'?

My Grandfather "Big Bill" was a veritable fountain of words to the wise, and one of my favorites was what he called "The Three B's of Public Speaking":

"Be Brief, Baby."

It doesn't get much briefer than "Word".