Q-Tip: The Renaissance

In rap years, roughly a century passed

between the release of Q-Tip's 1999 solo debut, Amplified, and its

official follow-up, The Renaissance. It wasn't supposed to be that way: In

2002, the hip-hop legend recorded a never-released album of funk-jazz-soul as

alter ego Kamaal The Abstract. So what does the Tribe Called Quest frontman sound

like in 2008 Though it seldom reaches the heights of Q-Tip's seminal early

work with that group, The Renaissance settles into a safe, soothing, mellow

groove early on and sustains it throughout with the help of guest vocalists

Norah Jones, D'Angelo, Amanda Diva, and Raphael Saadiq.

Q-Tip's past haunts the album,

especially on the neo-soultastic "Life Is Better," in which he name-checks the

rappers and producers who took hip-hop from the old school to the present day,

and the J Dilla-produced "Move," which riffs on the chorus of "Scenario" as the

late producer slices and dices a funky old soul sample. The Renaissance is appealingly

modest in scope, a grown-up album for fans who grew up alongside Q-Tip, and

like him, grew estranged from the empty flash of mainstream hip-hop. In a rare

nod to the present, Q-Tip samples Barack Obama before sliding into a jazzy

Tribe Called Quest-style groove on the album-closing "Shaka." The song pays

homage to his lost friends, including J Dilla. It's an appropriately elegiac,

bittersweet conclusion to a solid though less-than-transcendent comeback album

from a hip-hop icon who has survived to make good music, even if he hasn't

exactly thrived.