Do You Want More?!!!??!

“You are all about to witness some organic Hip-Hop-Jazz! One-hundred percent groove!”, exhorts The Roots’ mouthpiece Black Thought at the outset of 1994’s *Do You Want More*. What follows is a remarkable demonstration of instrumental and lyrical virtuosity that finds Black Thought and drummer and arranger ?uestlove leading The Roots through a series of loose, abstracted instrumental grooves and Old School inflected rhymes. They chart a bold course through the history of African American music, embracing the jazzy meanderings of Horace Silver, the tight grooves of the JB’s, the enlightening lyrics of KRS-One, and countless points in between. This music is, at its root, classic Hip-Hop with it’s feet firmly planted in the progressive aesthetic of contemporaries like Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, and a host of other boundary pushing rap outfits of the early nineties. The Roots’ subsequent triumphs, such as 1999’s sublime *Things Fall Apart*, have overshadowed the significant accomplishments of *Do You Want More* an album that deserves to be considered a Hip-Hop classic.

The singular hip-hop band’s second album is a story about America and Philadelphia, memory and survival. Like a good book, it goes by quickly, yet you force yourself to linger.