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Q-Tip's House Burned Down

© Steve Juon

Yes the news is sad but true: Johnathan "Q-Tip" Davis of the rap group A Tribe Called Quest now finds his home and record collection scattered like ashes to the wind. For full details on this story, you can visit SonicNet; what I'd like to focus on instead of the details though is the impact of this even for hip-hop music and culture.

Now some might jump on me for attributing too much importance to this occurance: they would say the deaths of Christopher "Notorious B.I.G." Wallace and Tupac "2Pac/Makaveli" Shakur were far more significant and impacting to hip-hop. This is a death though all in it's own: without Q-Tip the sound we call Native Tongues would not be. He produced or co-produced with Ali Shaheed Mohammed every record by A Tribe Called Quest. He had master tapes of unreleased songs by Tribe and others -- and while the music of 2Pac and Biggie Smalls lives on in their extensive collected recordings, these songs truly ARE dead and never to recover.

Symbolically, some could say this tragedy is also the death of hip-hop: the flames consuming that which we know and love, leaving only paler weaker imitations like Puff Daddy and the Bad Boy Family to take Q-Tip's place as the sound of New York City. Still, nothing for me could ever replace songs like "I Left My Wallet in El Segundo", "Sucka Nigga", or "Electric Relaxation" as the sound of the Tipster from Queens and his home diggy dawg the five footer Phife.

And as a Phoenix rises from the ashes of the flame reborn, so can Q-Tip. Perhaps losing the past means boldly forging into the future: launching a new sound for A Tribe Called Quest and the Native Tongues leading us boldly into the 21st century with fresh, funky, innovative hip-hop tracks. Tip's Ummah Productions has already shown the ability to make fresh music - the only thing holding it back is the artists who represent on it to make it shine. If Tribe's new album "The Love Movement" features inspired lyrics, the music shall surely be there to match.

And for those who say "Why did it have to happen to a nice guy like Q-Tip? Why couldn't it happen to Puffy?" I say to you this: accept tragedy as part of life and don't wish fates misfortunes on others. If Q-Tip accepts this as part of the cycle just as we accept Biggie and 2Pac's deaths as part of the cycle of life, we all go on and make that we lost live through our love of hip-hop music and culture.

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