ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT Biography
Offering a rootsier take on the Native Tongues aesthetic, Atlanta's Arrested Development made waves in the early 1990s with its Afrocentric, musically diverse approach to hip-hop. With group leader Speech front and center, the collective's debut album, 3 YEARS, 5 MONTHS & 2 DAYS IN THE LIFE OF..., generated several hits and won two Grammys. The band continued to release albums into the 2000s, but the popularity of gangsta rap, the very antithesis of AD's sound, kept them out of the charts.
Arrested Development is and has always been a Hip Hop sound system, sort of like a communal jam band with any number of talented members on board. Speech has always been the hub, but Dionne Farris, Eshe, DJ Kemit, Caron Wheeler, RasaDon, Baba Oje, and many others have contributed to this gumbo of image and sound. Arrested Development’s current lineup includes: Speech-vocals, Za-bass, Omar-drums, Machete X-turntables/vocals, Nicha-vocals, Kikora-dancer/vocals, and Spencer Love-vocals.
A.D.’s debut album 3 years, 5 months and 2 days in the life of…referred to the amount of time passed between the formation of the group and the signing of their first record deal. “Tennessee,” the crew’s bucolic first single and video, is an open letter to God, which, not unlike Billie Holiday’s “Strange Fruit,” gives new meaning to the term “family tree.” The song won an MTV Music Award for best rap single in 1992. “People Everyday,” their second single, is a super funky dancehall-treatment of the immortal Sly Stone anthem “Everyday People,” with new lyrics, which lay out the chilling details of a confrontation between “a nigga and an African.” This song also won them an award for best music video in 1992. “Mr. Wendal,” the band’s biggest hit, humanizes the “bums” on our streets. A.D. donated half of all the royalties from “Mr. Wendal” to the National Coalition for the Homeless. Between 1992 and 1995 Arrested Development released two studio albums and an MTV Unplugged album, which, combined, sold over 6 million units. AD also won two Grammy awards for best new artist and best rap single in 1993.
Arrested Development was the first American act to donate money to Nelson Mandela and the ANC to help South Africans; they worked with director Spike Lee, on the major motion picture biography X (1994) and they were the first act to usher in the present “dirty south” hip hop craze. For many music listeners who turned a deaf ear to hip hop, A.D.’s cd was the first rap album they had ever bought.
After a five-year hiatus, from 1995-2000, the group has reunited and recorded two new studio projects, “Heroes of the Harvest” and “Da Feelin’”(EP). To test the waters they released both cds in Japan, a highly successful solo market for frontman Speech. By 2001, Arrested Development made numerous visits to Japan (three visits alone within the first half of the year), where they performed to standing–room-only crowds. They shot a video to support the album and made special guest appearances on a host of Japanese television shows and participated in an astonishing number of radio and press interviews and photo shoots.
Back home in the U.S., A.D. performed in Atlanta’s ever-popular Music Midtown Festival during the summer of 2001, sharing the stage with Eyrkah Badu and Talib Kweli. When called to support Atlanta Unites, a benefit concert held in Centennial Olympic Park after the 9/11/01 tragedy, Arrested Development did not one, but two sets. VIPs in attendance included a host of national performers, Georgia Governor Roy Barnes, Senator Max Cleland, former U.S. ambassador and Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young, Talk show host Montell Williams, Babbie Mason and many more. The day’s event brought out over 75,000 people and was covered by every news agency in the U.S.
ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT lyrics and albums
