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David Jude Jolicoeur, who died Sunday February 12 at the age of 54, helped revolutionize hip-hop and changed the course of popular music. That’s why he’s so widely mourned today in the rap community and far beyond. As a third of De La Soul alongside Kelvin “Posdnous” Mercer and DJ Vincent “Maseo” Mason, the Haitian-American musician and producer who has names like “Jude”, “Trugoy the Dove”, “Plug 2” and finally just “Dave” expanded the art form in ways not seen before or since. Many fans — even those familiar with De La classics like “The Magic Number,” played over the end credits of the 2018 film Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse — might appreciate the seismic impact of their 1989 debut album not fully appreciate. 3 feet tall and rising. Generations of artists, from collaborators like Mos Def, J Dilla, and Common to acolytes like Freestyle Fellowship, Hieroglyphics, Open Mike Eagle, and many others, have been inspired by this one-of-a-kind masterpiece.
A handful of De La Soul contemporaries cultivated an equally surreal sensibility, including Ultramagnetic MCs Enigma Kool Keith, Public Enemys Flavor Flav and Digital Underground around “Underwater Rimes”. But 3 Feet High and Rising is the cornerstone of what has come to be known as “alternative rap” and “underground rap.” It wasn’t just the dozens of samples the trio from Amityville, New York and mentor producer Prince Paul crammed into the album, or how they used those references in ways that predecessors like PE didn’t, which was to an unbalanced vortex led by psychedelic funk, sly pop and self-deprecating emotion. It was Posdnous and Dave’s clean voices and introverted slang. They didn’t sound as cool and stylized as Rakim and KRS-One or boomed with authority like LL Cool J and Run-DMC (the latter a huge influence). They rhymed like middle-class kids with a cerebral and quirky sensibility, the rap equivalent of REM and They Might Be Giants.
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Vocally, Posdnous and Dave complemented each other. On that first album, both flowed with quiet, timid grace. On later affairs, such as 1993’s Buhloone Mindstate, Posdnous’s voice became more assertive and prone to declarative statements, leading some listeners to brand him as the lead of “Plug 1”. Meanwhile, Dave kept the same leisurely “Plug 2” pace, even as he refined his cadences and words. He delivered masterclasses of dense, metaphorically rich lyrics, whether it be the meditative, deep-cut classic “I Am I Be” on Buhloone Mindstate or the powerful, conscious chants of “Church” from 2004’s The Grind Date early bird catches the worm in this Rotten Apple/But delve deeper, you’ll find one seed/Plant more, even clear your head,” he rapped on the latter. He could be uncompromisingly silly: his performance as “Ma Whitter” in First Serve, a 2012 collaboration between himself, Posdnous and French producers Chokolate and Khalid Filali, is perhaps the funniest sketch you’ve probably not heard. However, like Posdnous, he did not shy away from making aggressive statements. With 1996’s “Stakes Is High,” he rattled off a list of everything he hated about hip-hop: “I’m tired of bitches shaking their ass / I’m tired of talking about blunts / Me I’m fed up with Versace glasses. ”
The concept of “alternative hip-hop” continues to be controversial. More so than Jungle Brothers and A Tribe Called Quest, her comrades in the storied Long Island rap crew Native Tongues, De La Soul embodied a tension between being conspicuous for his wit and intelligence and racially-tinged claims that it somehow made you better or better feels weirder than other artists. This undying tension between being celebrated or marginalized for one’s uniqueness is one that the De La Soul-inspired underground scene has yet to resolve. But to call the trio “nerds,” either pejoratively or as a badge of honor, is to limit the scope of their Black expression. They ranged from everyday economic worries like “Shopping Bags (She Got From You)”, hot youthful impulses like “Buddy”, child abuse and domestic violence like “Millie Pulled a Pistol on Santa” to drug abuse in “Say No Going.” And then there’s the wonderfully hilarious “Breakadawn,” in which Dave raps about the joy of reaching people in the cheap seats at concerts De La Soul for everyone.
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During De La Soul’s first decade, the group resisted being categorized in often contradictory ways. During an appearance on The Arsenio Hall Show in 1989, they switched from their Top 40 hit “Me Myself and I” to the B-side cut “It Ain’t Hip to Be Labeled a Hippie”. Two years later, they released the sarcastic and cynical 1991 masterpiece De La Soul Is Dead, which effectively dismembered their image as the friendly prophets of the DAISY age. They clashed on tour and sparked rows with rivals over barely covered recording, such as when Dave called out the Notorious BIG, “I have questions about your life if you’re ready to die,” he rapped on 1996’s Long Iceland”. Degrees.” They memorably complained about “rap and bullshit,” but also collaborated with R&B singer Vinia Mojica on the delightful single “A Rollerskating Jam Named ‘Saturdays’.” On Buhloone Mindstate, they sang, “It might go up, but it won’t explode,” struggling to define success in ever-changing terms.
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Much of De La Soul’s work in this century, beginning with 2000’s Art Official Intelligence: Mosaic Thump, has involved aging gracefully in an industry short-sightedly marketed to the youth, and making “adult rap ‘ before it was even called that. They remained skeptical about the game, whether it was teasing guys who thought they’d ditched “All Good” or poking fun at a new breed of arena rap geeks like Drake and Big Sean on First Serve close. However, the reviews are softer and less harsh than those on their prickly and exciting first four albums. De La’s 2016 album and The Anonymous Nobody purposefully spans a spectrum of rap stylists, from well-known mainstream stars like Snoop Dogg and 2 Chainz to underground icons like Roc Marciano and Pete Rock.
Throughout, Dave continued to excel as a subtly effective presence, the middle-aged professorial everyman who wasn’t afraid to let his beautiful thoughts roam. He wrote the kind of heartfelt verse that takes years to fully unpack, like when he raps on “Royalty Capes”: “I’ll be swallowed by the barracudas/Androids read raps from iPhones/I choke the blood out of felt-tip pens.” (In the song’s video, he discusses his suffering from congestive heart failure, which limited his ability to tour and perform.) On occasion, he and De La reminded the world of their massive cultural impact, such as starring in Gorillaz’s smash hit “Feel Good Inc.”, which memorably focuses on Dave’s cackling laughter; and this “Magic Number” drop on Into the Spider-Verse. But when Posdnous showed up alone to rap “Buddy” during the “Hip-Hop 50” tribute at the 2023 Grammy Awards, something seemed amiss. Now it’s clear why Dave was absent.
For those of us worried that younger fans aren’t fully appreciating De La Soul’s groundbreaking career, January’s announcement that her catalog would finally be available on streaming services brought a sense of joyous relief. Finally everyone can begin to explore the depths of an artistic achievement that is second to none. It’s sadly ironic that Dave died just before 3 Feet High and Rising made its streaming debut on March 3rd. Yet his memory echoes three decades of hip-hop brilliance.