Arrested Development takes great pride in its artistic legacy.
That’s why cofounder and frontman, Speech, is stumped by Rolling Stone magazine’s exclusion of the acclaimed rap group’s breakthrough LP from its 200 Greatest Hip-hop Albums of All Time list.
“Rollingstone owes y’all somе answers/ In 93 they called us band of thе year/ But look it here in 2022/ They abandon us,” Speech raps on “Hip Hop Saves Lives,” off the group’s latest full-length, Bullets In The Chamber.
“Rolling Stone was one of the more notable magazines that championed Arrested Development, and I thank them for that,” says the rapper. “They called us ‘Band of the Year’ in 1993, which is an honor. But in 2022, out of 200 slots, they didn’t find it appropriate to include at least our first album as one of the more important records. That’s a weird drop-off.”
Speech—whose Arrested Development will appear in concert with Digable Planets and The Pharcyde at the Warfield on Sat/21—is not wrong.
Monumental debut 3 Years, 5 Months and 2 Days in the Life Of… (1992) yielded three striking singles: “Tennessee,” “Everyday People,” and “Mr. Wendal.” It went on to sell six million copies and earn the group two Grammys. That same year, the outfit added “Revolution,” a rallying cry for social justice, to the soundtrack of Spike Lee’s Malcolm X (1992), starring Denzel Washington.
“Tennessee,” in particular, was so evocative in its depiction of Black lynching with well-crafted, poetic lines like “Climb the trees my forefathers hung from” and “Speech’s hair?/ No it look like the roots of the tree my ancestors were hung from/ But that’s okay, get it, ‘cuz he’s down to earth.”
The supremely conscious Afrocentric collective vibrated high, bringing fresh and unique perspectives to the rap game at a time when many were going the gangsta or materialistic rap route.
Arrested Development introduced an elder to hip-hop (RIP Baba Oje) and, along with Digable Planets, was early in its inclusion of both men and women. It’s inarguable that the outfit put Southern rap on the map years before Outkast and Killer Mike.
“So it seemed shortsighted or ignorant to not cite us as one of the top 200 of all time,” says Speech.
The eight-piece band’s progressive politics have always landed in the Bay with the region’s history of hippies and Black Panthers. In 1992 alone, Arrested Development played a pair of shows at DNA Lounge, Day 2 of KMEL Summer Jam at Shoreline Amphitheatre, F/X in San Jose, and two nights at Oakland’s Paramount Theatre.
Speech promises that the group’s upcoming Warfield concert will be their best yet.
“It will be people’s most celebrated hip-hop show this year,” he says. “It’s three groups that have created such a great vibe with each of our releases. We made a huge impact and got a lot of people to join on to hip-hop. All three of us coming together for a show is monumental for hip-hop lovers.”
Whether tackling racism, gun violence, war, prison justice reform, poverty, or the environment, Speech has always exercised his freedom of expression to great effect.
Growing up in Milwaukee, WI, and witnessing firsthand the political and economic disparity between black and white communities spurred him to address social issues in his storytelling. However, it was critical, in his opinion, to do this more thoughtfully than some of his fellow MCs.
“I knew that whatever music I was going to put into this world was not going to be music that was going to glorify or normalize violence,” says Speech. “I wanted to create music that put on a pedestal the idea of appreciating your life and wanting to thrive and move forward with pride and dignity.”
Ironically, creating such philosophical music made the group a tougher sell to labels. The title of its debut, 3 Years, 5 Months and 2 Days in the Life Of…, famously signifies the length of time it took the group to achieve its record deal.
Maintaining industry interest amid the rise of materialism in hip-hop in the mid-’90s proved equally challenging for the band that ascribed dignity to the houseless with “Mr. Wendal.”
But commercialism is not the endgame for Speech, who once rapped, “It’s better to write for ourselves and have no public/ Than to write for the public and have no self.”
Bullets in the Chamber finds Speech as unapologetic as ever as he tackles today’s social ills.
“And This I Know” describes how President Biden failed the same Black community that helped elect him. “For Free” testifies about the toll climate change has taken on the Black community. “Hourglass” critiques all the senseless gun violence.
“Guns don’t have to be a necessary evil in America,” says the rapper. “These shootings have become so common that I’ve become numb to them. I think most Americans are simply being desensitized to gun violence. That is a horrible place to get to. But I know we do care and need to vote accordingly when the time comes.”
It’s as easy for good progressives to rally behind Speech on these issues as it is to criticize him for some of the more confounding rhymes on the album.
On “God Bless You,” there are questionable lines like “From Goldsteins to dope fiends” and “So vote, I’m confused, did we win, did we lose/ You want in boi u better/ Be some friends with some Jews.”
“Overachiever” includes the verse “I don’t got the same attractions, I’m not in a gay pub/ I don’t have to fake owning nice cars to fill my tank up.” “Classy” incorporates the rhyme, “No hook-ups/ No conjunction junctions/ Surround U fruity negroes like Pie Dough/ And then make restart your momentum like DIDO.”
The most disturbing verse is found in “Hour Glass”: “The cisgender had a mentor a pansexual offender/Try to furnish an answer but can’t remember/Which one of the garments in the closet fit better.”
Speech, who insists he’s neither antisemitic nor homophobic, says much of this was just clever wordplay in service of rhyming. Still, he can see how certain lines might be misinterpreted—even by people in his camp.
“There’s a Jewish friend of ours who is a mix engineer,” he says. “He refused to mix that record because of the ‘Be some friends with some Jews’ lyric.”
Speech has a harder time contextualizing a comment he made in a 2017 interview where he states, “When it comes to the queer community, I deeply respect queer communities despite my belief that living out a homosexual lifestyle is a sin.”
Headlining the Pride Festival in Atlanta later the same year—which he describes as one of his all-time favorite appearances—didn’t change his position.
“I’m in that same spot,” says Speech, who became a Christian in 1996. “From all that I’ve read and understand scripturally, homosexuality is a sin. However, there are a million others, many of which I commit myself. So I have respect and even a fire to see people who are gay have the same rights as people who are not. These things are just common-sense, love-for-people type issues.”
But the rapper makes a point of adding that as his spiritual journey is still evolving, so are his religious beliefs.
“I am still growing, learning, and open,” he says. “For instance, I know there are gay Christians who have a different view of the scriptures that address homosexuality and what they meant in ancient times and the original Hebrew. So there are discussions, and I am open to understanding more.”
Similarly, Arrested Development’s creative journey is far from over. Its last three albums won a lot of younger fans, creating an unexpected resurgence for the band. What’s more, Bullets in the Chamber shot up on several year-end lists, including The Source’s esteemable Best Hip Hop 2024.
A recent “Roots Picnic: Hip-Hop is the Love of My Life” tour stop at the Hollywood Bowl drew 18,000 fans on the strength of a bill that included Arrested Development, Digable Planets, and The Pharcyde.
So there is a strong possibility that the band that announced, earlier this year, that it wouldn’t record or release any new music might come out with a new album.
“The Hollywood Bowl show was so inspiring that we’re creating new music, but it’s with the understanding that it might or might not come out,” says Speech. “We’re running into too many of these inspiring scenarios to not feel creative. And I think there’s still so much more in me.”
DIGABLE PLANETS WITH THE PHARCYDE, ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT Sat/21, The Warfield, SF. Tickets and more info here.
