OutKast

In addition, Outkast will be starring in a HBO movie, My Life in Idlewild and will be doing a movie soundtrack album based on the movie.
. Intended as a throwback to the Southernplayalisticadillakmusic days, the album will feature ten songs, all strictly hip hop, and all produced by Organized Noise. He considers PiL "on hiatus," and plans a book on his years with the group. The sixth OutKast album, 10 the Hard Way, is due for release in 2005. Lydon released a solo album, Psycho's Path in 1997. Its first signees were Sleepy Brown and Bubba Sparxxx. Notable exploding members of the later PiL include world-music multi-instrumentalist (and former Damned guitarist) Lu Edmonds, and Cream bassist and drummer Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker.

OutKast's Earthtone III recently founded Purple Label, an new imprint to be distributed by Virgin Records. Their final lineup consisted of Lydon, Ted Chau (guitar, keyboards), Mike Joyce of The Smiths (drums), John McGeoch (guitar), and Russel Webb (bass). CBS later apologized. PiL kept going as a Lydon project until 1993, when Lydon disbanded the group. The Native American Cultural Center called for a boycott of OutKast and of CBS, the broadcaster of the awards show. Flipper retaliated by naming their next album, Public Flipper Limited. OutKast was one of the headlining acts at the show, and gave two performances: Big Boi performed "The Way You Move" during a medley with George Clinton & P-Funk and Robert Randolph and the Family Band, while André performed "Hey Ya" as the show closer. In February 2004, OutKast was criticized by Native American groups for André's performance, which featured dancers moving wildly around a green teepee in war paint and feathered headdresses. Controversy reared its hoary glower again with claims that the album cover and title concept had been stolen from the San Francisco noise/punk band, Flipper, contemporaries of PiL, whose album, Album, featured a similarly unadorned sleeve.

Speakerboxx/The Love Below won the Grammy Award for the 2004 'Album of the Year. Produced by Bill Laswell (despite Lydon-fuelled faction and disunion) and with many of his usual rotating cast of musicians, it also featured guitar solos by Steve Vai, considered by Vai as some of his best work. The final singles were André's "Protoype", which was paired with an unusual science fiction-themed video about alien visitors, and Speakerboxxx's' "Ghetto Musick", which featured both members of OutKast and a sample from a Patti LaBelle song. PiL's 1986 release was simply entitled CD, Tape, or Album, depending on the format. "Roses", a track featuring both members from The Love Below half of the album, did not met the level of success as either of its predecessors, but it became a modest-sized hit on urban radio and the American music video networks. Atkins stayed on through a disatrous live album, Live in Tokyo -- in which PiL consisted of him, Lydon, and a band of New Jersey wedding musicians -- and left in 1985, following the album, This Is What You Want, This Is What You Get. The band was moving, or perhaps hurtling, toward a more commercial pop music and dance music direction, and while many new fans had found PiL, little of their original audience (or sound) remained. Concerned with over-saturation, OutKast's next official single was not released until the summer of 2004. Recollections, as usual, differ widely on the particulars, and the album, while considered far superior to the official one that later appeared, has never been legally reissued.

Together, both singles spent over ten weeks at number one on the Hot 100 singles chart. Lydon and Atkins claim that he stole the tapes, while Levene's claim is, in effect, that posession is nine-tenths of the law. The digital video channels, MTV Jams and VH1 Soul also gave both videos the heaviest of play, MTV Jams having played each almost once an hour at their peaks. An aborted fourth album, from 1982, was later released by Levene as Commercial Zone. Despite a fall release, the songs' music videos (which were often aired segued together) became two of 2003's most played on MTV, VH1, MTV2, and BET, both having entered heavy rotation on all four channels at one point or another. Atkins was, like Levene and Lydon, a control freak in ways, but Levene had the disadvantage of having repeatedly fired Atkins over apparent trifles, and of being zonked on junk much of the time -- so when conflict arose again, Levene was the one to go. "Hey Ya!" was also one of the first songs to become a hit on the Apple iTunes Music Store, replacing "Stacy's Mom" at #1 and staying there for months. (Collins admits the deed; Bush went an extra step in buying some of Wobble's 'impossibly deep' Metal Box-era bass equipment [the secret is a 1970s or equivalent Fender Jazz Bass through all-tube Ampeg SVT amplifier, speakers faced toward a solid wall, with mikes arranged to pick up the ambient sound]).

Both immediately exploded at radio: "Move" initially becoming enormous on urban radio, then later pop and rhythmic, and "Hey Ya" becoming a smash crossover hit on pop, rhythmic, hot AC, and alternative rock radio then later on urban stations. Julian Cope, however, expresses the current majority view, saying that Flowers was "the last great PIL album." [2] (http://www.juliancope.com/unsung/reviews/index.php?review_id=984) Its drum sound was widely copied, notably by Phil Collins and Kate Bush. The first two singles from the album(s), which were released nearly simultaneously, were Big Boi's "The Way You Move" and André's "Hey Ya!". The record consists mostly of drums, vocals, and tape loops, with only gestures toward bass (played by Levene) and keyboards. The album eventually sold over five million copies, and, as double-album sales count double for Recording Industry Association of America certification, the album was certified diamond (10 million units sold) in December 2004. Atkins' populsive marching band-style drumming and Lydon's increasing lyrical abstraction made this LP a difficult listen for rock fans: contemporary reviews expressed great confusion. The album is also OutKast's biggest commercial success yet, having debuted on the Billboard Albums Chart at #1 and stayed there for several weeks. Levene had by then largely abandoned guitar in favor of synthesizer, picking up a technique that was nearly unique, although owing a debt, perhaps, to Allen Ravenstine of Pere Ubu.

Speakerboxx/The Love Below has received what is perhaps the duo's most rapturous critical reception to date; both discs were considered highly innovative and accomplished. Atkins, who had initially joined at the tail end of the Metal Box sessions (most tracks on that album were played by Richard Dudanski), was re-recruited to drum on The Flowers of Romance, an album considered much stranger and more difficult than the already strange Metal Box. André 3000's The Love Below is a sprawling and ambitious work that featured only brief instances of hip hop, presenting instead funk and pop music inspired by Prince, Rick James, Sly Stone, and Frank Zappa. The band soon regrouped, after a fashion, back in London. Big Boi's Speakerboxxx is, for the most part, a joyous party record, tempered by more politically-minded tracks like "War". An appearance a short time later on NBC's Tom Snyder show had Lydon and Snyder insulting each other on-air. It is essentially two solo double-albums, one by each member, packaged as a single release under the OutKast banner. The 18-inch model of Stonehenge had descended.

In September 2003 OutKast released a double album, Speakerboxxx/The Love Below. The promoters cleared the hall and cancelled the next night's show, and a local media furore ignited in New York. The following year, the group and Killer Mike contributed the lead single "Land of a Million Drums" to the Scooby-Doo soundtrack.. Lydon taunted the audience, who expected to hear familiar material (or at least see the band), and a melee erupted in which the audience pelted the stage with bottles and pulled on a tarp spread under the band, toppling equipment. One of these new tracks was the popular single "The Whole World", which won a 2002 Grammy Award for Best Rap Performance by a Duo or Group. (Drummer Sam Ulamo had been recruited for the gig from a bar -- the 60-year-old jazz player had never heard the band before.) While something reminiscent of, but clearly different from PiL improvised behind the screen, PiL records were played simultaneously through the PA. In December 2001, OutKast released a greatest hits album, Big Boi And Dre Present...OutKast, which also contained three new tracks. The band appeared at the Ritz playing from behind a projection screen.

DJ to form the Earthtone III production company, and began producing tracks for the artists on their Aquemeni Records imprint through Columbia, including Slimm Cutta Calhoun and Killer Mike, who made his debut appearance on Stankonia's "Snappin' & Trappin". For the Ritz gig however, Levene decided that PiL would reorganize as an improvisational multimedia troupe -- working, as usual, without planning or rehearsals. During the recording of Stankonia, OutKast joined with partner Mr. Orridge out of Britain in the early '90s.) Levene had also begun to get big ideas about PiL's formerly-ironic claims to be a 'corporation' and an 'art collective': While friends of the band including filmmaker Jeanette Lee had long been 'full members' of PiL (original drummer Jim Walker was only 'voted off the board' in 1980), no creative works besides the records had ever ensued. Jackson", and another for Stankonia as Best Rap Album. (A similar campaign would chase Throbbing Gristle and Psychic TV frontman Genesis P. All three singles' videos had heavy MTV2 airplay, and OutKast won two 2001 Grammy Awards: one for Best Rap Performance by a Duo or Group for "Ms. The band's musical core had by then been stripped down to Lydon and Levene (drummer Martin Atkins had recently exploded), and PiL had begun to relocate to New York, partly because the MI5 was conducting a harassment campaign -- later admitted -- against the band's headquarters, the London apartment that Lydon bought with his Sex Pistols royalties.

The album's final single was the Organize Noise-produced "So Fresh, So Clean", featuring a credited guest appearance from regular guest vocalist Sleepy Brown. A show at the Ritz, in New York, signaled a turning point. The single became their first pop crossover hit, landing the #1 position on the US pop singles chart, and the #2 position on the UK pop chart. Upon Wobble's departure, the band continued not-playing as a bassless trio. Jackson" is Badu's mother. When Levene found out, it provided fuel for a grudge; and while claims differ as to whether Wobble quit or was fired, the split was decisive. Jackson", was about divorce and relationship breakups, particularly André's breakup with Erykah Badu; the titular "Ms. While working on his first solo album, he began using PiL basslines as backing tracks, on the premise that nobody else in the band seemed likely to mind.

The second single, "Ms. Wobble had been releasing solo singles since 1978, and had long been unhappy with the band's relaxed sense of time and lack of ambition. (Bombs Over Bagdad)", a high-tempo jungle-influenced record. With that as a ground aesthetic, it's easy to see how an ambitious musician could be frustrated. It debuted at #2 on the album charts and would eventually go double-platinum. Stankonia's first single was "B.O.B. He'd never bothered to come up before. The pair's fourth album, Stankonia was released to excellent reviews in October 2000. One evening, moments after a phone exchange, he was astonished to see Levene walk in the door: The guitarist had been living the whole time in the apartment downstairs.

In 2003, the Supreme Court allowed Rosa Parks to proceed with her lawsuit; the members of OutKast were dropped as co-defendants, and Parks continued to seek action against LaFace and parent company BMG. (One exec called PiL "a well-oiled machine that burns money and generates pot smoke and excuses.") When Jim Walker joined, he started hanging out at Lydon's apartment, and noticed that Levene would often call from wherever Levene lived -- presumably miles away, since he never saw him. Parks hired lawyer Johnny Cochran to appeal the decision in 2001, but this too was denied, on First Amendment grounds. PiL's elusiveness lent it a thick mystique, but to those behind the curtain it was known as "the laziest band in the world" -- never rehearsing, rarely gigging (the original band only played five UK shows), and recording only when forced to by frantic record execs. The initial lawsuit was dismissed. Oddly, it was Wobble. The song's lyrics were largely unrelated to Parks, save for a line in the chorus: "Ah ha, hush that fuss / Everybody move to the back of the bus". Something had to break, and it was clear that it couldn't be Lydon.

She felt the song misappropriated her name, and also objected to some of the song's obscene language. Levene was a very small, skinny person, of the sort that one thinks of as 'runty.' Jah Wobble, for his part, was among the rarest of sensitive art-musicians and world-music aficionados in that his habits included assault and battery, setting people on fire, and hurling televisions out of hotel windows. In 1999, OutKast and LaFace Records was sued by Rosa Parks over the album's most successful radio single, "Rosa Parks". Lydon had always been a difficult character to work with, but Levene had begun to challenge his crown, by many reports acting increasingly grandiose and delusional, and by all reports sinking ever-deeper into heroin. The album featured collaborations with, in addition to Organized Noise and the Goodie Mob; their infant son Seven is heard on the song "Slump". A US tour led to several cancelled dates and (more of the usual) chaos, this time between the band and their US label, Warner Brothers (PiL was on Virgin in the UK). Both Big Boi and André explored more eclectic subject matter, and, producing even more of the album themselves, delved into more innovate sounds inspired by soul, trip hop, and electro music. Clark, in later years, would refer to the appearance as "One of the ten best American Bandstand episodes of all time.".

The album was widely praised as an innovative, unique and refreshing album full of hip hop with a progressive vision, both artistic and musically. The studio audience made a valiant, but futile attempt to dance and stay in character, ruined by Lydon's good-humored incitements to storm the stage. General chaos broke out, and the show ended with the audience dancing with band members, band members goofing on their instruments, and Lydon chatting with fans while "Careering" blared on. OutKast's third album Aquemini (1998) also reached the #2 position on the charts; its title was a combination of the zodiac signs for Big Boi (an Aquarius) and André (a Gemini). The band mimed to the bleak soundscapes of "Poptones" and "Careering," from Metal Box, with Lydon haranguing the cameramen and making no effort to conceal that he was lip-synching. "Elevators (Me and You)", the first single to be produced by OutKast themselves instead of Organized Noise, became the group's first Top 20 hit the same year. PiL's booking there revealed a latent fiendish streak in host Dick Clark. "AtLiens" was the group's first Top 40 single, and reflected the beginning of André's increasing self-consciousness: "No drugs or alcohol/so I can get the signal clear", he rhymes about himself. The teenage dance show American Bandstand was, circa 1980, entirely innocent of such things, with a history beginning with the likes of Frankie Avalon and extending to the mild end of '70s pop-rock.

The album hit #2 on the US album charts, and helped the group earn more recognition among East Coast hip hop fans in the northern US, many of whom usually panned southern hip hop artists. Hallmarks of the genre include minimalism, classically-inspired ambient or atonal leanings, via Stockhausen, and an abandonment of traditional song form in favor of long, slowly-unfolding compositions. ATLiens was OutKast's second album, released in 1996. In fact, although radically different from other British and American rock groups, PiL was heavily influenced by German experimental rock, or Krautrock, especially by Can, Neu!, and the sonic aesthetic of producer Conny Plank. OutKast won Best New Rap Group at the Source Awards in 1995. One critic wrote, "they sounded nothing like the Pistols or anyone else at the time." [1] (http://users2.ev1.net/~dlimon/firecracker/firecracker8/pil.htm). On this early material, both André and Big Boi contrast lyrical content reflecting the lifestyles of pimps and gangsters with politically conscious material commenting on the status of African Americans in the southern US. But with Metal Box, PiL was no longer operating as a standard rock band, but was entering a different territory altogether.

Their full length debut, Southernplayalisticadillakmusik, was issued the next year); follow-up singles included the title track and "Git Up, Git Out", a politically charged collaboration with Goodie Mob that was later sampled by Macy Gray for her 1999 hit "Do Something". It is now widely regarded as a classic record, both for its music and its sheer tonality (the 45rpm 12" format added depth and fidelity to what was already a highly tactile, spacious sound), and it sold quite well upon release, and for years afterward. The song's funky style, much of it accomplished with live instrumentation, was a hit with audiences, and "Player's Ball" hit #1 on the Billboard Rap Chart. Metal Box is starker than First Issue, more spread out and uncompromising, and scattered with bits of musique concrete and ambient synthesizer. In 1993, they released their first single, "Player's Ball". Metal Box was originally released as three 45rpm 12-inch records packaged in a metal film canister (it was later reissued as a double LP set, Second Edition), and features the band's trademark hypnotic dub reggae bass lines, glassy, arpeggiated guitar, and bleak, paranoid, stream of consciousness vocals. OutKast signed to LaFace Records in 1992, becoming the label's first hip hop act and making their first appearance on the remix of labelmates TLC's "Ain't 2 Proud 2 Beg". Sessions took place in which a star-struck young drummer would show up for an 'audition' and be stunned to discover himself in the middle of a recording date with the tape rolling.

OutKast, Organized Noise, and schoolmates Goodie Mob formed the nucleus of the Dungeon Family organization. In addition to the drugs and disorganization that were the normal condition of the band, Jim Walker had quit from general disillusionment, making way for a series of exploding drummers -- in one case literally, when Wobble set fire to the aptly-named Karl Burns. They eventually teamed up, and were pursued by Organized Noize, a group of local producers who would later make hits for TLC and Xscape. 1979's Metal Box was a more focused effort, although created, like First Issue, under notably unfocused circumstances. Big Boi and André went to Tri-Cities High School together in East Point, Georgia, and battled each other lyrically on a regular basis. It sold well in the UK and in Europe. OutKast is currently the most successful hip-hop group of all time, having sold 14 million copies of their six releases: four studio albums, a greatest hits release, and Speakerboxxx/The Love Below, a double album contaning a solo album from each member of the group. Speakerboxxx/The Love Below is one of only three hip hop albums to go diamond, the other two being MC Hammer's Please Hammer Don't Hurt 'Em and The Notorious B.I.G.'s Life After Death. The album was, however, fairly easy for rock audiences to get a handle on.

The duo is André "André 3000" Benjamin (formerly known as "Dre") and Antwan "Big Boi" Patton, both from the Atlanta area. Lydon's vocals were more tuneless and incantatory than in the Sex Pistols, gesturing toward the avant-garde territory of such artists as Yoko Ono. Their original musical style was a mixture of Dirty South and G-Funk; since then, funk, soul, electronica, and rock elements have been added to the mix. Wobble's bass tone was called "impossibly deep" by contemporary reviews, and Levene's uniquely sharp guitar sound (Levene played an all-aluminum Veleno guitar, and a mostly-aluminum Travis Bean Wedge) was widely imitated, most notably by The Edge of the then-fledgling U2. OutKast is a popular and successful American hip hop duo based out of Atlanta, Georgia. The album, however, was groundbreaking: scabrous and dirge-like, but lyrical by turn, 'Gothic' before the term was coined, and grounded in heavy dub reggae. 2004: "Prototype" (André 3000). Wobble had also beaten up producer Bill Price's assistant engineer (Price, with John Leckie, had secured the tight sound of the "Public Image" single), inciting Price to ban the group from their preferred Wessex Studios, and forcing them to scramble for another venue and soundman as deadlines loomed and passed.

2004: "Roses" (#9 US; #4 UK). Heartened, the band relaxed and rolled a collective spliff: In preparing the album, First Issue, they ran through their recording budget well before finishing (drugs were a significant expense, studio fees an unwatched clock), and ended up with eight tracks of varying sound quality, half of which were written and recorded in a last-minute fire drill. 2003: "The Way You Move" (Big Boi featuring Sleepy Brown) (#1 US; #7 UK). The single did splendidly in the UK, and surprisingly well as an import in the US, where the mainstream rock culture of the time was strongly resistant to edginess or innovation. 2003: "Hey Ya!" (André 3000) (#1 US; #3 UK). PiL is often cited as one of the most challenging and innovative bands of the post punk period. 2001: "The Whole World" (featuring Killer Mike) (#19 US; #19 UK). PiL debuted with "Public Image," a single not far from Sex Pistols territory, but quickly became a far more experimental project.

2000: "So Fresh So Clean" (#30 US; #16 UK). The original drummer was Jim Walker (né Donat Walker), a Canadian student newly arrived in the UK, who answered an ad in a weekly music magazine. Jackson" (#1 US; #2 UK). Lydon's friends eventually ran into Levene on the street, and he quickly signed on. 2000: "Ms. Lydon and Levene had both considered themselves outsiders even within their own bands. (Bombs Over Bagdad)". Lydon also launched an effort to locate guitarist Keith Levene (né Julian Levene), whom he had met on tour in mid-1976 while Levene was a member of The Clash.

2000: "B.O.B. While that had proven a fatal assumption with Vicious (Lydon cites his inability to play as a prime reason for the Pistols' breakup), Wobble would prove to be a natural talent. 1)". Following the Pistols' breakup, and after a three-week trip to Jamaica with Virgin Records head Richard Branson, in which Lydon helped scout for new reggae artists, Lydon approached Wobble to start a new band, thinking that they were both diehard fans of reggae, and of what would later be called world music; and assuming, much as with Sid Vicious, that Wobble could learn the bass as he went. 1998: "Da Art of Storytellin' (Pt. Lydon and Jah Wobble (né John Wardle) had been friends since the early 1970s, and had casually played music together during the last days of the Sex Pistols. 1998: "Rosa Parks" (#57 US).
Public Image Ltd (PiL) is a band formed in 1978 by John Lydon, formerly and later Johnny Rotten of the Sex Pistols.

1997: "Jazzy Belle" (#52 US). Public Image/Second Edition (two-in-one), 2003. 1996: "Elevators (Me and You)" (#12 US). Plastic Box (box set), 1999. 1996: "ATLiens" (#35 US). That What Is Not, 1992. 1994: "Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik" (#74 US). Box (box set), 1990.

1994: "Git Up, Git Out". The Greatest Hits, So Far (compilation), 1990. 1994: "Player's Ball" (#37 US). 9, 1989. 2005: 10 the Hard Way. Happy?, 1987. 2003: Speakerboxxx/The Love Below. Album / Compact Disc / Cassette, 1986.

2001: Big Boi And Dre Present...OutKast (greatest hits LP). This Is What You Get, 1984. 2000: Stankonia. This Is What You Want.. 1998: Aquemini. Live In Tokyo (live album), 1983. 1996: ATLiens. The Flowers of Romance, 1981.