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Common
OffStereo builds narrated music history shows around real records. Common runs through 10 of them, each one placing them inside a wider story. They appear most often alongside A Tribe Called Quest, J Dilla and Kanye West.
Shows where Common appears
J Dilla's production DNA
J Dilla's un-quantized drums from Detroit create a breathing pocket that reshapes hip-hop, a sound Slum Village champions and A Tribe Called Quest expands.
1 of 10 tracks — The Light
Dilla Time: Rhythm Redefined
J Dilla's "quantize off" technique on the MPC3000 gave hip-hop a humanized, "drunk" feel, a rhythmic revolution on par with Armstrong that shaped A Tribe Called Quest to Flying Lotus.
1 of 8 tracks — The Light
Withers: Hip-Hop's Soul Foundation
Bill Withers' soulful catalog is a quiet load-bearing wall for hip-hop, with Kanye West, 2Pac, and Kendrick Lamar building their sound on his timeless grooves.
1 of 8 tracks — The Light
Soul-Loop Roots: Dilla to Foreign Ex
From J Dilla's Donuts to Slum Village, Common, Little Brother, and Kanye West, a generation of hip-hop built its soulful, sample-driven sound on an off-kilter swing.
1 of 10 tracks — The Light
Gil Scott-Heron: Revolutionary Bluesologist
Gil Scott-Heron's radical spoken word, from 1970's "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised," forged a militant voice for Black self-determination and inner-city life, influencing generations of hip-hop artists like Common.
1 of 8 tracks — The People
Summer's Fading Echoes
Don Henley's "Boys of Summer" to Pete Rock's "T.R.O.Y." shows how music captures the bittersweet melancholy of summer's end and life's profound transitions.
1 of 8 tracks — The Light
Soulquarians: Electric Lady's Echoes
The Soulquarians collective, with J Dilla's beats and D'Angelo's Voodoo at Electric Lady, redefines late-90s hip hop and R&B, influencing JAY-Z's "U Don't Know."
1 of 7 tracks — The Light
Kanye's Wire: Soul Sample Genesis
Kanye West's "chipmunk soul," forged after a 2002 crash with Chaka Khan's "Through the Fire," defines a hip-hop era, from Jay-Z's "Izzo" to Common's "The Corner."
1 of 8 tracks — The Corner (feat. The Last Poets)
Peterson's Piano: Hip-Hop's Secret Groove
Oscar Peterson's vast, spontaneous jazz catalog is the goldmine for hip-hop, fueling soulful beats from J Dilla and A Tribe Called Quest to Madlib.
1 of 8 tracks — The Light
What did the producer mean when he said
The intentional lag of drums behind the beat, from James Gadson's funk to J Dilla's "drunk" grooves, shapes neo-soul's hypnotic pulse and hip-hop's golden era.
1 of 8 tracks — The Light