"Do You Want More?!!!??!" Twenty Years Later - Chris "Preach" Smith

In the midst of some de-cluttering that comes
with every turn of a new year, I found a couple
of old cassette tape cases. You remember those,
right? It was like excavating a totem from some
ridge of upturned rock. I looked at and saw that
it was the case for The Roots’ second album, Do
You Want More?!!!??!. And like that, memories
rushed to the forefront like someone trying to
catch that packed E train headed uptown down
the escalators at Lexington Avenue. Today marks
twenty years since the Philadelphia rap group
dropped this album and changed the culture
forever on their way to being one of the world’s
most recognizable music groups and national TV
prominence as the house band on ‘The Tonight
Show With Jimmy Fallon’.

Back in 1995, The Roots and this album were
like a lightning bolt that rippled throughout my
last months of high school. The first charge came
the previous summer, however. My hip-hop jones
was being fueled by a combination of underground radio,
and scouring the video shows for something fresh in
addition to building with my boys on the block.
And so, when I saw the video for ‘Distortion
To Static’ for the first time…when I HEARD that
track…I was floored. Allow me a moment to get
into that video. You have The Roots set up in a
regular basement, wood paneling, dimly lit. A
place we’ve all been in, have had in our own houses.
All action is seen mostly through a fisheye lens.
As the beat laid down by Questlove comes in, we
get cuts to a television screen full of static and
everyone in a slumber until Black Thought snaps
his head up to look directly at the camera and
drop the first lines:

Yo, I’m every MC/it’s all in me
That’s the way it is, way its gotta be
Indeed as I distort I proceed, indeed
Gettin hotter than sacks of boom in my room at the Ramada

Thought basically weds old-school boom-bap
and his own sharpened lyricism in the first
four bars. The Chaka Khan flip sets it off. And
with that, you’re hooked. ‘Distortion To Static’
played out like a Max Roach session to me, hitting
me that much more since at this time I was
digging more into the sample work behind some
hip-hop albums. The visuals emphasized just
how different their style was (I still maintain
one of the best pieces of hip-hop imagery to
suggest someone killed a flow is when Thought’s
verse ends and you see a smoking outlet after
something is unplugged), and propelled me to
be one of the first to cop their album. Over the
next few months, that album became a prime 
backdrop for my life until graduation.

<iframe width=”640” height=”360” src=”//www.youtube.com/embed/Vj8R69KOb8U?feature=player_detailpage” frameborder=”0” allowfullscreen></iframe>

Do You Want More?!!!??! is a rich and full-bodied
stew of an album that essentially laid the groundwork
for who The Roots are today. You’ll note that this
is their second album, however for some people 
this was their first introduction to the group. (A 
side note: if you copped certain presses of the album,
the track numbers begin at #18 with ‘Intro/There’s
Something Goin’ On’; this denotes a continuation 
from where the first album, Organix, left off at track
#17). Once it starts, you immediately get immersed
in a vibe that makes you feel like you’re deep in the
bowels of a spot like the Nuyorican Poets Cafe or the
Village Vanguard watching them on stage. The live 
feeling doesn’t fully leave thanks to key interludes
especially the ‘sound check’ that becomes ‘Essaywhuman’.
The interplay between Black Thought and Questlove
is a crisp call-and-response serving as a great bridge
between the album’s two halves. It’s also an homage
to the numerous freestyle riffs you find on live jazz
albums from John Coltrane, Charles Mingus and many
others. 
 
“Proceed”, the second single, is a laid-back tune that
shows Black Thought essentially slaying the mic with
his charismatic flow that is a sheath for keen lyricism.
The amount of versatility that he shows on this album
made me a fan from jump…and it always makes me 
wonder why there’s a multitude that does not have
him among their top MC’s. Another key element to 
this is the other lead MC, Malik B. Malik serves as a 
potent counterpart to Thought, starting with his 
verse on ‘Distortion To Static’. His style smacks with
witticism that stings like a Floyd Mayweather jab.
For example, check out a couple of bars from ‘You
Aint Fly’:

Thinkin that she’s pretty and saditty when I spill
She said, “I might, I think I can, alright I will
Tossed up was the digits cause the game is like splendor
I said, “Sabrina yea, I met you way back in December; you remember 

The Roots pushed the envelope on this album,
and anyone who disputes this…I have one track
that squashes your rebuttal,”Do You Want More?!!!??!”
Why? Bagpipes. M#$%^&@$%^IN BAGPIPES,
MAN. And the track KILLS. I sincerely still want to
play a round of golf with a decanter of Macallan
on a course in Scotland as morning breaks with
this track playing in the background. Another
acceptable selection would be the snazzy “? vs.
Rahzel”, with Quest going up against the human
beatboxer in a marvelous battle. And who can
forget the pristine bass work that Hub laid down
on most of this album? It ties everything together
like fine ribbon on an anniversary present.

I can’t wind down this piece without having a
few words about ‘Silent Treatment’. That track
was the backing music for a couple of heartbreak
moments I had during high school. It cut beneath
the tough bravado MC’s were acknowledged to
have like a doctor’s scalpel and pulled back the
skin to reveal all the rawness of disconnecting
from someone you loved. Thought, through his
storytelling and the accompanying soothing backbeat
and whistling by Questlove make this a go-to for
moments like that for me to this day. The video
just added to it, right down to the record store
setting.  

Photo Credit: Stereogum

And that’s just it - Do You Want More ?!!!??! was
and is the album that the culture needed at that
time. From the heavy jazz improv influences, to
the inclusion of spoken word/poetry both as an
homage to the roots of rap and a way to balance
every album made more powerful by Ursula Rucker’s
resonating words on ‘The Unlocking’(side note - the
group had originally looked to famed playwright
Ntozake Shange to appear on the album but were
unable to secure her spot) to innovative album
structuring, Do You Want More ?!!!??! is a gem of
an album release. At times when I listen to it,
it varies in feeling for me. It can feel like a movie 
score. It can play out like a rich tone poem for road
trips I’ve taken. And that is both the beauty of this
second album by The Roots, and the group themselves.
As the band has progressed on, and reached the heights
of cultural importance and stardom, the word that
comes to mind often is exaltation. That’s what this
album left me with way back when I was eighteen.
And as time has moved on, it still remains, seen in
different hues. As blue and profound as seen on their
album cover. As liquid gold that pours through the 
speakers on the first notes of ‘Proceed’. As vibrant 
red just like the liner notes. After all, isn’t that part
of life?