A Tribe called Quest

A Tribe Called Quest was an American hip-hop collective formed in 1985 and originally composed of MC and main producer Q-Tip, MC Phife Dawg, DJ and co-producer Ali Shaheed Muhammad and MC Jarobi White, who left the group in 1991 after the release of their debut album. White continued to contribute to the band sporadically before rejoining for their 2006 reunion. Along with De La Soul, the group was a central part of the Native Tongues, and enjoyed the most commercial success out of all the groups to emerge from that collective. The group released six albums between 1990 and 2016. The band broke up in 1998 after releasing their fifth album. In 2006, the group reunited and toured the United States. In 2016, they released their sixth and final album, which was still incomplete when Phife Dawg died suddenly in March 2016, and was completed by the other members after his death.

The group is regarded as a pioneer of alternative hip-hop music, having helped to pave the way for many innovative artists. John Bush of AllMusic called them "the most intelligent, artistic rap group during the 1990s." The Source gave the group's debut album a rating of five 'mics,' the first time the magazine gave out this rating. In 2005, A Tribe Called Quest received a Special Achievement Award at the Billboard R&B Hip-Hop Awards in Atlanta. In 2007, the group was formally honored at the 4th VH1 Hip-Hop Honors.

Q-Tip (Kamaal Ibn John Fareed) and Phife Dawg (Malik Izaak Taylor) were childhood friends who grew up together in Queens, New York. Initially, Q-Tip performed as a solo artist under the name MC Love Child, occasionally teaming up with Ali Shaheed Muhammad as a rapper and DJ duo. While the duo frequently made demos with Phife, then known as Crush Connection, Phife only became a full member once Jarobi White joined. The group's final name was coined in 1988 by the Jungle Brothers, who attended the same high school as Q-Tip and Muhammad. Q-Tip made two separate appearances on the Jungle Brothers' debut album, Straight Out the Jungle, in the songs "Black is Black" and "The Promo".

In early 1989, the group signed a demo deal with Geffen Records and produced a five-song demo, which included later album tracks "Description of a Fool", "I Left My Wallet in El Segundo" and "Pubic Enemy". Geffen decided against offering the group a recording contract, and the group was granted permission to shop for a deal elsewhere. After receiving lucrative offers for multi-album deals from a variety of labels, the group opted for a modest deal offered by Jive Records. Jive Records was then known as an independent rap label that partly owed its success to building the careers of artists Boogie Down Productionsand Too Short.

A Tribe Called Quest first reunited in 2003, recording the song "ICU (Doin' It)" featuring Erykah Badu. It was supposed to appear on a Violator compilation, which was not released. On August 27, 2004, the group headlined Street Scene, a music festival in San Diego.

In 2006, the group again reunited and performed several sold-out concerts in the U.S., Canada and Japan. A Tribe Called Quest was a co-headliner at the 2006 Bumbershoot festival in Seattle. The group appeared in 2K Sports' Bounce Tour promoting the NBA 2K7 video game and a remix of their song, "Lyrics to Go", was included in the game. According to Phife, A Tribe Called Quest planned to release an album since they owe Jive Records one more in their six-album contract. The date of its release was never confirmed, and Phife urged fans to hold on as the group does not wish to release an LP which might damage their reputation. Speaking about the possibility of a new album showing up soon, Phife said “Man, we was only 18–19 when we first got started. [When] We broke up we were still like 28. Now we are 35–36. It'd be real different being in the studio. It would be real interesting to see where Q-Tip is. It would all be on a much higher level. But we are all into such different stuff from way back then. We'd need at least a solid month to work on something. Trying to get all of us together for that much time. … I don't see that happening.”

A Tribe Called Quest was the headlining act in 2008 at the Rock the Bells series of concerts, and were co-headliners on the 2010 Rock the Bells festival series.