All it took for me was seeing that kid rapping in the Atlanta Braves jersey to know that I was witnessing something different. He was in the woods rapping with all of his crew. Then he was at the dinner table eating some cereal with the gang. And oh yeah, he’s just cruising around down with the top down in some crazy classic whip. You see… I didn’t know who OutKast was… I didn’t know who this first rapper was. I didn’t know who was singing that hook… and wait… who was this second emcee with like the best stage presence I’ve ever seen? WHO WERE THESE GUYS??????!?!?!?
I saw the video for “Player’s Ball” from OutKast and I was hooked. That song just made me feel cool… Those guys looked cool… I would listen to the track and just feel cool. I could close my eyes and those drums would have me entranced along with that catchy hook and those verses… Damn… Those verses… this track is an absolute classic.
I bought that cassingle with the quickness. It had the instrumental on there as well so you know I was practicing the flow in front of the bedroom mirror with my door closed. How could I not? OutKast was officially on the map from Atlanta, GA and I was fully bought in. Little did I know that “Southernplasticadillacmuzik” was going to be better than “Player’s Ball”… yup… “Southernplasticadillacmuzik” hit and it was different than any other hip hop I had heard before. And wait… This dude Andre from the crew was rockin a Braves jersey again??? I swear… these guys just looked like any of us. But none of us could ever rap like these dudes or have the production they had. Man…. Just listen to this. Watch this… Feel this…
The album dropped and it was a classic from first play. Tracks like “Crumblin Erb” and “Git Up Git Out” took my mind on different experiences from the south which I really didn’t know outside of Dominique Wilkins and the Atlanta Hawks on TBS or the Braves crazy run in the 90s… OutKast showed me what the south was like. They told me more about Georgia which is something I could never get in a text book or on the news. Cassettes brought me this connection to the world that was unavailable at the time. And wait… now who is this guy rapping in the fly Green Bay Packers joint? Cee-Lo? The Goodie Mob? Wait… who is the Goodie Mob?? These cats in the ATL were so dope.
“Crumblin’ Erb” is the best track on the album in 2025 though… I would say that back in 2001 though as well. “Crumblin’ Erb” is one of the best hip hop tracks ever made. If you can’t feel that track I don’t even know if you have ears. Listen to how clean the beat sounds and how hard those drums knock with Andre and Big Boi killing their verses… and then that hook… whoa… This OutKast debut album is amazing.
Then the 2nd album was building buzz and OutKast was no better than before? How could that even happen? How did these guys level up on that debut??? And everybody was listening to OutKast… It wasn’t just the rap heads… it wasn’t just the hip hop heads… it was the music heads… everybody knew what day ATLiens was dropping and everybody had that CD. You would go to a homie’s house and he would have it playing… well… without parents nearby so you had to have those fingers on the volume… but when this came on TV you just knew you were watching greatness.
I bought the CD the day it came out back in the Mid90s and it was on that CD that I heard my favorite rap song of all time. It wasn’t an easy pathway to find the track though. It wasn’t a single… it wasn’t at the front of the album… it wasn’t even a typical favorite-track-ever type of track for most but for me it was everything. I had to make it through the longest intro of all time but once I got there, I was there… many a days fast-forwarding that track so I could get to my cut… “Growing Old” was that song but “13th Floor/Growing Old” was the full track. Just go skip ahead to 1:30 and sink into your chair… your couch… your life… go press play on this one.
Gang Starr was dope but I was a little bit young to get fully into Gang Starr for those early albums. But with OutKast, they dropped in 1994 and 1996 with those first 2 albums and they opened my mind to what creativity could be. They showed me that whatever you thought art was, it wasn’t. They showed me that there were no ceilings to music and expressing yourself over amazing production. They showed me what it meant to build a music brand. They showed me how to never compromise your personality and be put in a box. Aquemini hit and we got our party anthem for the early 00s and there was no rapping on it. “Spottieottiedopalicious” is so gooood… I’m sure I misspelled it and that’s alright… the fact that I can even get that close is fire so many years late… this track makes people feel positive. It makes people want to smile…
But fam… “Return of the G” was the hardest shit ever… My CD I owned had a skip so I had to struggle bus my way through my physical copy but when there were no skips on that track with the right CD player, I was in total awe. Andre Benjamin had this flow that was so cool and on this he let you know he was the greatest rapper to ever hold on the mic. Yes, I will stand on that… Andre 3000 is the best rapper ever.
By the time Stankonia hit, OutKast was global. They brought Atlanta and Georgia as a whole to the world and showed the rap world that the south really had something to say… “Bombs Over Baghdad” tho??????????????? Remember how up above I said Andre 3000 is the best rapper ever… Go listen to this right now… then come back to me… you can’t argue it… I know Nas is amazing… I know Jigga is great… Pac… Biggie… Kendrick… I know, I know, I know… They are not Andre though. There will never be another Andre.
I saw that OutKast got inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame last night and I saw Andre’s speech and it just made me feel something. It made me go get out my OutKast cassettes and CD’s and press play… It made me go to eBay and buy a new OutKast cassette… it made me want to just spend a day/week/month/year listening to OutKast and watching their videos… Care to join?
Here’s a playlist of my favorite OutKast tracks of all time… Some other features in here as well so show off Andre and Big Boi’s talents. I truly feel they’re the best duo too… I love Gang Starr… I love UGK… I love Mobb Deep… OutKast just hit different for me. They make me feel something.