The Meaning of “Aquemini”

> The idea of having pride in the South has for a long time generally been associated with whiteness. “Southern pride” conjures images of Confederate flags and a longing for a time when the states below the Mason-Dixon could own black people. But what about black Southerners? What do we have pride in? Growing up in Mississippi, I didn’t find any pride in my elementary school named after Jefferson Davis. I didn’t find pride in the Dixie flag fluttering above my head every time I drove through downtown Jackson.

Growing up white in Atlanta I am so grateful for a southern pride orthogonal and antithetical to hateful slavery dominated, white "Southern pride". I'd still have pride in Atlanta without Outkast, but they really gave Atlanta and the south in general a new voice.

I love this album. It's got my vote for the single best piece of art made in the 1990s. I don't know of anything else that has the range of content (going from swagger to fun party music to exploring the depths of the "black experience"), while also pushing ahead on the form/style front, from a couple of underdogs. It's also worn the test of time (and many, many repetitions) quite well, which doesn't have to be the case for revolutionary works of art.

I was raised in Atlanta and I instantly bought tickets to see them play their first comeback show at Coachella. It blew my mind that the Coachella crowd, while awesome welcoming people, were lukewarm about the fact that OutKast was reuniting. In Atlanta you grew up indoctrinated with OutKast we literally danced to Hey Ya in middle school physical ed.

I got to see them a few times on the comeback tour but I wish they had got tapped for the Atlanta Super Bowl halftime show instead of Maroon 5.

This album is one of the best of that decade, period. It's futuristic, grimey, cerebral, and danceable all at once. The duo is at their peak and the guest verses are extremely memorable.

"Conceived under the influence of toxic wasted doctors, computer buggin, debuggin devices, and vice versa. And various viruses! Performed with laser light precision and verbal precision. For a linguistic ballistic lobotomy. Mind fuckin neuro psycho sodomy of the medulla oblongata. Exit your mind down your spine and out your behind. Fuck you."

That George Clinton spoken word verse is seared in my memory.

In my opinion, it took more than a decade before we'd see the emergence of hip hop artists who could pull off comparable alchemy with regularity.

>We thought that being like a New Yorker was the pinnacle of black culture, and that if we could make it out of the South, then we’d make futures for ourselves.

As a black New Yorker who has also lived in the South, I’m glad the inferiority complex is eroding. Sorry it was there in the first place. New Yorkers can be so insufferable. “It’s the best city in the world!” is held as gospel truth there. But what that actually reveals is how parochial they are! Funny people, funny place.

Maybe it’s a sort of Stockholm Syndrome: you must convince yourself of this otherwise the rats, rent, noise, and expense couldn't possibly be worth it.

It makes me happy to hear that OutKast has had way more recognition and success than I realized. From the moment I first heard those horns in SpottieOttieDopaliscious I knew that these were guys to pay attention to.

Outkast on hn?? I love it. Southernplay..., Atliens, aquemini were in constant rotation in high school. Them southern boys are like the Beatles of hiphop... their albums are front to back gold.

Great album. Amazing that ATLiens, Aquemini and Stankonia came out within a few years of each other. This cemented OutKast as arguably the greatest hip hop group ever. And then shortly after, they released an album that won the Grammy for Album of the Year.

Most iconic hip hop formations or individuals (still) make a lot of buzz outside or around music. Outkast simply planted their work and let it explode. It feels like their marketing has always been a little bit of an understatement. It is almost too easy to forget about dre and big boi, but their work is immortal and is some of the best music has to offer.

I remember watching that Source Awards when he made that statement. Some of the crowd were booing when they won the award which is why he said it. It took hip hop a minute to respect Outkast. Well I should say East Coast Hip Hop. The East coast vs West coast battle was still going on strong and both sides weren't ready to deal with the music revolution coming from the south which Outkast represented. The 90s were a crazy time in Hip Hop. But by the time Aquemeni came out they had earned their respect and that album just solidified their status.

The article is wrong though. While the night made the East coast vs West coast rivalry worse, it didn't start it. A rapper named Tim Dogg making a song called Fk Compton did. There was already tension but that really started the simmering.

Aquemini and Stankonia are both all-time classics.

Loved this album, but took my many many listens to get into it. It’s the entry point to Rolling Stone magazine’s top 500 albums if you ever decide to work your way through it

Great album, but it’s not Purple Rain or Thriller, because I don’t really want to spend the rest of the month explaining the n word, among others, to my kids. Ah, well. It’s a problem comparing music across genres, as they said.