20 or so years ago, Little Brother dropped their classic album, The Listening. Little Brother hailed from North Carolina and at that time, nobody was coming out from the NC. Now if you look at who’s hot in rap you’ll see North Carolina rappers like J. Cole, Cordae, DaBaby, Rapsody, Lute, $tunna 4 Vegas, and many more I know I’m forgetting. But 20 years ago it was the rappers Phonte and Big Pooh who stepped in over soulful boom bap beats by then unknown beatmaker named 9th Wonder to make up the group, Little Brother.
They met in 1998 while all attending North Carolina Central University in Durham, NC. They were part of the larger hip hop collective, Justus League which included many other NC legends like Khrysis on the beats and Chaundon, Median, L.E.G.A.C.Y., and several other dope emcees that you’ll hear more of after you do your listening here. 9th, Phonte, and Big Pooh’s first release officially as Little Brother would be on ABB Records in 2001. The track was called “Speed” was it was just…. different? The beat was some 00’s style boom bap and Big Pooh and Phonte had those bars to melt perfectly onto the soulful joint. Then, in 2002, they released “Atari 2600” which was some funky Curtis Mayfield vibes with Phonte Coleman flexing his voice and just having genuine fun with the music. This was about as unconventional as a song you could have but the North Carolina cats didn’t care. They were expressing their art in all shapes and forms.
Little Brother were building their buzz through the blogs on the internet and hip hop publications where you’d see their ads constantly. All of the art direction, music, and launch strategy around Little Brother was refreshing. As a fan of groups like ATCQ, De La, Hiero, Gang Starr, and others, Little Brother seemed like…. well… the little brother to these 90’s hip hop groups we all loved so much. Little Brother were the little brother to the music and that tie-in with their group name is just too dope as well.
The first song I heard from Little Brother where I was stopped in my tracks was “Whatever You Say” which was just so damn smooth. A beat you could nod your head to, a chopped up vocal sample hanging behind the track, verses from Phonte and Pooh and a fantastic chorus and bridge. And then after their verses they just remain just having fun as the song transitions into a skit yet the track didn’t flip yet. The beat changes and Big Dho pops up on “Justus League Radio” and interviews 9th Wonder telling emcees that they need to holler at him for beats. Then 9th comes on and you get to hear from the producer himself. This was the reincarnation of 3 Feet High and Rising for me. Goodie Mob meets De La meets Group Home meets Nappy Roots.
The next song off of The Listening that stuck with me was “Away For Me” where I fell in love with the beat and didn’t even care for the words for the first 20 times I heard this track. I was always trying to get the words out of the way so I could hear the beat that 9th made with no interruptions. But then on that 21st try I gave Phonte and Big Pooh their chance to have my undivided attention and their lyrical content and overall vibe met what I thought the vibe needed. Below I have the instrumental and then the actual song. Do yourself a favor and listen to them in their entirety in this order.
The last track off of The Listening I have to shine some light on is the outro to the album, “The Listening”. I can’t think of another outro on a debut hip hop album by a group that does more than this does. This ends the album but it gets you on a positive note thinking what Little Brother will do next. Telling you people aren’t listening but you were and you knew you were seeing something special.
Since this album was released close to 20 years ago, I wanted to shine some light back on the trio from North Carolina who opened doors for many and did hip hop right. While we only got a few albums from the original trio, the music that we’ve gotten them collectively has been a beautiful thing to listen to. And if y’all are still sleeping, hit the playlist. I got you.