Malik B of The Roots has died

[roastthemonaspit]

Malik B, founding member of The Roots, has died at 47

Yikes

[badmanreturns]

Fucking hell

[dingaling]

Ffs

[littlebirds]

Gutted. Already said a few words from the hip hop thread, where there’s been some discussion/tributes. Gonna be spinning those first four albums and Game Theory on repeat tomorrow. 47 fucking hell. RIP.

@littlebirds

Ah man. Those early Roots albums were completely formative for me, and getting into a whole load of rap and other music too. At the time, I wasn’t so hyped on Phrenology and Things Fall Apart (silly now, as they’re both v good records), and I was convinced it wasn’t The Roots without Malik B. He was never the rapper Black Thought is, but he dropped great verses and added variety and a different perspective to their tracks. Was so hyped when he returned on Game Theory, and was all over his features, still my favourite tracks on the record, which probably ended up being my favourite album of theirs. At least a part of me thinks there’ll never be another proper Roots album without him. What you leave is in the music buddy.

[BobRickerton]

47 ffs. Here I Come was my introduction to The Roots, what a shame.

[littlebirds]

Love the tracks with a couple of verses from both him and Black Thought, going back and forth. They had great chemistry.

The Roots - Respond/React

The Roots | Mellow My Man

[bozo]

‘Do You Want More?’ was the first album of theirs I got into. It’s so good. Really sad to hear the news. RIP.

[theShipment]

RIP to a legendary mc

[bozo]

The Roots - Section

My favourite Roots song

[littlebirds]

Do You Want More? -> Illadelph Halflife -> Things Fall Apart is such a great run of records, with each release getting stronger. Would maybe make them tighter --best part of 4 hours to get through the three of them – but so much brilliant material.

[Antpocalypsenow]

I’ve gone through all these this afternoon as well, I’ve always tended to go to Things Fall Apart and then that Phrenology - Game Theory - Rising Down run but fuck me those early records are so good eh. Organix seems to have disappeared from Spotify though which is a pain.

Properly sad though this, that Take It Personal episode for Black Thought had a fairly long interview in the middle which touched on some of the Malik B relationship. He speaks so highly of him as an MC, really sad loss.

[bugduv]

Things Fall Apart is a fantastic record.

Amongst the very best albums of the nineties.

[Antpocalypsenow]

An all-timer. I love it so much.

[CHAIRMAN_LMAO]

Very sad. Didn’t love the first two records, but they really cracked it on Illadelph Halflife. I think it was the What They Do video that got me interested as it got played on The Box quite a lot.

Wasn’t ever a mega fan, so it’s only now that I’m reading up on Malik B and some of the issues he had and his reasons for leaving. Also - only just remembered that they lived in London for a while!