De La Soul Start Kickstarter for New Album ‘And the Anonymous Nobody’
UPDATE 2: De La Soul‘s monthlong Kickstarter campaign wrapped up May 2nd with the hip-hop collective raising over $600,000 for their new LP. “Thank you so much to all of you for rewarding us with your time and help!! We have not only become the second most funded music project on Kickstarter, but we have also gained a clearer insight into how you feel about us as a group and what we do,” De La Soul wrote to fans after their Kickstarter ended. “You have helped directly play a part in giving us the much needed creative fuel by showing that we still matter to all of you! In knowing that we feel nothing less than number 1!!! Much love and this music is coming your way soon!!”
UPDATE: De La Soul have surpassed their initial Kickstarter goal of $110,000 in less than 24 hours.
Seminal hip-hop crew De La Soul will begin recording their eighth album, And the Anonymous Nobody, in Atlanta this April, with plans to fundraise the project through a new Kickstarter campaign.
The forthcoming LP will boast a handful of special guests, including David Byrne, 2 Chainz and Little Dragon, who will appear on the tracks “Snoopies,” “Whodini” and “Drawn,” respectively. Additional featured artists are expected to be announced in the coming months.
The album will also be built entirely around samples taken from numerous jam sessions the group recorded with Los Angeles session band, The Rhythm Roots All-Stars.
“And the Anonymous Nobody really plays on two ideas,” the group tells Rolling Stone. “No egos, no seniority, no bosses, just a group of equal ‘nobodies’ working towards one goal: making music. Second, there’s always a silent champion or brave individual — a ‘nobody’ — that steps in saves the day. The person that steps in and stands for something. Something bigger that him… and makes a change. ‘Nobody can save the day!’ Well he sure can! We are those nobodies.… stepping in, standing for something and hopefully making a change.”
“It’s not like we had a pre-formed idea of what we wanted to sample and then told some band to play it for us,” MC Kelvin “Posdnuos” Mercer added in a statement. “We just got into the studio with the All-Stars and let the music flow where it felt like flowing. And it was amazing. We didn’t start planning what we’d sample until much later.”
De La Soul have also outlined a number of rewards that will be available to donors, including exclusive album tracks, autographed handwritten lyrics for a De La Soul cut of the backer’s choice and an original gold record plaque for the band’s groundbreaking LP, 3 Feet High And Rising. Three fans will even get the chance to go shopping with individual members of De La Soul, with the choice of picking out sneakers with Mercer, toys with David “Dave” Jude Jolicoeur or records with DJ Vincent “Maseo” Mason.
And the Anonymous Nobody will mark De La Soul’s first album as a trio since 2004’s The Grind Date and will be a different album from the group’s still-in-the-works LP You’re Welcome. De La Soul teased that record last year after making their entire catalog available to download for free for 25 hours to celebrate the 25th anniversary of 3 Feet High and Rising.
The group did release a new mixtape, Smell the D.A.I.S.Y. last March, which included previously unheard beats produced by the late J Dilla. Last November, the group dropped the politically charged cut, “The People,” featuring Public Enemy’s Chuck D.