Things Fall Apart by The Roots

Things Fall Apart, the fourth studio album from Philadelphia's the Roots, came out on MCA on February 23, 1999, and it's the record where the hip-hop band finally broke through. It was cut at Electric Lady across 1997 and 1998, while the same Soulquarians circle was working on D'Angelo's Voodoo, Erykah Badu's Baduizm and Common's One Day It'll All Make Sense, and Spin saw it as the moment the Roots' crew swelled into a full-blown movement. The title comes from Chinua Achebe's novel, which borrowed it from Yeats.

Black Thought and ?uestlove lead a band that builds its beats on live instruments, with Rahzel and Scratch in the lineup, and the sound is loose, jazzy and warm, neo soul and alternative rap tangled up together. "You Got Me" won a Grammy for Best Rap Performance by a Duo or Group, the album was nominated for Best Rap Album, and it went gold within weeks and platinum 14 years later.

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