Buhloone Mind State - the lost great De La Soul album?

Also to be discussed, was Stakes is High really overrated when it came out, or am I remembering incorrectly?

If anything, everything since has not been up to De La par.

Well, actually, my entourage is pretty evenly split. My bodyguards, yeah, they generally listen to more rock than hip hop. But my stylist, my PR guy, my accountant, my gopher, my sycophant, and my photographer are all hip hop junkies from way back. So I feel like I get a good exposure to both.

Wrong. Not perfect, but comparable to Buhloone. More serious, but livelier. Better rhyming and production.

That was pretty funny, with the hot-tube and all.

You've got to love that the first single, Breakadawn, is buried as track number 13 in the album.

I adore this album. It's the De La Soul album I listen to most. Actually, I don't listen to either 'is Dead' or '3ft' anymore. Frankly, I find '3ft' pretty unlistenable. It just goes to show that the most innovative albums are often not the most listenable.

Is 'listenable' a word?

one of the most heartfelt hip hop tracks EVERRRR.

Paul's on the cover!

Just an extremely good hip hop album.

I seem to remember that it also inspired some very good 'pheNOMMMMMenon' impersonations from Beavis and Butthead way back when.

(i'm still seeing the girl who had a well-worn CASSETTE copy of this album in her car on first outing... mostly cuz of her/partially cuz of BMS)

"Held Down" from Bionix is probably my fave De La Soul song right now.

"It might blow up, but it won't go pop" has got to be one of my favorite hip hop lines of all time.

love this album 4ever

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jb5o3JwbjqU

yeah it's a great, always feel like it's sister album is the also great "j.beez wit the remedy"

In the song I Am I Be, who is/are the Native Tongues member(s) being called out?

Dang this is a good album, I need to DL it

Love this album. Area-I Am I Be-In The Woods is De La compressed into eight minutes.

de la, jungle brothers & tribe were all beefing @ that point w/ various things

good article, see if this link works http://books.google.com/books?id=rSYEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA99&lpg=PA99 ("the q-tip thing" = leaving red alert for simmons & cohen)

1st paragraph here was in response to a Euler opinion being called a challop De La Poll Is Dead

maybe deej is another rap writer for this set

this has been my fav de la soul record since i was a teenager, although part of that was incidental

My favorite DLS album.

I Am I Be is my all-time fave de la song, I think

yeah top 3 for me easy

very quick top 5 de la soul songs:

1 I am I be
2 Ring Ring Ring
3. Buddy (ft. JB/Tribe/Latifah/Monie Love)
4. Ego tripping Part 2
5. Say No Go

i like that list, im tempted to include roller skating jam & breakadawn tho

Oliver Wang at NPR on the album:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/therecord/2013/12/30/258155415/20-years-ago-de-la-soul-refused-to-go-pop

this is great, I think it actually may be my favorite DLS album, or at least the one that's easiest to just let play. and how often is a 5 minute instrumental a non-skippable track on a hip hop record?

my favorite too

One of my all time favs. Shame this isn't streaming, because in some ways it's the De La album most relevant to the times... def the most in line with what Chance and company are doing these days

the handling/legal limbo of De La's catalog is a crime

album is 30 years old today

they added three bonus tracks

Happy 30th anniversary to our 3rd studio album 'Buhloone Mindstate' 🎈

Stream the new 30th anniversary edition which includes 3 bonus tracks: "Lovely How I Let My Mind Float" (previously unreleased digitally), "Sh.Fe.MCs," and "My Mindstate."

🎈🧠 https://t.co/07Yp9Vdy1T pic.twitter.com/oho6Ciuyxk

— De La Soul (@WeAreDeLaSoul) September 21, 2023

Greatest album 9f all time

this is such a masterpiece, in a mega de la soul phase right now

i'm the foot/but who's steppin?

might have to revisit this one, I've been listening to De La Soul is Dead a lot recently and I'm a little perplexed why 3 Feet seems to be so much better known. better highlights for sure but Dead is a better album, Buhloone maybe even better yet. also the fact that they got Scha Dara Parr on it fucking owns

IMO its better than ...Is Dead. Less filler for one thing.

the original trilogy are all great imo and each one has a unique identity that i love

as far as 3 feet...it's pretty hard to overstate how unique and fresh it felt at the time when it was released compared to everything else that was happening in hip hop so i think it maintains that mystique, and it's a great album

also me, myself & i is killer single and video

I didn’t start liking “Me, Myself & I” or 3 Feet High and Rising until the AOI albums

Used to love buhloone mainly as the underrated ('this is so slept on!'), more understated and overlooked pick (with a great maceo parker cameo - used to think I am I be was the deepest rap shit ever as a teen). I liked it as a mellower, sort of middle ground between grown man rap de la and the earlier period. I just love prince Paul tbh and miss de la with Paul. Prob need to go back to those first three and see what I think.

I like that y'all are up early discussing Buhloone Mindstate.

Tbh once Paul left the fold I never really liked de la as much which makes me think I liked Paul more than de la. So I prob need to check out the AOI albums again though my memory of them is they were patchy. But Buhloone is one of those perfectly edited and selected, sequenced albums.

Last year's albums is one of their best.

I don’t know how it never crossed my mind that Stakes is High, even with the title, could be a legitimate Korn album.

The first AOI was my first De La album, so I have a massive soft spot for it. It is also the first that just seems like “a collection of songs” without any unity or feel between them. It is like when Paul left halfway through SIH and they decided to try a bunch of different things, noticed they were good all rounders and thought that was good enough. That would be fair if they didn’t make the straight classics beforehand. It also seemed lost in the shuffle of a lot of rap music at the time doing albums that seemed like that - almost box ticking exercises, one pop one with a singer, one hardcore hiphop song, one a bit more indie, one with a old school throw back feel, one that felt a bit futuristic possibly produced by the Neptunes, one fearing west coast or southern artists, one featuring Sean Paul (although I think they did this on the next one) etc.

Buhloone though, that’s the good shit right there. No qualms, just 10/10 vibes.

Stakes is high had some great tracks but overall it did miss the touch Paul had, esp in regard to crafting an album, and iirc the engineering too. It lacked a certain punchiness in the sonics. Sounded closer to rawkus or indie stuff from around that time.

I don’t know how it never crossed my mind that Stakes is High, even with the title, could be a legitimate Korn album.

― My homies buttthole surfers' record sounds like a f (Western® with Bacon Flavor), Saturday, July 25, 2026 7:27 PM (two days ago) bookmarkflaglink

lol I was just thinking De La Soul is Dead sounds like an ICP album

grind date is great, last year's lp is fantastic, stakes is high has some of their best rapping.

but yeah, the first three are unimpeachable classics

The first AOI was my first De La album

wow I can't imagine how that would have changed the way I feel about this group. loved them since I first saw the music video for Potholes on My Lawn and anticipated all their albums after up to Stakes Is High.

to me DLSID is a maybe a better album but Buhloone Mind State is my favorite and the one I'd pick over all the rest if I had to.

Yeah I think I was twelve when Ooooh came out and I loved it. It took me a couple years to get the catalogue, I think I got Stakes next and then the first one - it seemed like a whole trip I couldn't really fathom. There wasn't kisstory yet, I was still on dial up, 1989 seemed like a whole world away from a radio playing 50 Cent on repeat. Luckily it is undeniably dope and pushed me into exploring more.

I like that y'all are up early discussing Buhloone Mindstate.

"i be the in cuz a critic posting posts is out"

i remember being bored by stakes is high at the time, it felt very grayscale after the first three albums, which was probably intentional on their part. i should see how it sounds to me now

It’s a very good album, I encourage another listen

jesus how have I slept on Buhloone for so long

Buhloone was the one I really rediscovered when they finally all came to streaming. I had liked it when it came out but I was getting into other kinds of music at the time and De La wasn't as much in my rotation as it had been during college when the first two came out. Buhloone is great, definitely on par with the first two. It's the one I've listened to most the last few years. Even tho 3 Feet High will always have pride of place for me, because as noted above it was such a joyful thing when it first hit, like inventing a whole new kind of music.

Buhloone might have been the first rap album I bought, not counting the Beastie Boys.

Not Buhloone related per se but I had such a magical moment with Stakes is High when it came to streaming. The CD was in constant rotation at age 13 but eventually all my discs were boxed up in a closet and I only had downloads of everything.

For some reason my Stakes is High download was missing what may be my favorite track -- Sunshine. I played my download many times over the years, but that song basically slipped from my consciousness for ~20 years. Lots came rushing back when I played the stream and that came outta nowhere like a ghost

It’s a fantastic closer to the album too

I always craved front-to-end pop remixes of 3 Days Later and Ego Trip - they’re both incredible tunes with weird “wait wtf is this” interludes that throw them off-balance. But of course - they’d sound completely wrong without those bits.

Love the whole album - this and Midnight Marauders were the songs I played on my Walkman the year I had a paper round in the northwest London suburbs, doing my best to find something incongruous to listen to

MM sounds almost plodding and mono tempo compared to BMS. MM is sort of tightly packed with samples while BMS lets everything breathe without being too loose or unwieldy. Plus BMS has more interesting detours.

I would say instead that both are absolutely fantastic examples of what they set out to do

Ahhh how I loved this album in college. Relistening now and I still remembered most of the rhymes. Smile on my face the entire time.