Kamaal/The Abstract is the third studio album by American hip hop artist Q-Tip, released September 15, 2009, on Battery Records. Recorded in 2001, the album is a departure from his solo debut album Amplified (1999). Kamaal/The Abstract is an eclectic fusion album that features Q-Tip rapping, singing, and exploring his jazz musical influences. The album contains introspective and life-related lyrical themes.
The album was originally planned for release in 2002 as the follow-up to Amplified. However, it was shelved by Q-Tip's record label at the time, Arista, who doubted its commercial potential. It eventually leaked onto the Internet, while the distribution of promotional copies led several publications to run reviews of the album.
After its official release in 2009, the album debuted at number 77 on the U.S. Billboard 200 chart, selling 6,000 copies in its first week. Upon its release, Kamaal/The Abstract received positive reviews from most music critics.
Read more about Kamaal/The Abstract: Music, Lyrics, Release and Promotion, Track Listing, Personnel, Charts
Famous quotes containing the word abstract:
“What persuades men and women to mistake each other from time to time for gods or vermin is ideology. One can understand well enough how human beings may struggle and murder for good material reasons—reasons connected, for instance, with their physical survival. It is much harder to grasp how they may come to do so in the name of something as apparently abstract as ideas. Yet ideas are what men and women live by, and will occasionally die for.”
—Terry Eagleton (b. 1943)