Outkast Share Statement As Producer Rico Wade Laid To Rest On 30th Anniversary Of Debut Album
Yesterday was 30 years since the release of Outkast’s debut album, Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik. While the hip-hop duo were celebrating the anniversary, they were also mourning the loss of producer Rico Wade, who passed away earlier this month and was laid to rest yesterday. Big Boi and André 3000 shared statements on social media.
“The first time we met Rico [Wade] of Organized Noize, we had the ‘Scenario’ instrumental on and we just rapped damn near the whole song, non-stop,” André 3000 wrote. He continued:
Big Gipp from Goodie Mob — it was his truck we were listening to it out of. We put it in his cassette. We didn’t know Gipp or Rico or none of them, but Rico knew people who did beats — Ray [Murray], and Sleepy Brown. He said, ‘Let me hear what you got,’ so we put in the ‘Scenario’ tape and started rhyming, non-stop, back-and-forth.
That day, after we rhymed, Rico saw something in us. At that time we’d both shaven off all our hair. We’d dyed our hair blonde one time: We were young and in high school, we were outcasts, you know? Rico saw that, and he said, ‘These guys can really rhyme. They don’t really rhyme like people from the South.’ So he told us to come over to his house, and that’s where the dungeon is, in the basement.
From the beginning. Organized Noize signed us. They were our big brothers, and they did a production deal with LaFace records. They were the ones that gave us our first shot and we been doing music with them since the beginning.
“Without Rico Wade […] There would be no Outkast,” Big Boi added. Wade’s funeral took place in Atlanta, where he was born, and Clark Atlanta University’s marching band performed tributes.
