Go Ahead in the Rain is a fan's narrative on A Tribe Called Quest that gives readers the language to imagine a better world.-- "Electric Literature" (2/13/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Go Ahead in the Rain is a literary hybrid: part academic monograph on the group and its music, part pocket history of hip-hop, part memoir, and part epistolary elegy. It is a book that conveys the wonder of being a fan and the visceral impact of experiencing the feeling of having oneself reflected back in music and pop culture.-- "Publishers Weekly" (1/11/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Go Ahead in the Rain is a sparkling tribute to A Tribe Called Quest...Abdurraqib is an excellent guide through the cultural landscape that made (and unmade) Tribe, effortlessly weaving socio-cultural history, music criticism and personal anecdote in an accessible manner, to remind you if you had forgotten and convince you if you had been unaware of the band's art and impact beyond their Lou Reed-sampling hit 'Can I Kick It'.-- "Times Literary Supplement" (1/3/2020 12:00:00 AM)
Go Ahead in the Rain is a Tribe song of positivity and persistence, an excellent illustration of the way that Abdurraqib both describes and mirrors the impact of his subject.-- "Hudson Booksellers, "Best of 2019"" (12/1/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Go Ahead in the Rain is an accurate, honest documentation of the band, their music, and the time...Brilliantly entertaining, informative, and self-reflective. This is essential reading.-- "February Indie Next List" (1/2/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Go Ahead in the Rain is both the promised love letter of its cover image and a remarkably helpful guide to Tribe neophytes. Those who know nothing will know slightly more, and will find a place to start. Those who grew up listening to these records...are likely to find joy and connection in Abdurraqib's memories.-- "Rock & Roll Globe" (2/5/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Go Ahead in the Rain is more than just an homage to A Tribe Called Quest...it's more like a reckoning. The result is a critical examination of the group--their message and history--as well as a musical memoir of sorts, and an exploration of the lasting impact music can have on the soul.-- "Vanity Fair" (12/20/2018 12:00:00 AM)
Go Ahead in the Rain is not just for fans of A Tribe Called Quest, but for anyone who has ever felt deeply understood by a band, or found comfort in the solitude of putting on a pair of headphones.-- "Washington City Paper" (2/14/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Go Ahead in the Rain isn't just a love letter to one of the greatest hip-hop groups ever--it's also a brilliant poet unpacking his formative connections to the beats, the wordplay, and the jazz that set Tribe apart...Go Ahead in the Rain examines how young fandom evolves into something more like true adoration.-- "Pitchfork, "Best Music Books of 2019"" (12/19/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Go Ahead in the Rain might appeal most to the music-obsessed, but its audience is wider than its title suggests. At its heart, the book looks at the constant conversation between life and art: how music changes the way we understand and interact with the world, and alters the culture at large.-- "Seattle Times" (4/12/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Go Ahead in the Rain transcends the usual fan book for its poetic prose as well as its insights into the wider context of the music.-- "Shepherd Express" (4/1/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Go Ahead in the Rain...cunningly and lovingly weaves memoir and eloquently told music history into a compelling and absorbing tribute to the transformative power of music.-- "No Depression" (2/28/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Go Ahead in the Rain...seems to push the whole genre of music writing forward.-- "Garth Risk Hallberg, The Millions" (12/7/2019 12:00:00 AM)
[Go Ahead in the Rain is] illuminating for fans of the group, but even hip-hop novices will be moved by Abdurraqib's book. It's a tribute to A Tribe Called Quest and a tribute to the power music has to grow with the listener. It's a book for anyone who has secluded themselves in headphones, pressed play, and heard themselves singing back in someone else's voice.-- "Vibe" (2/25/2019 12:00:00 AM)
[Go Ahead in the Rain] could create a lifelong fan of a book-lover who's never even heard of 'Bonita Applebum.'-- "Creative Loafing Tampa" (12/9/2019 12:00:00 AM)
[Go Ahead in the Rain] evokes the sensation listeners get at the end of the last track of a wonderful recording, that recognition of having just heard something remarkable.-- "Library Journal" (1/19/2019 12:00:00 AM)
[Go Ahead in the Rain] is yet another essential for your reading list, part music criticism, part appreciation and something else entirely.-- "Treble Zine" (11/27/2019 12:00:00 AM)
[Go Ahead in the Rain] manages to be both a vivid history of early hip-hop and an extended elegy for a rap group that defined the author's sensibility.-- "Guernica" (2/10/2020 12:00:00 AM)
[Go Ahead in the Rain] reads like a well-researched journal entry meets hip-hop history lesson.-- "Alternative Press, "Top 10 Music-Related Books of 2019"" (11/27/2019 12:00:00 AM)
[Abdurraqib] allows us into his own history alongside the groundbreaking group, blending personal, musical, and cultural insights into something that truly resonates.-- "Buzzfeed News" (1/4/2019 12:00:00 AM)
[Abdurraqib] has a seemingly limitless capacity to share what moves him, which means that to read Go Ahead in the Rain, you don't need to be a Tribe Called Quest fan: Abdurraqib will make you one. His love for the group is infectious, even when it breaks his heart...[Abdurraqib writes] about music so beautifully and intelligently that readers are moved to love it, or reminded to love it more.-- "NPR" (2/5/2019 12:00:00 AM)
[Abdurraqib] weaves an astoundingly compelling narrative...[Go Ahead in the Rain] is, without a doubt, an artistic statement of beauty.-- "Anhedonic Headphones" (2/9/2019 12:00:00 AM)
[T]his is a writerly talent worthy of our awe. One could argue writers are at their best when they use their insight to make sense of the world they observe. In a book about A Tribe Called Quest specifically--a group that attracted fans across race, gender, and generation gaps--Abdurraqib's penchant for holding and showing so much simultaneously is a perfect fit.-- "Barrelhouse" (2/5/2019 12:00:00 AM)
A must-read for Tribe fans, Go Ahead in the Rain is also a love letter to the music of our youth, and how our relationship with those musicians can become such a vital part of ourselves as we move through life.-- "Bad Feeling Magazine, "Best of 2019: The best pop culture books"" (2/3/2019 12:00:00 AM)
A poetic salute to what Abdurraqib considers to be the greatest rap group of all-time.-- "Paste Magazine, "2019 Gift Guide for Music Lovers"" (12/12/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Abdurraqib explores fandom, artistry, love, and pretty much everything else there is, with remarkable skill and generosity...there are a lot of great books on this list; this is my favorite.-- "Powell's Books Blog, "Best Nonfiction of 2019"" (12/4/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Abdurraqib identifies with Phife Dawg, and his letter to the late rapper is particularly moving. Go Ahead in the Rain is not comprehensive, but at times it is as moving as the music itself.-- "Irish Examiner, "Noteworthy music books of the year"" (12/22/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Abdurraqib is a poet, and he writes with a precise, gorgeous rhythm that makes a reader want to linger on each line. (My copy of the book is dog-eared and highlighted into oblivion.) But what kills me the most is Abdurraqib's empathy--for the people who make the music that sustains us, and also for us, for being sustained.-- "The New Yorker, "Our Favorite Nonfiction Books of 2019"" (12/18/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Abdurraqib mixes observations about the group with passages of personal retrospective and a rich description of Tribe's musical context.-- "The Current" (2/6/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Abdurraqib...fills this book with jazz and memories of the great rap magazine The Source, childhood crushes and, of course, a warm history of a legendary group. It's that rare vivisection, the kind that cuts cleanly and deeply, but leaves the subject more alive than when we found him.-- "Chicago Tribune, "The 10 Best Books of 2019"" (12/2/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Abdurraqib...is one of the most exciting and empathetic writers we've got...[Go Ahead in the Rain is] a full book of trenchant and highly personal essays about [A Tribe Called Quest].-- "The Ringer" (9/6/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Abdurraqib...makes an implicit argument for a criticism that works toward connection. At the heart of Go Ahead in the Rain are questions about ourselves; it asks how and why we love artists, and what we can do with that love.-- "The Nation" (2/12/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Abdurraqib's erudite ode to A Tribe Called Quest walks readers through their unique formation, but also easily freewheels across late 80s and 90s pop and hip hop culture...His depiction of a singular time in America (which he grounds in his own reflections of high school), when technology was changing everything rapidly and music felt less stratified, and his exploration of sample culture before the tightening effects of copyright laws, are particularly precise and just right.-- "Publishers Weekly, "The Best Books We Read in 2019"" (1/1/2020 12:00:00 AM)
Abdurraqib's stunning essays - especially his book-length homage Go Ahead in the Rain: Notes to A Tribe Called Quest - have proven him one of his generation's most essential cultural voices.-- "The Boston Globe" (9/6/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Abdurraqib's Tribe expertise inspires the reader to seek out albums, playlists, and songs, with a spirit of exploration that reflects the group itself.-- "The A.V. Club, "The 15 most essential music bios (and autobiographies) so far this century"" (4/6/2022 12:00:00 AM)
Booklength criticism masquerading as memoir, an account of growing up as boho youth whose ears and brains get opened, Hanif Abdurraqib's fond exegesis chews over A Tribe Called Quest like even the most meticulous 33 1/3 entry doesn't.-- "Humanizing the Vacuum, "The best books of 2019"" (12/31/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Even at his most introspective, Abdurraqib embraces nostalgia without succumbing to it, and honors the experience of fandom while interrogating it...With Go Ahead in the Rain, he manages to both celebrate their achievements and 'lay them to rest.'-- "The Atlantic" (9/25/2022 12:00:00 AM)
I loved Go Ahead in the Rain because it's about what it means to take refuge in music and also what it means to break out of that refuge through music.-- "NPR's Favorite Books of 2019" (12/3/2019 12:00:00 AM)
If you're a hip-hop fan, you need to get it...a brilliant piece of music writing.--Nikesh Shukla "Saturday Review, BBC Radio 4"
If you're a hip-hop head, you've got to get Hanif Abdurraqib's Go Ahead in the Rain...it's a beautiful meditation on the pioneering rap group and one of the rare books about hip-hop to be long-listed for a National Book Award.-- "BuzzFeed News, "68 Books For Every Person On Your Holiday List"" (11/27/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Lots of books tell us why an artist matters, but this is one that reminds us how special it is to find an artist that matters to us.-- "Treble" (6/13/2022 12:00:00 AM)
Music fans should be reading absolutely everything Hanif Abdurraqib writes, period. He approaches all his subjects with deep generosity and respect, making observations personal and political, all written with a poet's canny pen. Here he turns his ear to A Tribe Called Quest...He deftly situates their work within the rap landscape and the broader music scene with his astute, critical lens.-- "Book Riot, "10 Terrific Nonfiction Books About Music"" (3/23/2022 12:00:00 AM)
One need not be a fan of Tribe in order for [Go Ahead in the Rain] to do its work, and this is because Abdurraqib elegantly underpins his personal investment in Tribe with the long history of race, culture, and aesthetics in American life.-- "Public Books" (7/29/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Part history and part love letter, [Go Ahead in the Rain is] a unique kind of music book that will have you revisiting Midnight Marauders ASAP.-- "GQ, "The Best Books of 2019"" (12/3/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Reading [Go Ahead in the Rain] is like listening to The Low End Theory with a good friend, and confiding in each other all the feelings and thoughts the music brings up...For anyone who's listened to Tribe so many times that their music feels commonplace, part of the air, invisible, Abdurraqib brings it back to vivid presence through context and beautiful, poetic description.-- "KQED Arts" (5/13/2019 12:00:00 AM)
Some of the most insightful writing I've seen on the evolution of hip-hop into a brilliantly cohesive whole. . . Abdurraqib's analysis of grief, authenticity, and the political content of hip-hop stand out, and the letters he writes to the group's members highlight his evolving compassion and empathy for the group's struggles.-- "Pop Matters" (7/18/2023 12:00:00 AM)
The beauty of Go Ahead in the Rain, of its engagement with Tribe Called Quest's jazz-influenced hip-hop, is how Abdurraqib discards well-trodden assumptions about what criticism is: that it must relegate the critic to a position of detached, passionless analysis, or that it must proceed in orderly, logical fashion in order to prove a point. In place of these conventions Abdurraqib presents a work concerned with enmeshment in and with the music, the history that it expresses and alters, and the communities that have given us this music...Go Ahead gives us a glimpse into a criticism that doesn't just subject black music to the conventions of the critical essay. Rather, it allows black music to contort and reinvent those conventions.-- "National Book Critics Circle" (2/26/2019 12:00:00 AM)
The beauty of Hanif Abdurraqib's trim volume is that it doesn't try to be definitive. Instead, Abdurraqib embraces the subjectivity of his fandom, putting the seminal hip-hop duo into context via his own experiences coming of age along with the genre. There's a lot of critical insight into this first great book about ATCQ, one that hopefully won't be the last but will endure regardless.-- "The Current, "Best music books of 2019"" (12/18/2019 12:00:00 AM)
The core pleasure [of reading Go Ahead in the Rain] is watching Abdurraqib watch Tribe work. When Phife is distracted during the recording of Tribe's debut album, sneaking away from the studio to catch nearby Knicks games, Abdurraqib is right there with him. Us too.-- "Vanity Fair, "The Best Books of 2019, So Far"" (7/8/2019 12:00:00 AM)
The poet and critic's love letter to his favorite hip-hop crew is a deeply moving journal of fandom, death, grief, and growing up.-- "Rolling Stone, "Best Music Books of 2019"" (1/1/2020 12:00:00 AM)
The vantage from which [Abdurraqib] dissects Tribe's legacy is rooted in the heritage of black music and delivered from the present cultural moment, making Go Ahead in the Rain, much like Tribe's music, capable of remaining relevant for decades to come.-- "PopMatters" (2/11/2019 12:00:00 AM)
The writing throughout this book is so sharp that I found myself reading and then immediately re-reading lines, amazed at their beauty and precision...Go Ahead in the Rain's tangential, hybrid form is a more accurate representation of the way memories attached to music often feel: non-linear, disjointed, but altogether emotionally vivid.-- "JMWW" (6/7/2019 12:00:00 AM)
This arrestingly personal, sweeping biography explains why A Tribe Called Quest mattered--both as musicians who helped transform the landscape of rap in the 1990s and as artists whose albums changed the author's life.-- "Library Journal, "Best Arts Books 2019"" (11/18/2019 12:00:00 AM)
With [Go Ahead in the Rain], Abdurraqib creates a lasting work with an ambitious scope. He obscures the line between social commentary, memoir, and biography. Most importantly, Abdurraqib constructs a worthy homage to one of hip-hops most innovative artists.-- "Labour/Le Travail" (12/1/2019 12:00:00 AM)