Q-Tip f/ Busta Rhymes, Raekwon, & Lil Wayne: "Renaissance Rap (Remix)"

You know the part on “Move” where Tip forsakes funky chaos for morphine-laced brilliance, smoky neon lights oscillating in perfect harmony? Of course you do. It’s my favorite part of Q-Tip’s immensely enjoyable “don’t call it a comeback” record (sorely excluded from our year-end festivities—our bad). Well, direct from the heavens—err, Twitter actually, we have a re-imagining of that morsel of dope, stretched to the margin and rendered in panoramic scope.

The Abstract throws his handful of jewels on the table first, cheshire cat disposition beneath the precise velvety-ness of his cadence, and he quietly narrates his pre-fame endeavors, an amended version of the album track, concluded with poignance: “Get it in ya head / We gon’ rock the dead / Night of the living MCs / The weak ones fled.” Then he graciously passes the mic and plays hypeman to his cohorts, embellishing their bars with gleeful yelps and encouragement. This whole phenomenon is so enjoyable in part because it feels markedly organic, like Tip has this impossibly hot beat from a legend, and he’d like to share it with his venerable peers—not just old contemporaries like Busta and Rae, who sound grizzled and immensely capable here, but the (relatively) new kid on the block, too.

It’s nice to hear Busta Rhymes rattling off a stream of slightly nonsensical, wildlife-related outlandishness laced with a hushed shit-talking. It’s the type of performance that reminds you the guy has anthems like “Woo Ha!” and “Abandon Ship” in his canon, and that Busta is at his grin-inducing pinnacle when he bears his eccentricities and the outlandishness of his wordplay and treats them as strengths. Raekwon’s verse is a rush of syllables and slang in the best possible way, smooth and measured, the more subdued flow Rae has been utilizing the last few years fits perfectly here, navigating blips and snares like a gymnast weaving through a packed intersection. Then Wayne drops: “Ever since I made it up out of middle America / E’ybody wanna be in my genital area,” and everyone reaches for the back button on their clickwheels, brains compelling them like sugared-up four year olds following a slide down the biggest hill in your neighborhood: “again!” And that’s the essence of this: no mythology, no hype, just an epic posse track floated into the bowels of the internet for you and yours.