At a certain point in the winding lifespan of André 3000’s musical journey, there came a time when we as fans began to worry less about his lack of creative output and more about his general wellbeing. He’d ascended pop’s mountaintop as the outrageous half of OutKast, the best-selling hip-hop duo of all time. Then, without much explanation, he bowed out. He grieved the loss of three parents (mom, dad and stepdad) in a decade’s time. And, for years, the only glimpse we got into his state of mind were the random guest verses he’d kill at will or the doubly random social media sightings of him inexplicably playing flute while wandering the Earth solo.
Catching him in the act became a game overzealous fans played — like some hip-hop version of “Where’s Waldo?” — almost against his wishes. But he was also “in on the joke,” he assures me. “I laugh at it because my homies in Atlanta, we’ll talk and they’ll be like, ‘Man, you know n***** think you crazy to f*** around with this flute.”
Maybe he was preparing us for what was to come all along.
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