By Lauren Rouleau
The son of two educators, Talib Kweli Greene, a Brooklyn, N.Y. native, kicks off his tour today in Washington, D.C. for his latest album, “Quality,” which was released Nov. 19.
The tour is in support of Common’s latest critically acclaimed album, “Electric Circus.” Kweli is opening up for Common, and will be in the Massachusetts area when he and Common will perform in Worcester at the Palladium on Friday.
Common and Kweli won their grammy for “Best R’B Song” on Sunday’s show for their song, “Love of My Life (An Ode To Hip Hop),” from the “Brown Sugar” soundtrack.
His name means “student of truth,” and he has been creatively writing plays, poetry and short stories since elementary school days.
“I wasn’t really one of the cool kids,” Kweli recalls. “Hip hop became a way for me to write and be cool; it gave me a language to speak to my peers. In junior high, I started writing rhymes for my friends, and then I eventually began writing rhymes for myself.”
In high school, Kweli met Dante Smith, later to be known as Mos Def. The two began to hang out in Washington Square Park in downtown Manhattan.
After collaborating with Tony “DJ Hi-Tek” Cottrell and Mood, Hi-Tek and Kweli released “Fortified Live” as a single on Rawkus under the name Reflection Eternal.
The following year, Kweli and Mos Def released, “Mos Def And Talib Kweli Are Black Star,” widely hailed as one of 1998’s finest albums.
Outside of music, when Brooklyn’s oldest black-owned bookstore, Nkiru Books, was in financial straights, Mos Def and Kweli bought it and converted it to the Nkiru Center for Education ‘ Culture.
Kweli’s most recent project is “Quality,” where his children, Amani Fela and Diani Eshe are sources of inspiration for the album.
“‘Quality’ is about me growing as a man and as an artist, and continuing what I’ve been known to always do, which is place quality over quantity,” Kweli explains. “I will never do a record without some sense of responsibility. Even if you don’t agree with what I have to say, even if I’m speaking something that’s not relevant to your life, you’ll still be able to appreciate it.”
