De La Soul AOI: Bionix 2LP

AOI: Bionix is De La Soul's sixth full-length album, released on December 4, 2001. The first single, "Baby Phat," featuring Yummy Bingham and Devin the Dude, was an ode to larger-sized women. Elsewhere, "Held Down," featuring Cee-Lo, found Posdnuos in an introspective mood as he mused on fatherhood, religion, and fame. Slick Rick also made an appearance on "What We Do (For Love)," a humorous song about puberty and sexual discovery. The album featured skits with a character by the name of Reverend Do Good, which worked as social commentary as well as the intros and outros of the songs. The final Reverend Do Good skit acts as one final advertisement for Ghost Weed as heard on De La Soul's previous album, Art Official Intelligence: Mosaic Thump. A mischievous teenager takes a hit of the substance, then morphs into Slum Village frontman J Dilla, who provides the intro and outro to the marijuana-themed song "Peer Pressure" (which he also produced).

...the trio sounds positively refreshed here, finally content to concentrate on its specialties: wrapping groovy, sparkling productions around smart, sympathetic themes with rapping that doesn't scrimp just because they're not gangsta....De La Soul handed virtually all of the production duties over to the talented [Dave] West, and it pays off doubly, not only giving Bionix a great sense of album flow, but freeing up the trio to concentrate on its excellent rapping (probably the best since their debut). It hardly seemed possible that De La Soul were capable of such incredible work after being lapped by most of the hip-hop world, but Bionix ranks right up there with 3 Feet High and Rising.