Andre 3000, one half of OutKast, spoke about the Atlanta duo’s twentieth anniversary tour at the opening of his art show at Art Basel in Miami.
“Honestly, just, you know—I didn’t wanna do the tour.” Andre 3000 says in an article posted by FADER yesterday (December 3). “ We hadn’t performed in 10 years. It was old songs. I’m like, ‘How am I gonna present these songs? I don’t have nothing new to say.’ So I was like, ‘Maybe I can start saying new stuff while doing these old songs.’ It became a theme where I was more excited about this than the actual show. This is fun, running out in these.”
The Art Basel show, “I feel ya: SCAD + Andre 3000 Benjamin,” features 47 jumpsuits that Andre 3000 made for the recent OutKast tour, in conjunction with the Savannah College of Art and Design.
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In the FADER article, Andre 3000 explains to musician Nicolas Jaar that he decided to don the jumpsuits after feeling like he bombed at the first reunion date at Coachella.
“My first Coachella show, which was a horrible show, I wore something like [my outfit right now],” Andre 3000 says. “I didn’t know what to wear on stage, so it was my overalls.”
Andre 3000 started wearing the jumpsuits, which featured messages that ranged from socially conscious to humorous.
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“Across cultures darker people suffer most. Why?” one suit says.
He says that the stage was a better venue for his ideas than social media.
“I live my life out on stage and everywhere else,” he says. “I don’t necessarily have to tweet it out. But I felt like it was cool that I could say crazy thoughts or fun stuff. And I think it actually gets more attention because it is what it is instead of tweeting it.”
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He says he thought the tour might be perceived as a cash grab.
“I felt weird about going out on stage and doing it again,” Andre 3000 says. “I felt like people would be like, ‘Y’all are doing all these festivals, y’all are just doing it for money.’ And I felt like a sell-out, honestly. So I was like, if I’m in on the joke, I’ll feel cool about it.”
Andre 3000 has stated there are no plans for an OutKast album. In August, he said he did the tour to support Big Boi and the young fans.
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“Honestly, I never planned to go onstage again in that way,” he said at the time. “If I feel like I’m getting to a place where it’s mimicking or a caricature, I just want to move on. But I felt like: Let me do it now ’cause these kids [in the audience], it feels good to know that they’re happy. I really don’t actually get anything from performing. I feel good in being able to look at Big Boi and say, ‘Hey, man, we did it.’ Big Boi’s got these great records on his own, but this means something else for him..”
