Conscious hip hop icons Arrested Development will head back to Australia in March for a performance at WOMADelaide.
Arrested Development made a historic splash with their debut album released in 1992, featuring hit tracks People Everyday, Tennessee and Mr Wendal.
Not only was 3 Years, 5 Months & 2 Days in the Life Of… a top ten hit in the US, UK and Australia, but Arrested Development were the first hip hop act to win the Grammy for Best New Artist. They also won Best Rap Performance for Tennessee, took home Best Rap Video at the VMAs two years running, and their debut album ultimately sold more than four million copies in the US alone.
WOMADelaide
- Friday 6 to Monday 9 March
- Botanic Park / Tainmuntilla, Adelaide SA
- Lineup and tickets here
Stay up to date with what’s happening in and around Melbourne here.
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The group, formed in Atlanta by MC and producer Speech, have never again risen to such lofty heights, but they’ve also never stopped working. Their latest album, Adult Contemporary Hip Hop, was released in July 2025. The album title is a nod to Arrested Development’s status as hip hop lifers, and the fact that they’ve never strayed from the boom bap and conscious hip hop sound that put them on the map.
Speech borrowed the album title from a good friend of his, the late Milwaukee rapper Twan Mack. Mack was an active campaigner for the inclusion of “adult contemporary hip hop” as a category at music award shows.
“Hip hop is 51, 52 years old,” says Speech, who’s chatting to Beat ahead of the group’s appearance at WOMADelaide. “And over these years, we’ve learned that there needs to be more of a diverse subcategory within hip hop, because you got some hip hop lovers who have known the genre for all 18 years of their life, and then you have others that have known the genre for 50 years.
“I think it’s unrealistic for there just to be categories and award shows for just hip hop. That’s like rock not having soft rock, hard rock, heavy metal, whatever. There’s different types of rock music, there’s different types of hip hop music, and we need to be more diverse.”
Mack died suddenly in late 2024 at the age of 54. Let’s Get On With It, the opening track on Adult Contemporary Hip Hop, begins with Speech praising Mack. “My dude passed, Twan Mack, my muse in rap,” he says. Mack himself features on track three, Live Forever, which closes with the lines, “Shout out to Twan Mack / Your verse is still on here in spirit / Love you bro / Live forever.”
“We dedicated this album and the album title to him,” Speech says.
Speech co-produced Adult Contemporary Hip Hop with UK-based producer Configa. You won’t find any trap or drill beats on the record, nor any Auto-Tuned rhymes. But various hallmarks of the Arrested Development sound are present: political, Afrocentric lyrics; boom bap beats and soul and gospel samples; Speech’s melodic flow; and uplifting backing vocals from long-serving Arrested Development family members 1Love, Tasha LaRae and Fareedah.
But despite the group’s affinity for golden age sounds, Speech isn’t content merely trading in nostalgia.
“It’s a thing that you have to keep readdressing as an artist, because there’s a way that you could do music to where if you ignore what people are into at the time, you can find yourself irrelevant in the discussion and in what people are feeling,” he says. “So I think that there is a mixture of staying true to where you’re at in the moment, while at the same time paying attention to what’s going on in the world.”
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Arrested Development will perform just one set at WOMADelaide, on the Foundation Stage on Monday 9 March. The group’s back catalogue includes more than a dozen albums, but they continue to play all the hits, such as Mr. Wendal, People Everyday and Tennessee from 3 Years, 5 Months & 2 Days in the Life Of…, and Ease My Mind from its 1994 follow-up, Zingalamaduni.
“It never gets old to see somebody in the crowd and to feel their passion and to feel their excitement and the way they’re connecting,” Speech says. “It makes the music fresh again.”
In recent years, particularly as the political climate in the US has grown increasingly toxic, Speech has been pleased to see many younger listeners connecting with Arrested Development’s message of love and unity.
“When we tour, there is a lot of 18-year-olds, 25-year-olds who weren’t even born when our first album came out and they’re coming to our shows,” he says. “I also remember when I was younger, I was interested in Blue Note Records and jazz that I wasn’t born to see come out. Like, I didn’t know with these releases how well or bad they performed when they were first released; I just was deeply interested in what this music was about. So, I think that there’s a great deal of younger people that are doing the same thing right now.”
Arrested Development will perform at WOMADelaide 2026. See the complete lineup here.
This article was made in partnership with WOMADelaide.
