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Greg Tate
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Gregory Stephen Tate (October 14, 1957 – December 7, 2021) was an American writer, musician, and producer. A long-time critic for The Village Voice, Tate focused particularly on African-American music and culture, helping to establish hip-hop as a genre worthy of music criticism. Flyboy in the Buttermilk: Essays on Contemporary America (1992) collected 40 of his works for the Voice and he published a sequel, Flyboy 2, in 2016. A musician himself, he was a founding member of the Black Rock Coalition and the leader of Burnt Sugar.[1]

Key Information

In 2024, Tate was posthumously awarded a Pulitzer Prize, a Special Citation award.[2]

Early life and education

[edit]

Gregory Stephen Tate was born on October 14, 1957,[3] in Dayton, Ohio.[1][4] When he was 13 years old, his family moved to Washington, D.C.[5][6] His parents Charles and Florence (Grinner) Tate were civil rights movement activists involved in the Congress of Racial Equality, and played Malcolm X speeches and Nina Simone's music around the house.[3]

Tate credited Amiri Baraka's Black Music and Rolling Stone, which he first read when he was 14, with stimulating his interest in collecting and writing about music.[7] As a teenager, Tate taught himself how to play guitar. He attended Howard University, where he studied journalism and film.[8]

Career

[edit]

Early career and music

[edit]

In 1981, following an introduction by family friend Thulani Davis,[3] The Village Voice critic Robert Christgau asked Tate to contribute to the Voice.[9] The following year Tate moved to New York City, where he developed friendships with other musicians, including James "Blood" Ulmer and Vernon Reid.[9] In 1985, he co-founded the Black Rock Coalition (BRC) with some of the African-American musicians he knew who had a common interest in playing rock music, writing in a manifesto that the group "opposes those racist and reactionary forces within the American music industry which undermine and purloin our musical legacy and deny Black artists the expressive freedom and economic rewards that our Caucasian counterparts enjoy as a matter of course".[8][10]

In 1999, Tate established Burnt Sugar, an improvisational ensemble that varies in size between 13 and 35 musicians and blended a range of genres including funk, free jazz, and psychedelic rock.[11][10] Tate, who played guitar and conducted the group,[10][12] described it in 2004 as "a band I wanted to hear but could not find".[13]

Writing

[edit]

Though initially a freelancer, Tate quickly became the leading critic on Black culture for the Voice and in that position, one of the leading cultural critics in New York City.[3] He became a staff writer for The Village Voice in 1987, a position he held until 2003.[14] He developed a reputation for "slangy erudition", Hua Hsu wrote: "His best paragraphs throbbed like a party and chattered like a salon; they were stylishly jam-packed with names and reference points that shouldn't have got along but did, a trans-everything collision of pop stars, filmmakers, subterranean graffiti artists, Ivory Tower theorists, and Tate's personal buddies, who often came across as the wisest of the bunch."[12]

Tate's 1986 essay "Cult-Nats Meet Freaky Deke" for the Voice Literary Supplement is widely regarded as a milestone in black cultural criticism;[15] in the essay, he juxtaposed the "somewhat stultified stereotype of the black intellectual as one who operates from a narrow-minded, essentialized notion of black culture" (cultural nationalists, or Cult-Nats) with the freaky "many vibrant colors and dynamics of African American life and art",[16][15] trying to find a middle ground in order to break down "that bastion of white supremacist thinking, the Western art [and literary] world[s]".[17] His work was also published in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Artforum, DownBeat, Essence, JazzTimes, Rolling Stone, and VIBE.[18] At Vibe he became a columnist in 1992, titling his series "Black-Owned".[19] The Source described Tate as one of "the Godfathers of hip hop journalism".[20] A key contribution was his conceptualisation of hip-hop as existing on a continuum with jazz,[12] claiming for the former the level of cultural respect and inquiry the latter commanded.[21]

In 1992, Tate published Flyboy in the Buttermilk: Essays on Contemporary America, a collection of 40 essays on culture and politics, drawn from his writing for the Village Voice.[22][4] Writing for Pitchfork, Allison Hussey said, "It became a definitive work for Tate", treating subjects like Miles Davis, Public Enemy, and Jean Michel Basquiat.[4] Jelani Cobb called the collection "a clinic on literary brilliance" with significant influence on other writers.[10] This impact on subsequent generations of critics was one of Tate's major contributions, with Jon Caramanica writing that "he affected every writer I cared about and learned from — we're all Tate's children."[19]

Tate often had the admiration of the musicians he wrote about, like David Bowie and Flea of Red Hot Chili Peppers; Flea cried in appreciation when Tate reviewed the Peppers' 1999 album Californication.[23]

In 2003, Tate published Everything But the Burden: What White People Are Taking From Black Culture, an edited collection of 18 Black writers addressing the topic of white appropriation of Black art.[24][25] The same year, he published Midnight Lightning: Jimi Hendrix And The Black Experience, an appraisal of the rock legend as a Black icon.[26]

In 2016, Tate published Flyboy 2. In The New Yorker, Hua Hsu wrote that this follow-up to his first collection brought "into sharper focus" Tate's interest in what Tate described as “the way Black people ‘think,’ mentally, emotionally, physically,” and “how those ways of thinking and being inform [their] artistic choices."[12]

Later career

[edit]

He was the Louis Armstrong Visiting Professor at Columbia University's Center for Jazz Studies in 2009 and a visiting professor of Africana studies at Brown University in 2012.[18][20] In 2010, he was awarded a United States Artists fellowship.[27]

Personal life

[edit]

Tate had a daughter, Chinara Tate, born circa 1979.[28][3] In New York, he was a longtime resident of Harlem.[29]

Tate died of cardiac arrest on December 7, 2021, in New York City, at the age of 64.[3][30] That night, the Apollo Theater in Harlem displayed his name on the marquee in remembrance, its usual response for cultural icons.[29]

Works

[edit]
  • Flyboy in the Buttermilk: Essays on Contemporary America. New York: Simon & Schuster. 1992. ISBN 0-671-72965-9. Foreword by Henry Louis Gates Jr.
  • Editor Everything But the Burden: What White People Are Taking From Black Culture. New York: Broadway Books. 2003. ISBN 0-7679-0808-2.
  • Midnight Lightning: Jimi Hendrix and the Black Experience. Chicago: Lawrence Hill Books. 2003. ISBN 1-55652-469-2.
  • Flyboy 2: The Greg Tate Reader. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press. 2016. ISBN 978-0-8223-6180-0.
  • Co-editor with Liz Munsell. Writing the Future: Basquiat and the hip-hop generation. Boston: Museum of Fine Arts. 2020. ISBN 978-0-8784-6871-3.

References

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Further reading

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[edit]
Revisions and contributorsEdit on WikipediaRead on Wikipedia

Greg Tate

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Greg Tate (1957 – December 7, 2021) was an American cultural critic, journalist, and musician whose essays on Black music, hip-hop, visual arts, and broader African American aesthetics shaped critical discourse in late 20th- and early 21st-century popular culture. A staff writer at The Village Voice from 1987 until 2005, Tate elevated hip-hop from street phenomenon to canonical art form through rigorous, stylistically inventive prose that drew parallels to jazz, rock, and Abstract Expressionism. His 1992 essay collection Flyboy in the Buttermilk: Essays on Contemporary America exemplified his approach, fusing vernacular flair with intellectual depth to dissect cultural appropriation, racial identity, and artistic innovation. Tate also performed as a guitarist in ensembles blending jazz and funk, and in 2024 received a posthumous Pulitzer Prize for Criticism, recognizing his enduring impact on music and cultural journalism. He died of cardiac arrest at age 64.

Early Years

Childhood and Family Background

Gregory Stephen Tate was born on October 14, 1957, in Dayton, Ohio, to Charles E. Tate and Florence (née Grinner) Tate. Both parents were active civil rights advocates in Dayton, serving as members of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) and promoting Black self-determination through community organizing and political engagement. Charles Tate worked at the Booker T. Washington Foundation, focusing on educational and community initiatives, while Florence Tate became the first Black female reporter at the Dayton Daily News in 1963, covering local issues amid the era's racial tensions; she held a bachelor's degree in English from LeMoyne College and drew from her upbringing in the Jim Crow South. As the eldest of three siblings—which included brother Brian Tate, a musician, and sister Geri Augusto—the young Tate grew up in a steeped in and intellectual discourse on racial justice. His parents modeled commitment to Black empowerment, with Florence Tate later advancing to roles such as communications director for and , and authoring a on her revolutionary experiences. This environment, characterized by Florence's pan-African orientation and the couple's emphasis on selfless action against systemic inequality, profoundly shaped Tate's early worldview. The family relocated to , when Tate was about 12 years old, around 1969–1970, as his parents deepened their involvement in national Black political movements. This move exposed him to the intensifying urban civil rights and dynamics of the nation's capital, building on Dayton's foundational influences during a formative period of his youth.

Education at Howard University

Tate attended in , after his family relocated there from . He pursued studies in and , fields that aligned with his emerging interests in cultural analysis and media. While at , Tate hosted a show, which provided an early platform for engaging with music and . This experience marked the beginning of his involvement in music criticism, as he started experimenting with writing about contemporary sounds, including those from the burgeoning hip-hop scene. His self-taught guitar skills, developed prior to university, complemented these pursuits, fostering a hands-on approach to cultural . Tate graduated from , completing his formal education there before moving to in the early to launch his professional career. His time at the historically Black institution, often referred to as a hub for intellectual and artistic development among African American students, laid foundational skills in that he later applied to elevating discussions of Black music and .

Professional Career

Entry into Journalism and Early Writings

Following his studies in journalism and film at Howard University, where he hosted a radio show and began experimenting with music criticism, Tate entered professional journalism through freelance contributions in the early 1980s. He started writing for The Village Voice in 1981, initially producing music reviews that addressed emerging Black cultural expressions. Tate's early publications appeared across outlets including and , focusing on genres like hip-hop, punk, and to argue for their artistic legitimacy amid mainstream dismissal. A notable 1982 piece, "Bad Brains: Hardcore of Darkness," published in , examined the Black punk band , blending analysis of racial dynamics in hardcore music with broader cultural commentary. By 1986, Tate's freelance work had evolved into more theoretical essays, such as "Cult-Nats Meet Freaky Deke" in , which critiqued tensions between Black nationalist traditions and experimental aesthetics in figures like and . These writings established his voice as erudite yet accessible, prioritizing vernacular innovation over conventional criticism. In 1987, Tate transitioned to a staff position at , where he continued producing pieces that elevated hip-hop's intellectual depth until 2003. His initial output, grounded in firsthand engagement with New York's underground scenes after relocating there in 1982, laid the foundation for hip-hop's critical canon by insisting on its roots in African-American oral and performative traditions.

Music Criticism and Hip-Hop Elevation

Tate's music criticism emerged prominently in the early 1980s through his contributions to , where he dissected the burgeoning hip-hop scene with a blend of poetic prose, cultural erudition, and Afrocentric analysis. His 1982 review "Beyond the Zone of the Zero Funkativity" of George Clinton's Computer Games exemplified this approach, weaving references to Black funk traditions and futuristic aesthetics to argue for hip-hop's roots in innovative Black musical expression. By championing artists like Run-D.M.C., , and , Tate positioned hip-hop not as mere street entertainment but as a counterhegemonic force akin to , emphasizing its sampling techniques, rhythmic urgency, and resistance to mainstream commodification. Tate elevated hip-hop's critical stature by framing it within broader artistic continuums, drawing parallels to historical genres while critiquing industry racial dynamics. In a 1990 Village Voice interview with , he probed the rapper's theatrical bravado and social responsibility, highlighting hip-hop's performative soulfulness over superficial aggression. His essays, such as the 1986 "Cult-Nats Meet Freaky-Deke" in the same publication, explored post-nationalist aesthetics in rap, challenging reductive nationalist readings and advocating for eclectic, freaky innovation in the genre. Tate's style—rhythmic metaphors fused with theoretical depth—legitimized hip-hop for intellectual audiences, influencing a generation of writers and establishing him as a foundational figure in hip-hop . Later works extended this elevation into the 1990s and beyond, as seen in his Flyboy in the Buttermilk (1992) essay collection, which included pieces linking hip-hop to visual artists like Jean-Michel Basquiat and critiquing white appropriation in Black music forms. In a 2004 essay on Eminem, Tate dissected disparities in artistic freedom, noting how non-white rappers faced stricter scrutiny than white counterparts, thereby underscoring hip-hop's role in exposing systemic biases. His 2015 Rolling Stone review of Kendrick Lamar's To Pimp a Butterfly reaffirmed hip-hop's capacity for profound cultural commentary, praising its fusion of jazz, funk, and political lyricism as a pinnacle of the genre's evolution. Through such writings, Tate not only documented hip-hop's ascent but actively shaped its discourse, mentoring figures like Joan Morgan and fostering Black Rock Coalition initiatives to promote artistic autonomy.

Expansion into Visual Arts and Cultural Essays

Tate's engagement with visual arts began in the mid-1980s amid New York City's vibrant intersection of hip-hop, , and fine art, where he critiqued emerging Black artists who fused street culture with gallery aesthetics. His 1986 Village Voice essay "Cult-Nats Meet Freaky-Deke" analyzed figures like and , arguing for a "freaky-deke" sensibility that merged with experimentation, distinct from rigid ideological frameworks. This piece exemplified his shift toward interdisciplinary criticism, privileging artists who embodied Black creativity's pluralistic tensions over dogmatic narratives. By the late 1980s and 1990s, Tate produced targeted essays on visual artists, often tying their work to hip-hop's sonic and performative innovations. In 1989, his Village Voice profile "Nobody Loves a Genius Child" portrayed Basquiat as a "lonesome flyboy" navigating the 1980s art boom, emphasizing the painter's roots in hip-hop sampling and downtown improvisation rather than isolated genius myths. He later revisited Basquiat in 1992 writings and contributed to essays on contemporaries like David Hammons and Senga Nengudi, highlighting their use of everyday materials to subvert institutional norms. These pieces, collected partly in his 1992 anthology Flyboy in the Buttermilk: Essays on Contemporary America, extended cultural essays to probe Black visual production's resistance to commodification and erasure. Tate's visual arts involvement deepened through curatorial and monograph contributions in the 2010s. He co-curated the 2020–2021 exhibition "Writing the Future: Basquiat and the Hip-Hop Generation" at the , which opened virtually on April 3, 2020, and featured over 100 works linking Basquiat to graffiti pioneers like and , underscoring hip-hop's influence on 1980s visual experimentation. Tate co-edited the exhibition catalog, contributing an essay titled "Hip-Hop's Afrofuturistic Hive Mind" that framed these artists as collective innovators against racial silos. He also penned essays for artist catalogs, including Kerry James Marshall's 2017 Mastry retrospective (delivered as a lecture at MOCA ) and volumes on , Deana Lawson, Ellen , and José Parlá, consistently emphasizing causal links between visual form, Black vernacular, and sociopolitical critique. A planned posthumous volume, White Cube Fever: Hella Conjure and Writing on the Black Arts (), assembles Tate's essays on visual artists such as , Sanford Biggers, , and , focusing on their "conjure" aesthetics—ritualistic, improvisational practices defying white cube sterility. Across these works, Tate's cultural essays rejected superficial , instead applying first-hand observation of artistic processes to reveal how Black visual practitioners engineered resilience amid historical dispossession, influencing subsequent interdisciplinary scholarship on and cultural hybridity.

Later Collaborations and Teaching

Following his departure from The Village Voice in 2005, Tate transitioned into academic roles, serving as a visiting professor of Africana studies at Brown University. He also held the Louis Armstrong Visiting Professor position in jazz studies at Columbia University. Additionally, Tate taught courses on Black arts, visual culture, and music at Yale University, Williams College, Princeton University, and other institutions. In parallel with teaching, Tate sustained his musical collaborations, co-leading the improvisational ensemble Burnt Sugar The Arkestra Chamber, which integrated elements of , , rock, and hip-hop. Founded in the late , the group continued performing and recording into the , with Tate contributing as a and conceptual leader until his death. Burnt Sugar's output included albums such as Convoy to (2017), reflecting Tate's ongoing commitment to experimental Black musical forms. Tate's later scholarly work extended to curatorial contributions, including essays for exhibition catalogs on visual art and , bridging his criticism with institutional contexts. In , he published Flyboy 2: The Greg Tate Reader, a compilation of essays spanning three decades, underscoring his enduring influence on cultural discourse. These efforts highlighted Tate's interdisciplinary approach, fostering dialogues between music, , and in academic and artistic settings.

Musical Contributions

Performance and Production Work

In 1999, Greg Tate co-founded the experimental music ensemble Burnt Sugar the Arkestra Chamber with bassist Jared Michael Nickerson, assuming roles as guitarist, conductor, composer, and musical director. The band, comprising up to two dozen rotating musicians, fused elements of , hip-hop, funk, rock, and in a style Tate described as a "neo-tribal" territory band. Under his leadership, Burnt Sugar released 16 albums on the group's Avant Groidd imprint, including Blood On The Leaf: Opus No. 1 (2001) and All You Zombies Dig The Luminosity. Tate contributed to performances through electric guitar playing and conduction techniques, directing improvisational structures in live settings. Notable appearances included a 2013 concert at Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center, featuring Tate on conduction and guitar alongside vocalist Mikel Banks and trumpeter Lewis Barnes Jr., and a 2019 20th-anniversary event at the with performers such as vocalist Shelley Nicole and spoken-word artist Carl Hancock Rux. Earlier, in the mid-1980s, he played guitar in , an affiliate band of the Black Rock Coalition, which Tate co-founded in 1985 to advocate for Black rock musicians. Tate's production efforts centered on overseeing Burnt Sugar's recordings and live productions, fostering a collaborative environment for experimental output over two decades until his death in 2021. No external production credits for other artists were documented in available sources.

Integration of Music in Criticism

Tate's critical writing on music often incorporated rhythmic and improvisational elements drawn from African American musical traditions, emulating the flow of jazz solos and hip-hop cadences in his prose structure. This stylistic fusion created a performative quality, where sentences undulated with internal rhymes, allusions, and layered references, mirroring the polyrhythms and call-and-response dynamics he analyzed in artists like Miles Davis and Public Enemy. In essays such as those collected in Flyboy in the Buttermilk (1992), Tate blended rap-like signifyin'—a technique of indirect critique and cultural remixing—with jazz-inflected improvisation, allowing his arguments to evolve organically rather than adhering to linear exposition. This integration extended to thematic depth, where Tate used musical metaphors to dissect cultural hybridity; for instance, he likened Public Enemy's bombastic sampling to electric-era Miles Davis's fusion experiments, employing prose that "moved like music" to convey the of themselves. His paragraphs, described as throbbing "like a party" or chattering "like a salon," packed dense intertextual nods—from sermons to iconography—evoking the communal, riffing essence of black . Critics like noted that Tate's sentences themselves delivered analytical insights, prioritizing sonic texture over detached objectivity to honor the improvisatory spirit of the genres he championed. By foregrounding musicality, Tate elevated criticism from mere evaluation to an artistic extension of the music, influencing subsequent writers to adopt hybrid forms that prioritize experiential resonance over conventional critique. This approach, evident in his Village Voice pieces from the 1980s onward, underscored hip-hop's legitimacy as while challenging rockist biases in mainstream journalism through embodied, groove-infused language.

Personal Life and Death

Relationships and Private Interests

Tate maintained close family ties throughout his life. He had a daughter, Chinara Tate, born circa 1979, to whom he became a father at age 22. He was also a grandfather to his grandson . Tate's siblings included his brother , a , and sister Geri. Following his death, his family described him as "an amazing son, brother, father, grandfather, uncle, nephew, [and] cousin—a family man in the deepest African sense," emphasizing his gentle nature and commitment to familial bonds. No public records indicate Tate's marital status or long-term romantic partnerships, though he alluded in a 2018 to ending his relationship with Chinara's mother prior to his move to in the early 1980s, amid personal uncertainties as a young parent. He occasionally referenced past romantic encounters, such as a 1990s girlfriend who initially failed to recognize his public persona, set against New York's bohemian, sexually liberated artistic scene of prior decades. Among private interests, Tate expressed enthusiasm for , identifying as a Libra and attributing personal traits like artistic balance and relational harmony to the sign's influence. He valued the role of , crediting his great-grandparents with providing pivotal support during his formative years. Beyond these, Tate kept much of his non-professional life out of the public eye, focusing his documented reflections on familial responsibilities rather than hobbies or leisure pursuits.

Circumstances of Death

Greg Tate died on December 7, 2021, in at the age of 64. The cause of death was , as confirmed by a statement from his family. No further details regarding prior health conditions or contributing factors were publicly disclosed by the family or medical authorities.

Reception and Influence

Acclaim and Key Impacts

Tate garnered significant acclaim for his pioneering role in legitimizing hip-hop as a subject of serious cultural and intellectual analysis, earning him the moniker "Godfather of Hip-Hop Journalism" from the Smithsonian National Museum of and Culture. His essays, characterized by a poetic yet erudite style, appeared prominently in starting in the early and extended to , Vibe, and , where they dissected the sociocultural dimensions of Black music and art with unparalleled depth. Peers and successors hailed his writing for its rhythmic flow and profound affection for African American expressive traditions, positioning criticism as an artistic endeavor in its own right. Posthumously, Tate's legacy was formally recognized with a 2024 Pulitzer Prize special citation for his body of music criticism, acknowledging his trailblazing insights into genres like hip-hop and their intersections with visual arts and broader Black cultural narratives. Institutions perpetuated his influence through initiatives such as the Greg Tate Award, established by the International Association for the Study of Popular Music-U.S. branch in 2022 to honor outstanding first monographs on popular music, and a namesake scholarship at Columbia Journalism School's 2024 WORD: LIFE hip-hop journalism conference. These honors underscore his status as a foundational figure whose work bridged vernacular poetry and scholarly rigor. Tate's key impacts reshaped cultural criticism by insisting on Black-led discourse amid predominantly white institutional gatekeeping, as he articulated in panels like the 2022 Experience Music Project Pop Conference, where he urged critics to confront racist structures head-on. He advanced as a framework for escaping reductive racial dialogues, integrating and into analyses of Black music's "maroon spaces" of resistance and innovation, which influenced artists and thinkers exploring fluidity. His elevation of hip-hop's artistic merit—drawing parallels to jazz, funk, and visual forebears like —paved the way for a generation of writers, including , to adopt culturally immersive, first-person-inflected approaches that prioritize experiential authenticity over detached objectivity. This shift fostered a more vibrant ecosystem for critiquing , emphasizing its global and interdisciplinary resonances.

Critiques of Style and Approach

Tate's , renowned for its rhythmic density and profusion of cultural allusions, drew occasional for prioritizing stylistic over , rendering some passages challenging for readers lacking familiarity with the referenced idioms or artists. His essays, such as those in Flyboy in the Buttermilk (1992), frequently layered insider references—drawing from , hip-hop lore, and black intellectual traditions—which, while innovative, could assume a level of prior knowledge that excluded broader audiences. Critics of his approach have pointed to an evolving detachment from contemporary hip-hop as the genre commercialized in the and , with Tate's later writings, like his 2004 essay on , reflecting ambivalence toward industry-driven whimsy rather than immersive analysis of new waves. This shift contrasted with his foundational pieces that helped legitimize hip-hop , suggesting a preference for theoretical over sustained tracking of genre mutations. In Flyboy 2: The Original Flyboy (), his increased use of interviews and collaborations was seen by some as diluting the singular, improvisational voice that defined his earlier work, potentially broadening appeal at the expense of auteurist intensity. Despite these observations, such critiques remain marginal amid widespread acclaim for Tate's fusion of criticism with performance-like flair, which mirrored the syncretic energies of the artists he championed. His method, rooted in first-person immersion and cross-disciplinary synthesis, prioritized evoking black cultural vitality over conventional argumentative linearity, a choice that invited charges of opacity from more traditionalist reviewers but aligned with his aim to make criticism itself an artistic intervention.

Posthumous Recognition and Legacy

Following his death from on December 7, 2021, Greg Tate received significant posthumous recognition, most notably a Special Citation in Music Criticism awarded on May 6, 2024. The award honored his 2016 collection Flyboy 2: The Greg Tate Reader, which the Pulitzer board described as providing "a bold and vivid perspective on Black music and culture" through innovative essays that blended personal insight with . This citation underscored Tate's role in elevating by chronicling Black artistic expression with rigor and flair, influencing how critics engage with genres like hip-hop and . Tate's legacy endures as a foundational figure in Black cultural , often hailed as the "godfather of hip-hop journalism" for pioneering incisive coverage of rap's emergence and its ties to broader African-American traditions. Peers and successors credit him with shaping generations of writers through his expressive style, which connected music to , visual , and social critique—as seen in essays defending artists like and against reductive interpretations. His influence extends to mentoring younger critics and fostering interdisciplinary work, with figures like positioned as inheritors of his tradition of polymathic, community-oriented analysis. Memorial tributes amplified this recognition, including a multifaceted NPR gathering of reflections from colleagues and protégés on his generative impact, and exhibitions like Photoville's "In Praise of Shadow Boxers, Dissonance & Dissidents," which celebrated his writing as a conduit for Black radical creativity. Institutions such as DownBeat and the Smithsonian noted his multifaceted contributions as critic, musician, and educator, ensuring his essays remain reference points for understanding innovation in Black music and beyond.

Major Works

Books

Tate's primary authored books consist of essay collections and a monograph focused on music, race, and culture. Flyboy in the Buttermilk: Essays on Contemporary America, published in 1992 by Simon & Schuster, compiles his writings from The Village Voice and other outlets, addressing topics such as hip-hop's emergence, black identity in popular culture, and critiques of American society including the Central Park jogger case and authors like Amiri Baraka. In 2003, Tate released Midnight Lightning: Jimi Hendrix and the Black Experience through Lawrence Hill Books, an imprint of Chicago Review Press, which analyzes Hendrix's music, persona, and innovations in sound from an African American viewpoint, exploring racial dynamics, sexuality, and Hendrix's place in black cultural history. Flyboy 2: The Greg Tate Reader, issued in 2016 by Duke University Press, extends his earlier collection with thirty years of selected criticism on black music, art, literature, film, and politics, emphasizing race, technology, and postmodern aesthetics through pieces originally published in venues like The Village Voice and Spin. Tate also edited the 2003 anthology Everything But the Burden: What White People Are Taking from Black Culture, published by Harlem Moon/Broadway Books, featuring essays by multiple contributors on cultural appropriation, white engagement with black styles, and related social phenomena.

Selected Essays and Articles

Greg Tate contributed essays and articles to outlets such as , , SPIN, and , often dissecting the intersections of Black aesthetics, , visual , and cultural . His work at , where he was a staff writer from 1987 to 2005, frequently highlighted hip-hop's influence on broader artistic expressions. Notable essays include ": Hardcore of Darkness," published in in 1982, which profiled the Black hardcore punk band and their fusion of , punk, and Rastafarian themes amid racial tensions in the music scene. "Cult-Nats Meet Freaky-Deke," appearing in on December 9, 1986, critiqued rigid Black nationalist doctrines while advocating for a "post-nationalist black aesthetic" that embraced , , and cultural experimentation beyond dogma. In 1989, Tate's essay on in , titled "Jean-Michel Basquiat, Flyboy in the Buttermilk," analyzed the artist's rise as a bicultural figure in the white-dominated , his stylistic innovations drawing from and , and the racial commodification he navigated before his death at age 27 from a overdose. Later pieces encompassed ", Fantasea (Self-Released )," a 2012 SPIN review praising the rapper's debut mixtape for its bold house-rap synthesis and lyrical ferocity. And in 2015, his review of Kendrick Lamar's lauded the album's dense fusion of jazz, funk, and political introspection as a modern hip-hop milestone.

References

  1. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/08/arts/music/greg-tate-dead.html
  2. https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/greg-tate-critic-obituary-1268145/
  3. https://www.washingtonpost.com/obituaries/2021/12/08/greg-tate-dies/
  4. https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/greg-tate-wins-posthumous-pulitzer-prize-1235016151/
  5. https://jazztimes.com/features/tributes-and-obituaries/greg-tate-1957-2021/
  6. https://www.westarts.org/news-updates/a-biography-of-greg-tate-in-three-four-minutes
  7. https://washingtoncitypaper.com/article/544093/remembering-flyboy-greg-tate/
  8. https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/music/story/2021-12-08/greg-tate-critic-flyboy-in-the-buttermilk
  9. https://blogs.library.duke.edu/rubenstein/2018/03/22/florence-tates-pan-african-activism/
  10. https://www.nataliebullockbrown.com/blog/tate-tatum-greg-a-tribute-to-a-friend-brother-mentor
  11. https://www.owensfuneralhomeny.com/SCRIPTFOLDER/preview.php?id=694&p=49&search=
  12. https://www.bostonreview.net/articles/the-invisible-hand-of-greg-tate/
  13. https://downbeat.com/news/detail/in-memoriam-greg-tate-1957-2021
  14. https://variety.com/2021/music/news/greg-tate-hip-hop-journalism-village-voice-dead-dies-1235128168/
  15. https://www.culturetype.com/2021/12/12/greg-tate-1957-2021-cultural-critic-who-made-his-name-writing-about-hip-hop-was-equally-attuned-to-visual-art/
  16. https://www.artforum.com/news/greg-tate-c-1958-2021-251190/
  17. https://www.vulture.com/article/greg-tate-obituary.html
  18. https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2021/12/17/greg-tate-transformative-impact-cultural-criticism
  19. https://www.npr.org/2021/12/11/1063200404/greg-tate-critic-memorial-tribute-guide
  20. https://www.villagevoice.com/flying-high-remembering-greg-tate/
  21. https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-critic-who-convinced-me-that-criticism-could-be-art
  22. https://crackmagazine.net/article/lists/6-essays-greg-tate-kendrick-lamar-basquiat-azealia-banks-bad-brains/
  23. https://pitchfork.com/features/article/how-a-group-of-journalists-turned-hip-hop-into-a-literary-movement/
  24. https://hyperallergic.com/698943/greg-tate-giant-among-cultural-critics-dies-at-64/
  25. https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/greg-tate-rembrance-liz-munsell-j-faith-almiron-1234614751/
  26. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/08/arts/music/greg-tate-critic.html
  27. https://baystatebanner.com/2020/04/15/hip-hop-and-basquiat/
  28. https://dukeupress.wordpress.com/2021/12/08/farewell-to-greg-tate/
  29. https://burntsugarindex.com/
  30. https://www.npr.org/2022/04/24/1094256223/under-greg-tate-musical-possibilities-were-limitless
  31. https://burntsugarindex.com/artist/greg-tate/
  32. https://www.dukeupress.edu/flyboy-2
  33. https://www.capitalbop.com/greg-tate-on-burnt-sugar-afrofuturism-and-the-maroon-spaces-that-music-allows/
  34. https://www.robertchristgau.com/get_album.php?id=6243
  35. https://www.hallwalls.org/music/5314.html
  36. https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/programs/music_burnt_sugar_20th_anniversary_january_2019/01-31-2019
  37. https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/fly-as-hell-an-interview-with-greg-tate
  38. https://robfields.com/2021/12/30/remembering-greg-tate-1957-2021/
  39. https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/Obituary/article/88119-greg-tate-celebrated-author-critic-musician-dies-at-64.html
  40. https://nmaahc.si.edu/about/news/statement-death-influential-author-critic-and-musician-greg-tate
  41. https://www.downbeat.com/news/detail/in-memoriam-greg-tate-1957-2021
  42. https://www.ebony.com/greg-tate-an-acclaimed-music-writer-and-cultural-critic-passes-away-at-64/
  43. https://www.blackenterprise.com/late-music-critic-greg-tate-receives-pulitzer-prize/
  44. https://iaspm-us.net/Guthrie-and-Tate-Awards
  45. https://journalism.columbia.edu/news/hip-hop-conference-scholarship
  46. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/07/arts/music/black-critics-pop-conference.html
  47. https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/books/story/2022-03-17/who-will-inherit-greg-tates-mantle-of-black-cultural-critic-in-chief-i-have-a-candidate
  48. https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/greg-tate-influence/
  49. https://photoville.com/projects/tribute-exhibition-to-greg-tate/
  50. https://archive.org/details/flyboyinbuttermi00tate
  51. https://www.amazon.com/Midnight-Lightning-Hendrix-Black-Experience/dp/1556524692
  52. https://www.npr.org/2003/06/26/1311311/jimi-hendrix-book
  53. https://www.amazon.com/Flyboy-2-Greg-Tate-Reader/dp/0822361965
  54. https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/176649/everything-but-the-burden-by-edited-by-greg-tate/
  55. https://www.amazon.com/Everything-But-Burden-People-Culture/dp/076791497X
  56. https://www.unitedstatesartists.org/artists/greg-tate
  57. https://www.villagevoice.com/2020/11/10/bad-brains-hardcore-of-darkness/
  58. https://www.villagevoice.com/cult-nats-meet-freaky-deke/
  59. https://www.villagevoice.com/jean-michel-basquiat-lonesome-flyboy-in-the-80s-art-boom-buttermilk/
  60. https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-album-reviews/to-pimp-a-butterfly-119818/
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