Q-Tip is a hip-hop icon, beginning his career with uber-successful ‘90s trio A Tribe Called Quest before launching a solo career that saw him collaborating with the likes of Nas and Janet Jackson. The legendary rapper with voice and flow that made Tribe's "Bonita Applebaum" and other songs hip-hop anthems has been a pillar of the rap community since the late 1980s.

Rapper Q-Tip, born Jonathan Davis in Harlem in 1970, formed A Tribe Called Quest with classmates Ali Shaheed Muhammad and Phife (Malik Taylor) in 1988 while the trio was attending the Murray Bergtraum High School for Business Careers. Tribe signed with major label Jive Records in 1989 and dropped their debut single, "Description of a Fool," off their LP People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm soon after. The group, now part of the Native Tongues Family with De La Soul and the JBs, soon gained the reputation as one of hip-hop's most influential and socially progressive hip-hop groups. Tribe's jazz-infused sound couples with rhymes that border on poetry-produced albums such as 1991's Low End Theory and 1998's Midnight Marauders that remain in the canon of hip-hop to this day.

After the dissolution of A Tribe Called Quest in 1998, Q-Tip went solo. The East Coast MC released his debut LP Amplified (Arista) in 1999 and scored with hit single and commercial success "Vivrant Thing." The 21st century saw Q-Tip losing the signature name (to Kamaal The Abstract) but not the rhyming skills that made him famous. 2002's Kamaal The Abstract was more of a solo effort than Amplified, which clung to Tribe-like conventions, but label Arista decided not to release the album because of its perceived lack of commercial appeal. Whether rapping with A Tribe Called Quest or as a solo artist gracing the mic for hip-hop acts like Mobb Deep and Common, Q-Tip is a hip-hop legend.