Back to the ‘Grind’: De La Soul Revisits Overlooked Classic Album, Share Unreleased Song ‘Bigger’

After years in which their body of work was in digital limbo due to legal hurdles, De La Soul have started furiously digging into their own crates. Two weeks ago, surviving members Maseo and Posdnuos announced the re-release of their limited-edition 1994 EP Clear Lake Auditorium. Now, they’re somewhat belatedly celebrating the 20th birthday of their seventh and often overlooked album.

Coming March 21 is an expanded edition of The Grind Date, the 2004 album that found them ditching the skits and working with J Dilla, along other producers; Flavor Flav, MF Doom, Ghostface Killah and Common also made cameos. By then, De La were practically veterans; the album arrived 15 years after 3 Feet High and Rising, their swirly, trippy and hilariously clever debut.

The deluxe edition is set to include instrumental versions of three of its songs — “Verbal Clap,” “Shopping Bags (She Got From You)” — and two unreleased tracks from the sessions, “Bigger” and “Respect.”

Whether they’ve wanted to or not, De La Soul have been in the news in the last few years more than in what feels like decades. In 2023, co-founder Trugoy the Dove died, just as the band’s back catalog finally arrived on streaming services.

Last fall, the group came out against Marcus J. Moore’s new biography of the band, High and Rising: A Book About De La Soul, threatening legal action. As Moore recently told Rolling Stone, “When you’ve been fighting against an industry for 35 years, then naturally anybody coming along that you feel is trying to take from your legacy, you’re going to make them the enemy.”