Celebrating 30 years of ATLiens
ATLiens, 1996
The beginning
August 27, 1996, was the beginning of taking the South seriously when it came to HipHop. OutKast released their 2nd studio album, ATLiens, following their debut album, Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik (1994).
ATLiens was the first time I remember hearing HipHop and learning it. It was just me and my uncle in his car rapping Elevators (Me & You) riding down somewhere in Cobb. I was 4 years old. There hasn’t been a feeling close to what this album did and still does when I listen to it.
This album has followed me throughout my entire life; from age 4 to 34, it has been THE album. To ride to, to rap to, and to just have as background music — ATLiens feels like Atlanta, and that’s what makes it the best album to come out of the South.
Just a year before ATLiens was released, Andre 3000 made a statement that solidified the South in the hip-hop scene. In 1995, Outkast was nominated for Best New Artist/Group at The Source Awards and won. Upon walking up, the crowd booed them. Andre took that moment to make sure people knew the South was here to stay by ending his speech with, “The South got something to say”. Everyone knows The Source Awards was the award show to attend if you were a rapper, and with that came a lot of tension (East Coast vs. West Coast at the time), so naturally, would this room even be accepting of Southern hip-hop newcomers OutKast? Andre ended up speaking life into the South with those words, and the group kept delivering hit after hit, album after album for many more years.
ATLiens deep cuts
Every album has its deep cuts, but ATLiens has quite a few special ones.
Ova Da Wudz - This is still Big Boi’s greatest verse to me. The flow is unmatched, and I loved that this is technically “his” song on the album.
Babylon - This is Andre’s song on the album. Dark and moody, it tells the tale of life, death, and temptation—all things worldly, fitting the track title.
E.T. (Extraterrestrial) - Another moody track, but Big Boi starts with an incredible, aggressive verse, with Andre coming back behind him with a more mellow ease.
13th Floor/Growing Old - The closer of the album, the track opens with a melancholy monologue written and performed by Big Rube. Andre ends the album with a verse that brings everything together, “Fat titties turn to teardrops, as fat ass turns to flab. Souls that was open wounds eventually turn to scab. Trees brighten green, turn yellow, brown autumn caught em. See, all them leaves must fall down, growing old.”
The big picture
ATLiens is a conceptual album about what being Black in the South is like, but also about general life transgressions and temptations. The sound of Atlanta was captured perfectly, and it’s why we can still turn on this album in 2026 and get the same feeling we did in 1996. OutKast has been immortalized thanks to The Source Awards, The Dungeon Family, and Organized Noize for giving this dynamic duo a platform. While there is no talk of OutKast getting back together for music, you can catch them both, or at least one half of the duo, around Atlanta.
The Dungeon Family
RIP Rico Wade.
