Interview: André 3000 reveals why his new solo album has no bars — and no boundaries

At a certain point in the winding lifespan of André 3000's musical journey, there came a time when we as fans began to worry less about his lack of creative output and more about his general wellbeing. He'd ascended pop's mountaintop as the outrageous half of OutKast, the best-selling hip-hop duo of all time. Then, without much explanation, he bowed out. He grieved the loss of three parents (mom, dad and stepdad) in a decade's time. And, for years, the only glimpse we got into his state of mind were the random guest verses he'd kill at will or the doubly random social media sightings of him inexplicably playing flute while wandering the Earth solo.

Catching him in the act became a game overzealous fans played — like some hip-hop version of Where's Waldo? — almost against his wishes. But he was also "in on the joke," he assures me. "I laugh at it because my homies in Atlanta, we'll talk and they'll be like, 'Man, you know n***** think you crazy to f*** around with this flute."

Maybe he was preparing us for what was to come all along.

For the first time in over 17 years, André 3000 is releasing an album of new music. New Blue Sun – announced today and set to be released this Friday, Nov. 17 – is a stunning 87-minute mind-bender, minimalist and experimental, tribal and transcendent.

One thing it is not, however, is a rap record: No bars, no beats, no sub-bass. André doesn't sing on this joint, either. What he does do is play flute, and plenty of it — contrabass flute, Mayan flutes, bamboo flutes — along with other digital wind instruments. In place of lyrics, he offers eight provocative song titles, the first of which almost reads like a lowkey apology, with a wink of irony: "I swear, I Really Wanted To Make A 'Rap' Album But This Is Literally The Way The Wind Blew Me This Time."

The painstaking standard André 3000 set may have made it harder to entertain himself in the years post-OutKast, but so has the thought of chasing his tail. Even without a solo rap album in his catalog, he's consistently ranked among the greatest of all time. Like Coltrane reaching for new heights, he mastered rap's rigidity, pushed it past its limits and eventually reconfigured the entire landscape alongside Big Boi. He granted a lineage of ATLiens permission to run amok with melodic, sing-songy rhyme styles that would earn them the same early derision and eventual mass following he'd gained.

Aging gracefully is not a luxury afforded most rappers. Even 50 years in, hip-hop is still no country for old men. But what of the rapper who comes to see rap itself as old hat? How should we, as fans, react when the poet laureate of our collective psyche trades in his pen for a woodwind?

A departure album in the classic sense, New Blue Sun also feels like André has arrived. Its making came about organically, once he relocated from New York to L.A.. Instead of the OutKast origin story that started at Headland and Delowe, where Big Boi and Dre met their future Dungeon Family producers Organized Noize back in the day, this remix began with an unassuming trip to Erewhon — the chic L.A. health food chain where André bumped into percussionist and experimental jazz heavy, Carlos Niño.

Before long, André started showing up, flute in hand, to Niño's crib where they'd jam in the basement the same way he did in the early Dungeon days. Their impromptu meeting introduced André to a community of collaborators who contribute to New Blue Sun — from keyboardist and Alice Coltrane acolyte Surya Botofasina to guitarist/multi-instrumentalist Nate Mercereau.

With no intention of making an album, they began recording about a year ago. Each song was pure improvisation, with musicians responding to each other in real time.

The result is subtle but daring. Mainly because it flies in the face of everything we've come to expect, and selfishly demand, as André 3000 fans. Yet, somehow, the purely instrumental New Blue Sun exposes his unrefined soul — and the delicate nature of his creative process — in ways the Gemini wordsmith's fine-tuned verses tend to conceal.

When we talked a few weeks before the album's release, he was equally transparent and tangible, whether laughing about Tyler, the Creator's funny response to his new music, detailing the wild ayahuasca trip that had him purring like a panther in Hawaii or sharing the reason why he gets so many requests to play flute at funerals now.

The man may not owe us anything, but he's finally ready to share.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

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