This month, in “painful reminders that we’re getting old,” legendary Oakland-based hip-hop group Souls of Mischief announced the “93 ’Til Infinity 30th Anniversary Tour of 2023: Around the World in 93 Dates.” The tour, as you might have deduced, is stopping in 93 cities across the globe to celebrate the enduring popularity of their debut album and title track “93 ’Til Infinity.” The group, made up of A-Plus, Phesto, Opio, and Tajai land at the Howard Theatre on June 22. Few can say their first major project has had the kind of staying power that this debut album has. In a 2013 interview with Spin, A-Plus says they wrote the song in high school originally called “91 ’Til Infinity.” But the album didn’t come out until 1993. “So that was that,” he says. The track samples a song from Crosswinds, an old jazz album by Billy Cobham. A-Plus says he pulled it out of the dollar bin. I was 3 years old when the album dropped, and didn’t find Souls of Mischief until in college, thanks to a roommate who helped me break free of my St. Louis-centric hip-hop sensibilities. For a young jazz head, 93 ’Til Infinity (and A Tribe Called Quest’s Low End Theory) quickly became two of my favorite soundtracks of young adulthood. And that’s the beauty of this album, as Phesto points out in the Spin interview. “It means so many different things to so many different people,” he says. Indeed it does, “from now ’til infinity.” Souls of Mischief play at 8 p.m on June 22 at Howard Theatre. thehowardtheatre.com. $25–$50.
Souls of Mischief
