Das EFX
Encyclopedia
Das EFX is an American
hip hop
duo. It consists of emcees Skoob (also known as Books, born William "Willie" Hines, November 27, 1970) and Dray (also known as Krazy Drayzy, born Andre Weston, September 9, 1970). They rose to popularity in the early 1990s due to their affiliation with EPMD
's Hit Squad
and the duo's stream of consciousness lyrical delivery, which became one of the most influential lyrical styles in hip hop music during the early 1990s. Their style combined nonsensical lines with a fast-paced flow (that included words that end with "-iggedy") and numerous pop culture references.
but the two met at Virginia State University
in 1988 and began performing together. They named themselves "Das" standing for "Drayz and Skoob" and "EFX" meaning "effects". Das EFX caught the attention of EPMD at a local talent show where, despite losing the competition, they did well enough to convince EPMD to sign them to a recording contract. The duo gained critical and commercial fame with the release of their landmark debut album, Dead Serious
, which highlighted their unusual rapping style which they nicknamed "sewage".
Dead Serious went platinum and its lead single, "They Want EFX," (which contains samples from James Brown
's "Blind Man Can See It" and Malcolm McLaren
's "Buffalo Gals
") reached the top ten on the U.S.
Billboard
R&B
chart
, the Top 40 on the Billboard Hot 100
and #1 on the Hot Rap Tracks
chart. Follow-up singles "Mic Checka" and "Straight Out the Sewer" did not chart on the Hot 100, but reached #1 and #3 on the Hot Rap Tracks chart, respectively.
The duo also made a guest appearance on Ice Cube
's smash hit single "Check Yo Self
". The song reached #20 on the Hot 100 and #1 on the Rap Tracks chart. The track peaked at #36 in the UK Singles Chart
in August 1993. The single also sold over one million copies in the U.S. Their refrain
of "Chiggedy-check yo self before you wriggedy-wreck yo self" became a catchphrase in 1993. The song has since appeared in the videogame Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas
, playing on the radio station Radio Los Santos.
From the time of their debut in 1992 to 1993, several elements of their style were adopted by other hip-hop artists, including the Lords of the Underground
, The Fu-Schnickens
, Kris Kross
, Common
and even, to a lesser extent, Public Enemy. The iggedy style was also referenced in the 1996 BLACKstreet
song "No Diggity
" with "diggity" meaning "doubt". This also became a popular catchphrase at the time. Jay-Z
's early style is described by Vibe as "a distinctly Das EFX-type, stiggety style" on his 12" single "Can't Get With That", though this is the type of delivery he along with his mentor, Jaz-O, exhibited on the track "The Originators" in 1989.
As their career progressed, however, Das EFX's once-distinctive and unique lyrical delivery became more commonplace as other artists imitated it. Derailed by the popularity of their own style, the duo slowed down their fast-paced flow, eliminated the iggedy suffix
and downplayed their cartoonish content on their second album, Straight Up Sewaside
. However, around the time of their third album Hold It Down
(which was far less commercially successful than their debut release), Das EFX found themselves caught in the middle of EPMD
's ugly breakup; it led to a three-year absence from recording. They returned in 1998 with the album Generation EFX
and followed up in 2003 with the album How We Do
; both were panned by critics. Das EFX continue to record and perform today to a much smaller yet devoted cult following
. In an episode of Beverly Hills, 90210
, David Silver can be seen reciting the lyrics to "They Want EFX."
In 2006, after a hiatus, Das Efx went on many International tours with DJ Rondevu.
In 2007, the duo appeared on the remix of Nas
' "Where are They Now" and continued to tour the globe on a regular basis. They toured again in 2010, and are working on a new album.
has made numerous references to Das EFX's unique style and lyrics in sketches of his popular Chappelle's Show
. In one sketch, a teenaged Chappelle tells his girlfriend "I riggity-realize that I liggity-love you". In another, Chappelle as President Bush
announced that a country named "Riggity-Row" will join the Coalition of the Willing
. In yet another sketch, Chappelle as a news anchor announces the opening lyrics of "They Want EFX" as a special report.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
hip hop
Hip hop music
Hip hop music, also called hip-hop, rap music or hip-hop music, is a musical genre consisting of a stylized rhythmic music that commonly accompanies rapping, a rhythmic and rhyming speech that is chanted...
duo. It consists of emcees Skoob (also known as Books, born William "Willie" Hines, November 27, 1970) and Dray (also known as Krazy Drayzy, born Andre Weston, September 9, 1970). They rose to popularity in the early 1990s due to their affiliation with EPMD
EPMD
EPMD is an American hip hop group from Brentwood, New York. The group's name is a concatenation of the members' name "E" and "PMD" or an acronym for "Erick and Parrish Making Dollars", referencing its members, emcees Erick Sermon and Parrish Smith...
's Hit Squad
Hit Squad
The Hit Squad was a 1990s hip hop collective of East coast hip hop artists formed by Erick Sermon and Parrish Smith better known as EPMD. The collective separated when EPMD broke up for the first time in 1993, later reforming as Def Squad.-Career:...
and the duo's stream of consciousness lyrical delivery, which became one of the most influential lyrical styles in hip hop music during the early 1990s. Their style combined nonsensical lines with a fast-paced flow (that included words that end with "-iggedy") and numerous pop culture references.
History
Member Skoob hails from Brooklyn, New York City while Krazy Drayzy hails from Teaneck, New JerseyTeaneck, New Jersey
Teaneck is a township in Bergen County, New Jersey, and a suburb in the New York metropolitan area. As of the 2010 United States Census, the township population was 39,776, making it the second-most populous among the 70 municipalities in Bergen County....
but the two met at Virginia State University
Virginia State University
Virginia State University is a historically black and land-grant university located north of the Appomattox River in Chesterfield, in the Richmond area. Founded on , Virginia State was the United States's first fully state-supported four-year institution of higher learning for black Americans...
in 1988 and began performing together. They named themselves "Das" standing for "Drayz and Skoob" and "EFX" meaning "effects". Das EFX caught the attention of EPMD at a local talent show where, despite losing the competition, they did well enough to convince EPMD to sign them to a recording contract. The duo gained critical and commercial fame with the release of their landmark debut album, Dead Serious
Dead Serious (album)
Dead Serious is the debut studio album of American hip hop duo Das EFX, released April 7, 1992 on East West Records and distributed through Atlantic Records. Recording sessions for the album took place at Firehouse Studios in Brooklyn, New York and at Charlie Marotta's North Shore Soundworks studio...
, which highlighted their unusual rapping style which they nicknamed "sewage".
Dead Serious went platinum and its lead single, "They Want EFX," (which contains samples from James Brown
James Brown
James Joseph Brown was an American singer, songwriter, musician, and recording artist. He is the originator of Funk and is recognized as a major figure in the 20th century popular music for both his vocals and dancing. He has been referred to as "The Godfather of Soul," "Mr...
's "Blind Man Can See It" and Malcolm McLaren
Malcolm McLaren
Malcolm Robert Andrew McLaren was an English performer, impresario, self-publicist and manager of the Sex Pistols and the New York Dolls...
's "Buffalo Gals
Buffalo Gals
"Buffalo Gals" is a traditional American song, written and published as "Lubly Fan" in 1844 by the blackface minstrel John Hodges, who performed as "Cool White." The song was widely popular throughout the United States...
") reached the top ten on the U.S.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
Billboard
Billboard (magazine)
Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...
R&B
Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs
Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, is a chart released weekly by Billboard in the United States.The chart, initiated in 1942, is used to track the success of popular music songs in urban, or primarily African American, venues. Dominated over the years at various times by jazz, rhythm and blues, doo-wop, soul,...
chart
Record chart
A record chart is a ranking of recorded music according to popularity during a given period of time. Examples of music charts are the Hit parade, Hot 100 or Top 40....
, the Top 40 on the Billboard Hot 100
Billboard Hot 100
The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...
and #1 on the Hot Rap Tracks
Hot Rap Tracks
Rap Songs is a chart released weekly by Billboard in the United States. It lists the 25 most popular hip-hop/rap songs, calculated weekly by airplay on rhythmic and urban radio stations and sales in hip hop-focused or exclusive markets. From 1989 through 2001, it was based on how much the single...
chart. Follow-up singles "Mic Checka" and "Straight Out the Sewer" did not chart on the Hot 100, but reached #1 and #3 on the Hot Rap Tracks chart, respectively.
The duo also made a guest appearance on Ice Cube
Ice Cube
O'Shea Jackson , better known by his stage name Ice Cube, is an American rapper and actor. He began his career as a member of the hip-hop group C.I.A. and later joined the rap group N.W.A. After leaving N.W.A in December 1989, he built a successful solo career in music, and also as a writer,...
's smash hit single "Check Yo Self
Check Yo Self
"Check Yo Self" is the second hit single from Ice Cube's third solo album The Predator. It was released in July 1993 and features New York rappers Das EFX. It topped both the Billboard R&B/Hip-Hop and Rap charts while also reaching number 20 on the Hot 100 chart...
". The song reached #20 on the Hot 100 and #1 on the Rap Tracks chart. The track peaked at #36 in the UK Singles Chart
UK Singles Chart
The UK Singles Chart is compiled by The Official Charts Company on behalf of the British record-industry. The full chart contains the top selling 200 singles in the United Kingdom based upon combined record sales and download numbers, though some media outlets only list the Top 40 or the Top 75 ...
in August 1993. The single also sold over one million copies in the U.S. Their refrain
Refrain
A refrain is the line or lines that are repeated in music or in verse; the "chorus" of a song...
of "Chiggedy-check yo self before you wriggedy-wreck yo self" became a catchphrase in 1993. The song has since appeared in the videogame Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas is a 2004 open world action video game developed by British games developer Rockstar North and published by Rockstar Games. It is the third 3D game in the Grand Theft Auto video game franchise, the fifth original console release and eighth game overall...
, playing on the radio station Radio Los Santos.
From the time of their debut in 1992 to 1993, several elements of their style were adopted by other hip-hop artists, including the Lords of the Underground
Lords of the Underground
The Lords of the Underground are a hip-hop trio based in Newark, New Jersey. MCs Mr. Funke and DoItAll Dupré met DJ Lord Jazz when all three were undergraduates at Shaw University....
, The Fu-Schnickens
Fu-Schnickens
Fu-Schnickens was an American hip-hop trio. Similar to Das EFX for their cartoonish lyrics and near-constant allusions to pop culture staples, they were the first Hip Hop artists to rap in backwards fashion. The Fu-Schnickens' popularity was brief but significant in hip hop history...
, Kris Kross
Kris Kross
Kris Kross was an American rap duo of the 1990s comprising Chris "Mac Daddy" Kelly and Chris "Daddy Mac" Smith. The duo are best known for their hit 1992 song "Jump", which was #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 for eight weeks and was certified double platinum as a single...
, Common
Common (rapper)
Lonnie Rashid Lynn, Jr. , better known by his stage name Common , is an American hip-hop artist and actor....
and even, to a lesser extent, Public Enemy. The iggedy style was also referenced in the 1996 BLACKstreet
BLACKstreet
Blackstreet is an American R&B group founded in 1991 by Thomas Taliaferro and Teddy Riley, the inventor of New Jack Swing known for his work as a member of Guy. Chauncey Hannibal and Levi Little were signed under production and management contracts with Thomas Taliaferro and were merged into what...
song "No Diggity
No Diggity
"No Diggity" is a song by American R&B group Blackstreet featuring Dr. Dre and Queen Pen in her first recorded appearance. It reached #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #9 in the UK. It ranked at #91 on . It sold 1.6 million copies in 1996, and won the 1998 Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance by a...
" with "diggity" meaning "doubt". This also became a popular catchphrase at the time. Jay-Z
Jay-Z
Shawn Corey Carter , better known by his stage name Jay-Z, is an American rapper, record producer, entrepreneur, and occasional actor. He is one of the most financially successful hip hop artists and entrepreneurs in America, having a net worth of over $450 million as of 2010...
's early style is described by Vibe as "a distinctly Das EFX-type, stiggety style" on his 12" single "Can't Get With That", though this is the type of delivery he along with his mentor, Jaz-O, exhibited on the track "The Originators" in 1989.
As their career progressed, however, Das EFX's once-distinctive and unique lyrical delivery became more commonplace as other artists imitated it. Derailed by the popularity of their own style, the duo slowed down their fast-paced flow, eliminated the iggedy suffix
Suffix
In linguistics, a suffix is an affix which is placed after the stem of a word. Common examples are case endings, which indicate the grammatical case of nouns or adjectives, and verb endings, which form the conjugation of verbs...
and downplayed their cartoonish content on their second album, Straight Up Sewaside
Straight Up Sewaside
Straight Up Sewaside is the second album by the hip hop duo Das EFX. It was not as popular as their debut album Dead Serious, but was a critical success...
. However, around the time of their third album Hold It Down
Hold It Down (Das EFX album)
Hold It Down is the third album by Brooklyn-based Rap duo Das EFX, released on September 26, 1995 via East West Records. It contains production from acclaimed producers such as DJ Premier, Pete Rock and Easy Mo Bee...
(which was far less commercially successful than their debut release), Das EFX found themselves caught in the middle of EPMD
EPMD
EPMD is an American hip hop group from Brentwood, New York. The group's name is a concatenation of the members' name "E" and "PMD" or an acronym for "Erick and Parrish Making Dollars", referencing its members, emcees Erick Sermon and Parrish Smith...
's ugly breakup; it led to a three-year absence from recording. They returned in 1998 with the album Generation EFX
Generation EFX
Generation EFX is the fourth album by Brooklyn-based rap duo Das EFX, released on March 24, 1998. It was poorly received commercially and critically ignored. The bulk of its production is done by 8-Off, PMD, and long time Das EFX collaborators Derek Lynch and Chris Charity...
and followed up in 2003 with the album How We Do
How We Do (album)
How We Do is the fifth album by Brooklyn-based hip hop duo Das EFX, released on September 23, 2003.-Track listing:...
; both were panned by critics. Das EFX continue to record and perform today to a much smaller yet devoted cult following
Cult following
A cult following is a group of fans who are highly dedicated to a specific area of pop culture. A film, book, band, or video game, among other things, will be said to have a cult following when it has a small but very passionate fan base...
. In an episode of Beverly Hills, 90210
Beverly Hills, 90210
Beverly Hills, 90210 is an American drama series that originally aired from October 4, 1990 to May 17, 2000 on Fox and was produced by Spelling Television in the United States, and subsequently on various networks around the world. It is the first series in the Beverly Hills, 90210 franchise...
, David Silver can be seen reciting the lyrics to "They Want EFX."
In 2006, after a hiatus, Das Efx went on many International tours with DJ Rondevu.
In 2007, the duo appeared on the remix of Nas
Nas
Nasir bin Olu Dara Jones, who performs under the name Nas , formerly Nasty Nas, is an American rapper and actor. He is regarded as one of the most important figures in hip hop and one of the most skilled and influential rappers of all-time...
' "Where are They Now" and continued to tour the globe on a regular basis. They toured again in 2010, and are working on a new album.
Chappelle's Show
Comedian Dave ChappelleDave Chappelle
David Khari Webber "Dave" Chappelle is an American comedian, screenwriter, television/film producer, actor, and artist. Chappelle began his film career in the film Robin Hood: Men in Tights in 1993 and continued to star in minor roles in the films The Nutty Professor, Con Air, and Blue Streak. His...
has made numerous references to Das EFX's unique style and lyrics in sketches of his popular Chappelle's Show
Chappelle's Show
Chappelle's Show is an American sketch comedy television series created by comedian Dave Chappelle and Neal Brennan, with Chappelle hosting the show as well as starring in various skits. Chappelle, Brennan and Michele Armour were the show's executive producers. The series premiered on January 22,...
. In one sketch, a teenaged Chappelle tells his girlfriend "I riggity-realize that I liggity-love you". In another, Chappelle as President Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
announced that a country named "Riggity-Row" will join the Coalition of the Willing
Coalition of the willing
The term coalition of the willing is a post-1990 political phrase used to collectively describe participants in military or military-humanitarian interventions for which the United Nations Security Council cannot agree to mount a full UN peacekeeping operation...
. In yet another sketch, Chappelle as a news anchor announces the opening lyrics of "They Want EFX" as a special report.
Discography
- Dead SeriousDead Serious (album)Dead Serious is the debut studio album of American hip hop duo Das EFX, released April 7, 1992 on East West Records and distributed through Atlantic Records. Recording sessions for the album took place at Firehouse Studios in Brooklyn, New York and at Charlie Marotta's North Shore Soundworks studio...
(1992) - Straight Up SewasideStraight Up SewasideStraight Up Sewaside is the second album by the hip hop duo Das EFX. It was not as popular as their debut album Dead Serious, but was a critical success...
(1993) - Hold It DownHold It Down (Das EFX album)Hold It Down is the third album by Brooklyn-based Rap duo Das EFX, released on September 26, 1995 via East West Records. It contains production from acclaimed producers such as DJ Premier, Pete Rock and Easy Mo Bee...
(1995) - Generation EFXGeneration EFXGeneration EFX is the fourth album by Brooklyn-based rap duo Das EFX, released on March 24, 1998. It was poorly received commercially and critically ignored. The bulk of its production is done by 8-Off, PMD, and long time Das EFX collaborators Derek Lynch and Chris Charity...
(1998) - How We DoHow We Do (album)How We Do is the fifth album by Brooklyn-based hip hop duo Das EFX, released on September 23, 2003.-Track listing:...
(2003)