Cypress Hill

by Cypress Hill

Overview

It's hard enough to transform an entire musical genre -- Cypress Hill's eponymous debut album revolutionized hip-hop in several respects. Although they weren't the first Latino rappers, nor the first to mix Spanish and English, they were the first to achieve a substantial following, thanks to their highly distinctive sound. Along with Beastie Boys and Public Enemy, Cypress Hill were also one of the first rap groups to bridge the gap with fans of both hard rock and alternative rock. And, most importantly, they created a sonic blueprint that would become one of the most widely copied in hip-hop. In keeping with their promarijuana stance, Cypress Hill intentionally crafted their music to sound stoned -- lots of slow, lazy beats, fat bass, weird noises, and creepily distant-sounding samples. The surreal lyrical narratives were almost exclusively spun by B Real in a nasal, singsong, instantly recognizable delivery that only added to the music's hazy, evocative atmosphere; as a frontman, he could be funny, frightening, or just plain bizarre (again, kind of like the experience of being stoned). Whether he's taunting cops or singing nursery rhyme-like choruses about blasting holes in people with shotguns, B Real's blunted-gangsta posture is nearly always underpinned by a cartoonish sense of humor. It's never clear how serious the threats are, but that actually makes them all the more menacing. The sound and style of Cypress Hill was hugely influential, particularly on Dr. Dre's boundary-shattering 1992 blockbuster The Chronic; yet despite its legions of imitators, Cypress Hill still sounds fresh and original today, simply because few hip-hop artists can put its sound across with such force of personality or imagination. ~ Steve Huey

Product Details

Release Date:	08/13/1991
Label:	Bmg / Sony Music
UPC:	0886978823120
Rank:	20058

Tracks

1. Pigs
2. How I Could Just Kill a Man [Explicit Album Version]
3. Hand on the Pump [Explicit Album Version]
4. Hole in the Head
5. Ultraviolet Dreams
6. Light Another
7. The Phuncky Feel One
8. Break It Up
9. Real Estate
10. Stoned Is the Way of the Walk
11. Psycobetabuckdown
12. Something for the Blunted
13. Latin Lingo [Explicit Album Version]
14. The Funny Cypress Hill Shit
15. Tres Equis
16. Born to Get Busy

Album Credits

Performance Credits

Cypress Hill   Primary Artist
B-Real   Vocals
DJ Muggs   Turntables
Sen Dog   Vocals
Ganxsta Ridd   Vocals

Technical Credits

Joe Nicolo   Engineer,Mixing Engineer,Mixing,Executive Producer
Jason Roberts   Engineer
John Roberts   Engineer
Howie Weinberg   Mastering
DJ Muggs   Mixing,Arranger,Producer,Mixing Engineer
Brett Bouldin   Composer
Louis Folsom   Composer
Lawrence Muggerud   Composer
Chris Schwartz   Executive Producer
Dante Ariola   Logo Design
Stacy Drummond   Art Direction
Amanda Scheer-Demme   Management
Michael Paul Miller   Photography
Lowell Fulsom   Composer
Senen Reyes   Composer
Jimmy McCracklin   Composer
Louis Freese   Composer