Today in Hip-Hop: Das EFX Drop ‘Dead Serious’ Album

On this day, April 7, in hip-hop history...

1992: On April 7, 1992, New York based hip-hop crew Das EFX dropped their debut album, Dead Serious.

After forming out of friendship at Virginia State University, Andre Weston a.k.a Krazy Drayz and William Hine a.k.a Skoob, began rapping professionally as a duo in 1991.The duo worked on their craft with EPMD, recording at their production studios. By gelling their narrative, fast-paced rap style with old school production, the two caught the attention of record execs. It came down to Jive Records or Atlantic, and they went with the latter.

Their debut album, Dead Serious helped to curate a new, stream of consciousness sound in hip-hop. Nicknamed as "sewage," Das EFX's quick-tongued lyrical delivery and frequent ad-libbing (mostly adding "-iggedy" on the end of words) was a first of its kind at the time. Their signature style was soon mimicked by a number of up and coming acts from Kriss Kross to Ice Cube. Dead Serious birthed three singles, "Mic Checka", "Straight Out the Sewer" and the biggest hit of the three, "They Want EFX."

Dead Serious as an album peaked at number 16 on the Billboard 200 and was certified platinum in sales by 1993.The project also sat on top of the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart for five weeks. Based on their early meteoric success, the duo went on to put out four more albums. Dead Serious is listed as one of XXL's Best Hip-Hop Albums of the Last Forty Years.

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