Perennial purveyors of hardcore hip-hop, the revered Brentwood, Long Island duo of Erick Sermon and Parrish Smith has created some of the genres most thrilling music. The group known by their memorable acronym for Erick & Parrish Making Dollars has released seven albums to date, and their first four albums 1988s Strictly Business, 1989s Unfinished Business, 1990s Business as Usual and 1992s Business Never Personal are each considered Golden Era classics.
In the years between the releases of Business as Usual and Business Never Personal, hip-hop was in the midst of its transformative tipping point. Fueled in large part by the massive commercial success of MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice, the genre was shedding some of its traditionally niche underground skin for a more mainstream pop and R&B-flavored sheen.
On Business Never Personals lead single Crossover, EPMD observed the inevitable writing on the wall, lamenting that the rap era’s outta control, brothers sellin’ their soul to go gold and calling upon their listeners to ban the crossover. Evoking the same anti-pop spirit as memorable tracks like Ice Cubes True to the Game (1991), 3rd Bass Pop Goes the Weasel (1991) and Commons I Used to Love H.E.R. (1994), Crossover still stands as a stirring rallying cry to preserve and protect the purer strains of hip-hop.
Enjoy EPMDs live performance of Crossover on Yo! MTV Raps below, and then check out bonus interview footage including Fab 5 Freddys discussion with EPMDs Hit Squad brethren Das EFX, K-Solo and Redman.
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