In 1988, as New York rattled and popcorned with tense, funky drums sampled from James Brown records, two kids from Brentwood, Long Island stumbled across a smoother groove, giving East Coast rap more bounce.
Erick Sermon and Parrish Smith had rocketed to success the previous year with their first single, “It’s My Thing” b/w “You’re a Customer.” Taxed with writing an album, they took inspiration from what was in their immediate vicinity: Not a carefully crate-dug selection of Sixties and Seventies breakbeats, but Smith’s dad’s cassette of Zapp’s 1980 classic “More Bounce to the Ounce,” a liquid, electro-funk tune whose status as a Number Two R&B smash was still barely in the rearview. Constructed with engineer Charlie Marotta at North Shore Soundworks in Long Island, their second single “You Gots to Chill” gave New York a new way to funk.
Rolling Stone invites you to relax your mind and let your conscience be free, as Sermon and Parrish reflect on 30 years of a hard-but-smooth classic.
source: rollingstone.com