Songoftheday 4/1/20 - I'm peepin' shorty as she's walking to the train, I tap her on her shoulders excuse me miss but can I get your name...
from the albums Don't Be A Menace To South Central While Drinking Your Juice In The Hood (Original Soundtrack) and Legal Drug Money (both 1996)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #33 (two weeks)
Weeks in the Top-40: 7
Today's song of the day comes from the group Lost Boyz, who came together in Queens, New York in the early 1990s, with rappers Mr. Cheeks, Freaky Tah, Spigg Nice, and Pretty Lou. Their debut single "LifestyLes of the Rich And ShameLess", released in the spring of 1995, scored a minor hit on the rap (#10), R&B (#60) and pop (#91) charts in Billboard magazine, and got an album deal from Puff Daddy's label Uptown from it. A second single, "Jeeps, Lex Coups, Bimaz & Benz", also hit the charts at #11 Rap, #63 R&B and #67 on the pop Hot 100. With the momentum from those street-level tracks, the third single ended up on the soundtrack to the gangsta rap parody movie Don't Be A Menace To South Central While Drinking Your Juice In The Hood starring the Wayans brothers. "Renee", written by Mr. Cheeks (Terrance Kelly), is a rather promising love story with a girl who wants to be a lawyer, but ends pretty bleakly. It was released as the second single from the soundtrack after Joe's top-40 hit "All The Things (Your Man Can't Do)" at the start of 1996...
"Renee" became the Lost Boyz' first and only group top-40 hit in May of 1996. The song also climbed to #13 on Billboard's R&B chart, while peaking at #3 on their Rap Singles chart. Their followup single from the summer debut album Legal Drug Money, "Music Makes Me High" featuring Tha Dogg Pound, stopped just short of the halfway point of the American pop chart at #51, while hitting #28 R&B and #5 Rap Singles. It also landed the Boyz their first minor British hit almost making the top-40 at #42. Meanwhile, the group guested on another Don't Be A Menace soundtrack cut, Mona Lisa's "Can't Be Wasting My Time", which rose to #65 pop and #20 R&B. The fifth and final single from the Legal Drug Money set, "Get Up", climbed to #31 at R&B, peaked at #6 at Rap Singles, and went to #60 on the pop Hot 100. The Legal Drug Money album was their first top ten seller at #6, while topping the R&B albums list. At the same time, another single from the soundtrack, the R. Kelly-written "Let's Lay Together" from Isley Brothers, got to #24 on the R&B chart while nicking the American pop chart at #93.
The Lost Boyz returned in 1997 with their sophomore album Love, Peace & Nappiness. Although it also was a top ten success at #9 (R&B #2), selling over a half-million copies, the lead single "Me And My Crazy World" stalled again right around the halfway point of the pop Hot 100 at #52, while topping out at #23 at R&B and #5 at Rap Singles. It would be their final American hit, though the title track from the record scored a second minor success in the UK at #57. Sadly, Freaky Tah was murdered in 1999, and a third album LB IV Life released later that year was ignored by radio, although it managed to make the pop Top200 Albums chart at #32 (R&B #8). Mr. Cheeks took off for a solo career, landing a #1 R&B/top-20 pop hit in 2001 with "Lights, Camera, Action". Meanwhile Spigg Nice went to jail for robbery in 2004. Cheeks recently tried to assemble a "new" Lost Boyz with different rappers, but that went nowhere.
(Click below to see the rest of the post)
Here's the group appearing live on German TV...
...and finally, Mr. Cheeks performing "Renee" live in concert in 2016...
Up tomorrow: Post-grunge flyers have an explosive squeeze.
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