So look, I read a tweet by @_Jahan about the legendary @therealjuicyj and how he and 3-6 changed history, the sound of music & created a new direction for it. Its waaay more to it than that. So in the spirit of @naima & @eb4prez I'm about to give y'all a history lesson....

The Memphis underground sound is a DIRECT result of DJ Spanish Fly and his usage of a 12" pressing of The Showboys. This all takes place in 1986....

Mr. Magic was a well known DJ known for breaking new records on air. He signed a deal with Profile records to help promote their label artists. One of those act was The Showboys: The song was Dragrap.

The song Dragrap was loosely based off of the Dragnet TV theme. This song did not chart or do very well nationwide. The original pressings of the song don't have Triggerman on the label. That name came from DJ Spanish Fly.

DJ Spanish Fly was the club DJ for Club No Name: 4069 Lamar. Beautiful ladies get in free, UGLY LADIES.....THE PARKING LOT! He also did a live broadcast every Saturday night on Magic 101.1.

If you were a rapper and you wanted the tristate area to hear your song, you met DJ Spanish Fly. Fly got a hold of the 12" Dragrap single and did a mixtape called 30 Minutes of Triggerman. It was a 30 minute loop of the instrumental.

When Spanish Fly would play Triggerman (Dragrap) at Club No Name, The Bovans (drug family) would hit the floor and do "The Bovan Walk" which evolved into The Gangsta Walk. (That's a whole 'notha thread) It made the song a Memphis staple.

So, DJ Spanish Fly was dropping mixtapes every month and most included a mix of Triggerman. When the students of Memphis left to go to college, they had those mixtapes in hand. The sound was taken all over the country. He planted the seeds of the sound...

That sound made it to New Orleans via Grambling & Southern band members from Memphis. You won't find a Louisiana rap song before 1990 that has the Triggerman bells. (that's another thread too)

Locally, his influence filtered to DJ Squeeky. DJ Squeeky was from Orange Mound. He took Fly's formula and added local rappers Eightball, MJG, Skinny Pimp, 211 and DJ Zirk. Which gave us the underground hit Looking For The Chewin.

At this same time, DJ Paul and Juicy J had been doing mix tapes separately. You also had DJ BK making mix tapes and DJ Fila featuring LaChat. The underground mixtape scene was BOOMING. All of these artists were influenced by DJ Spanish Fly.

Everyone knows Slob On My Knob by Juicy J, but the song that really started it all? Lookin For The Chewin. If you've never heard the original? Here you are: