Boo-Yaa T.R.I.B.E.

Boo-Yaa T.R.I.B.E.

Boo-Yaa T.R.I.B.E. are a hip hop group from Carson, California, composed of the Devoux brothers Paul, Ted, Donald, Roscoe, Danny, and David. Their family is from American Samoa. They first began playing music in their father's Baptist church. Before anyone else arrived, they would play P-Funk and experiment with other forms of hip-hop. Particularly popular in their South Bay neighborhood, they began to dance to funk music. The brothers then created the dance crew the Blue City Strutters and publicly performed. All members are members or former members of West Side Piru and Samoan Warrior Bounty Hunters. Despite their religious upbringing, the brothers eventually fell into the gang scene popular in their home of Compton, Los Angeles. After their youngest brother was killed in 1987, they decided to turn their lives around and dedicate their lives to music because "that's what he would have wanted." To get away from the gang culture, the brothers decided to leave L.A. and go to Japan. While there, they were inspired to begin performing music again, with Paul "Gangxta R.I.D." rapping in front of eager Japanese audiences. They toured Japan in the mid 1980s and became very popular. Upon their return to California in 1988, the group focused again on making music and re-christened themselves as the Boo-Yaa T.R.I.B.E. Their pioneering debut LP, New Funky Nation, was different from most rap records at the time because the Boo-Yaa TRIBE played live instruments on it. Later on, they ventured into the realms of both gangsta rap and rapcore music. They also appeared on the Judgment Night soundtrack performing "Another Body Murdered" with Faith No More, on Kid Frost's East Side Story LP, on The Transplants' Haunted Cities LP and on the rock group P.O.D.'s Testify, with the emotional rap track "On the Grind." The "Boo-Yaa" in their name signifies the sound of a shotgun being discharged, while the "T.R.I.B.E." stands for "Too Rough International Boo-Yaa Empire." According to hip-hop documentarians, Boo-Yaa T.R.I.B.E. is "synonymous with hip hop in Los Angeles."

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