The Click

A Bay Area family affair, Click is a four-member hip-hop posse from Vallejo, CA, headed up by rapper <a href="spotify:artist:3crnzLy8R4lVwaigKEOz7V">E-40</a> (Earl Stevens) and including his brother <a href="spotify:artist:3bdKPOFrfxB3NvQyXLfjBt">D-Shot</a>, sister <a href="spotify:artist:2EpVYXcMdxyQEMMaBuDynU">Suga T</a>, and cousin <a href="spotify:artist:6nltEpEZtqZD1v4YJLlaZI">B-Legit</a>, who grew up in the same household. Though he first achieved solo success, <a href="spotify:artist:3crnzLy8R4lVwaigKEOz7V">E-40</a> actually began his career with the group, which was formed in 1986 as the Most Valuable Players and performed at a Grambling State University talent show. The response encouraged the group to rename itself and get down to business, and they released a single called "The King's Men." Meanwhile, <a href="spotify:artist:3crnzLy8R4lVwaigKEOz7V">E-40</a> -- earning his nickname of <a href="spotify:artist:3crnzLy8R4lVwaigKEOz7V">Charlie Hustle</a> -- followed the path of many other successful entrepreneurs, selling tapes from the trunk of his car in the late '80s. (He did so, however, while also managing a family run clothing store and working a day job at an oil refinery). <a href="spotify:artist:3crnzLy8R4lVwaigKEOz7V">E-40</a> started his own label, Sick Wid It Records, that put out a couple of Click cassettes and the group's official debut, Down & Dirty. In 1993, the perseverance paid off as <a href="spotify:artist:3crnzLy8R4lVwaigKEOz7V">E-40</a> landed a guest spot on <a href="spotify:artist:4TqmaFJYM8SvuhrunxpmT3">Spice 1</a>'s 187 He Wrote and got the attention of Jive Records, which signed a distribution deal with Sick Wid It. After the 1994 success of The Mail Man, <a href="spotify:artist:3crnzLy8R4lVwaigKEOz7V">E-40</a>'s first album for the label, Jive released Click's major-label debut, Game Related, the following year. But thanks to <a href="spotify:artist:3crnzLy8R4lVwaigKEOz7V">E-40</a>'s solo career, plus the solo outings of Click's three other members, it was six years before a follow-up saw the light of day. Money & Muscle, which was finally released in the summer of 2001, saw the group once again serving up heavy bottomed West Coast G-funk with occasionally lighthearted lyrics, such as "Hector da Ho Protector," a direct descendant of <a href="spotify:artist:3crnzLy8R4lVwaigKEOz7V">E-40</a>'s 1994 hit "Captain Save a Ho." ~ Dan LeRoy