Big Pokey (real name Milton Powell) December 4, 1977 is a rapper from Houston, Texas and is one of the original members of the Screwed Up Click. While rapping, he attended Blinn Junior College in Brenham, Texas and even tried out for the NFL at one point. Big Pokey hooked up with DJ Screw in the early '90s and started dropping rhymes on the DJ's many mixtapes. His first full-length album appeared in late 1999, "Hardest Pit in the Litter", which ended up being one of the better underground hip hop albums to come out of the South that year. A year later, Pokey returned with "D-Game" 2000, another album of mid-tempo 808-driven beats featuring several of his Houston peers as guests. In 2001 he collaborated with the Wreckshop Wolfpack for Collabo and then returned in 2002 with another solo album, "Da Sky's Da Limit". He's been featured on songs with Z-Ro, Big Hawk, Big Moe, Lil' Flip, Lil' Keke, Chamillionaire, and in 2005 he was in a song which was #93 on US Top 100 with Paul Wall called Sittin' Sidewayz. The Song Sittin Sidewayz was sampled from Big Pokey's freestyle on one of the more famous DJ Screw CDs called June 27th which included many other famous Southside artists as a Birthday CD to D-Mo, the CD June 27th is a freestyle that includes Big Pokey, Yungstar, Haircut Joe and many more, it is a true Houston Classic.
E.S.G. (born Cedric Hill) is a rapper from Houston, Texas (though he was born in Louisiana and moved to Houston after he finished college) who trailblazed through the late-'90s movement and helped popularize the "Screwed and Chopped" which was created by DJ Screw and a style associated with his onetime home, Wreckshop Records. The "Everyday Street Gangsta" made his first major move in 1995 when Perrion Entertainment released "Ocean of Funk", which featured his breakthrough single, "Swangin' and Bangin'" and its accompanying "Chopped and Screwed" mix. The mix became just as popular as the song itself, if not more so. This success inspired Perrion to reissue the most impressive songs from Ocean of Funk ("Swangin' and Bangin'", "Crooked Streets," and "Smoke On") on "Sailin' da South", this album distributed widely by Priority. Following these related 1995 albums by Perrion, E.S.G. maintained a low profile while imprisoned yet continued to reap the continuing success of Sailin' da South as its reach spread beyond Texas. He returned from prison in 1998 with a dark album for Blackhearted called "Return of the Living Dead". Around this time, E.S.G. took on an increasingly hardcore stance, presumably in response to the rising competition throughout the Dirty South movement. He next joined forces with Wreckshop Records, an up-and-coming Houston label driven by the reputation of the immortalized DJ Screw, and recorded a pair of albums, "Shinin' & Grindin'" in 1999 and "City Under Siege" in 2000, as well as a chopped and screwed remix of the latter. By this point considered one of the eminent rappers in Texas alongside Lil' Keke, Fat Pat, UGK, and Lil' Troy. E.S.G. capitalized on his reputation by co-establishing his own label, S.E.S. Records. The label's first release, Boss Hoggs Outlaws in 2001, paired the rapper with newcomer Slim Thug and sought to initiate S.E.S. among the increasingly crowded Dirty South market.
A fact many people are not aware of is that E.S.G. actually wrote the hit Lil' Troy song "Wanna Be A Baller", performed by Yungstar, Fat Pat, H.A.W.K., and Lil' Will on Lil' Troy's "Sittin' Fat Down South" album. He was never credited with writing the song and still holds a grudge about it, which he will occasionally mention in his music.
In May of 2006, E.S.G. released his latest album, entitled "Screwed Up Movement". It includes a regular speed disc and a chopped and screwed disc done by DJ Dolby D.
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