Graphic via POW
Before the label deal, before the classic records, before they were the assertive, brash Alkaholiks, E-Swift, Tash, and J-Ro were just three destitute artists trying to carve out a lane in the early-90s Los Angeles hip-hop scene. J-Ro was working security at a bank, half-resigned to the idea that his rap dreams might be done for good. He was a father by then. Burned out from trudging through ten years in the unforgiving L.A. underground.
âI just thought, man, thatâs it. Iâm done,â he tells me, slouched back in his chair with a grin that suggests he knows how wild the story sounds in hindsight. âIâve got a kid. Iâm in a uniform. Iâm clocking in every day. That was my life.â
Tash, on the other hand, didnât have it much better. âI was homeless,â he says, laughing through a cloud of blunt smoke as he reminded the guys that his stay back home in Ohio wasnât just for family or pleasure. âI did not move back to Ohio â I was homeless, man.â
Then came a moment. Behind the scenes of Tashâs stint back in Ohio and J-Roâs tenure as bank security, the groupâs producer, E-swift, had something cookingâthey were going to get signed whether the rap gods wanted it or not. âWe had made this demo, and I donât even know, it just landed in the right hands,â E-Swift told me as he shook his head in disbelief. âFabian DuVernay, who was working with Loud Records at the time, got ahold of it and told Steve [Rifkind], âYo, you gotta hear these guysâtheyâre making noise in the L.A. underground.ââ
Next thing they knew, Swift and Tash pulled up to J-Roâs job with news: Loud Records wanted to sign them. âI asked if I could meet them after work,â J-Ro remembered. âThey were like, âNo⊠now.ââ
He hopped in the whip and quit on the spot. âThey ainât seen me since,â J-Ro laughed.
The three hip-hop drunkies drove straight to Loudâs office, signed their deal with Rifkind, the labelâs founder, and cracked open a cooler full of 40s in celebration. It was the kind of impulsive, high-stakes gamble that would come to define the groupâs ethos: wild, unfiltered, and unapologetic.
As the three swap stories with me over Zoom, each posted up in a different state, nearly three decades removed from the chaos of their come-up, Iâm struck by what mustâve hit them back then, too: that against every odd, they actually pulled it off. In a game built to swallow up and spit out hungry emcees like candy corn, Tha Liks carved out a name that still echoes throughout hip-hop today.
We talk about their classic joints, starting with 1993âs 21& Over, all the way to their newest album, Daaam!, out now. â JD Sutler
What transpired from the initial Loud Records deal was their freshman debut, 21 & Over. And while the big hits off that joint were ostensibly âMake Roomâ and âOnly When Iâm Drunk,â I found the lore behind âTurn Tha Party Outâ to be more compelling. The song featured a track produced by a then-relatively unknown figure out of Oxnard. An elusive, Coltrane-like producer in the world of hip-hop and beyond: the man with many names, Madlib.
Tash, who had introduced the group to Madlib and the rest of the Oxnard-based Lootpack crew, said he knew the young producer was different from the jump. âIâve heard a lot of beats from a lot of producers, and sometimes, in my head, Iâd be like, âNah, he donât got it,ââ Tash said. âBut when I first heard Madlib, man, it was like a breath of fresh air. Back then, when Swift was making beats, he was already one of the dopest producers to me, but Madlib? Even if we werenât family, even if he wasnât my boy, I still wouldâve picked his beats over anybody elseâs.â
Before he ascended into the mythical echelons of hip-hop history, Madlib laced âTurn Tha Party Outâ with a beat that sloshed like warm beer over the rim, all foamy basslines, boom-bap drums, and a turntablistâs touch. Itâs classic early-90s West Coast: loose and braggadocious, like a garage freestyle session with the homies from around the block. Thereâs space in the mix, too, enough to imagine a half-empty jazz cafĂ© after last call. âItâs the Liks, baby â rockinâ with the Lookpack Crew.â
âWe looked around the room and said, âThatâs the one,ââ Swift recalled, speaking about the track after their first listen. There was little pretense, no drawn-out concept sessions, just raw chemistry and spontaneity. It was the kind of synergy that defined the groupâs early sound: a West Coast group with East Coast sensibilities who werenât afraid to break from the G-Funk tradition.
âWe just wanted to be original,â J-Ro said. âWe just want to make beats that no one else had, rap styles no one else really did, and thatâs what we were aiming for.â
From there, Tha Liks ran it back coast to coast, touring the country, sapping 40s, and rubbing elbows with some of hip-hopâs biggest and brightest. And true to form, what followed was Coast II Coast (1995). The LP featured East Coast dignitaries Q-Tip and Diamond D, as well as King Tee, Xzibit and some Lootpack Crew regulars. âWe were on the road coast to coast,â J-Ro said. âWe could do a show in any city, any night.â That national exposure sharpened their sound and expanded their reach, but it didnât shift their roots. Despite frequent comparisons to East Coast acts, the group saw their sound as a direct descendant of the West, particularly the Compton Sound Masters lineage, passed down through DJ Pooh and King Tee.
âI just want to make it clear: thatâs our lineage,â J-Ro said, talking more to his peers and colleagues than to me at this point. âIt wasnât like we were trying to follow a trend or chase a sound. We already had the blueprint. We learned from the masters, the Sound Masters. Weâre directly connected to the beginning of hip-hop.â
That sense of history wasnât abstract, it bled into their sound. You can hear it all over their second album, most vividly on cuts like âDaaam!â and âNext Level.â âDaaam!â plays like the soundtrack of a Scooby-Doo chase scene reimagined in a smoke-filled LA garage circa â95. Itâs funky breakbeats, cartoonish menace, and low-rider bounce. Itâs party-scene hip-hop at its most head-nodding, built to make hydraulics jump. Tash seals it with a bar straight from the rafters: âSo rap artists, âGet ready to rumble!â / âCause I got lyrics up my sleeve that slam harder than Mutombo.ââ
The guys tell me that their other standout, âNext Level,â was born on an unhinged ride through New York City with producer Diamond D, a longtime influence and collaborator. As they cruised through the Bronx, Diamond D played cassette demos in the car. They were the kind of gritty, bass-heavy boom bap the Liks loved.
âWe picked two beats off that tape,â Swift said, recalling the moment they heard the beat for âNext Level.â âBut that one â that one BUMPED!â The track featured a haunting piano sample superimposed against the backdrop of a warm, thunderous P-Funk-type bassline, the fuzz of a record spinning somewhere in the distance. Itâs a medley of sound and style that not only showcased the groupâs sonic versatility but also cemented a bond with Diamond D that would carry into future projects.
âMan, but I just remember that car ride with Diamond,â Swift said, as Tash and J-Ro cracked up, the memory still fresh in their laughter. âHe had that little Toyota Corolla, bumping, all over New York. I remember we went to Kid Capriâs house, we met the Cold Crush brothers. We was living in hip-hop, man.â
But like gin without tonic, coke without rum, you canât have Coast II Coast without âAll the Way Live.â A track that sounds like it was produced by a beat-savvy alien: disjointed, eerie, borderline industrial, and somehow still slaps with surgical precision. It shouldnât work, and yet it does. The Abstract Poetic, Q-Tip, himself floats on the track in peak form, cool and unbothered, while Tha Alkaholiks bring their trademark bravado, trading sharp, battle-ready bars like shrewd groove merchants. Itâs another classic New YorkâWest Coast fusion, both sonically and symbolically. âOne of the best times of my career, to be in the company of those dudes,â E-Swift said of Q-Tip and the swath of East Coast legends they worked with.
âIt was everything you dream about as a kid, like when youâre in the yard, taking the game-winning shot, dribbling around, imagining the moment,â Tash said. âSo when we actually started doing all the things we used to dream about, it was like, alright, new goals. Rap music helped a lot of those childhood dreams come true. I never thought Iâd travel the world, see places like Japan, coming from Columbus, Ohio. But thanks to these two brothers, we got to see pretty much the whole world.â
If Coast II Coast is Tha Liks in Godfather II, then Likwidation is their Revenge of the Sith. One of my favorite joints, âTore Down ft. the Lootpack,â rides another of Madlibâs foamy, hypnotic beats thatâs roomy enough to let the chunky bassline breathe and the snappy breakbeat crack. Tha Liks bring a sneering, battle-ready flow: âCause my Alkie style of rhyminâ is ahead of its time,â Tash spits, âI make words connect lovely like Coronas and lime.â The track marked yet another crucial collaboration with Madlib. Wildchildâs verse, particularly his opening bars, was singled out by the group as a standout, a âsmashâ that set the tone for the rest of the song.
âThe Lootpack Crew, Wildchild most definitely, all of them were just like family,â J-Ro said. âWorking with them was natural, it was a natural progression and it clicked. And some of our best music came out of those sessions with those guys.â
But if âTore Downâ is a standout deeptrack, then âHip Hop Drunkiesâ is a top-shelf hood classicânot in the least because the hip-hop drunkie bar none, Olâ Dirty Bastard, hits an iconic feature.
Tha Liks said the raucous collaboration between them and Olâ Dirty, was born out of genuine camaraderie between labelmates. Early in their careers, Wu-Tang Clan was opening for the group, and ODBâs wild energy naturally meshed with their irreverent, party-heavy ethos. The recording session was pure chaos.
âOne of the most memorable studio sessions ever,â Swift recalled as the other two chimed in with heavy laughs like there was a lot more they wouldnât let the outside world in on. âWe went in there, one microphone, three emcees, and one dude would rap and the other one would push each other out the way. It was not rehearsed. It was like, Iâmma rap to this bar right here. I wish we would have video. Had a videotaping been as big as it is now, that would have definitely been one for the archives.â
The crew spent hours drinking and talking before even turning on the mic. As Swift said, eventually they recorded the entire track with all three emcees sharing a single mic, cutting each other off mid-bar in a flurry of improvised brilliance. The beat hits like an adderall-fueled bender with snappy snares and staccato piano, the kind of beat that sounds like someone crushed up a script and stirred it into cheap beer. ODB is in peak form here: filthy, brash, slurring threats like a drunk church sermon. Itâs a track born from a simpler time when you could crack a few beers, slap down some bones, and let the weed smoke fill the inside of your apartment.
âHe showed up in one of those car service rides, already holding a bottle. Heâd started the party on the way to the studio,â Tash told me. âI can honestly say we knew them, like, it was a homie thing. It was real tight. I got to know ODB more later on, but man ⊠heâs truly missed.â
The beat was lifted from the intro to Marley Marlâs Symphony video, Swift told me, sampled off VHS before Marl later provided the original stems to rework it cleanly. The result was a raw, unfiltered classic. It was a beautiful collision of styles that captured ODBâs unrepentant authenticity. âHe wanted people to know, this is me,â E-Swift said. âIt wasnât an act.â
While an entire discography exists beyond the scope of this piece, the last two joints Iâve decided to cover each hit different chords when it comes to my appreciation for the LA-born trio. âLikwit Fusion,â the opening track on Lootpackâs Soundpieces: Da Antidote, marked a rare role reversal with Tha Alkaholiks stepping onto a Lootpack record rather than the other way around.
The concept came from Wildchild, J-Ro said, who pitched the idea and brought the crew together for what would become a gritty, bar-heavy posse cut over one of Madlibâs early signature beats. It kicks off like it was pulled straight from a dimly lit corner of Madlibâs personal crates. A group intro crashes into a loopy organ line, a washed-out bassline, and a bass drum/snare combo that hits hard as nails. âLikwit Fusionâ stands as a testament to the strength of the Likwit Crew, a loosely structured collective that operated more like a family than a rap group.
âEverybody was doing [different] things at certain times,â J-Ro said when asked why a full crew album or tour never materialized. âAnd then, you know, later on, everybody just kind of went their own ways.â
Speaking of everyone going their separate ways, âFlute Song,â a standout from Firewater, came together much like my conversation with Tha Liks: during a fragmented period with J-Ro living in Sweden and sessions scattered across cities. E-Swift stumbled on the beat while twisting knobs on a Triton keyboard, layering a warped flute with boom-bap drums and live congas to give it texture and depth.
A friend of the group began humming along in the studio, and Swift sampled her voice, adding a haunting, almost Bollywood shimmer to the track. The result sounds like a maniacal flute lifted from a mystical dollar-bin 45: smoky, spacious, and unmistakably early-2000s, with a warm bassline and a matured, unhurried flow shaped by years of wear since Coast II Coast. Recorded through a mix of experimentation and spontaneity, âFlute Songâ has remained a fan favorite. âThe whole crowd knows it,â J-Ro said, pointing to its hypnotic hook and punchy groove. Itâs the kind of track that makes you want to sip Manhattans in a hookah lounge surrounded by exotic strippers and the ghost of a hangover you wonât regret.
Tha Alkaholiksâ newest release, Daaam!, isnât quite a full return, but it doesnât need to be. Comprised mostly of re-recordings of their classic tracks with a few fresh cuts sprinkled in, the album plays like both a celebration and a reassertion of everything that made Tha Liks great in the first place.
âIt wasnât that energy, like working on a whole new album start to finish,â E-Swift admitted. âBut revisiting those songs, it was fun.â After decades of performing these joints live, slipping back into the rhythms and vocal inflections was second nature. The challenge, as Tash pointed out, came in trying to match the original recordings exactly: same cadences, same backgrounds, same energy. âIt was like being on stage,â he said. âBut now you gotta sound like the record.â The result is uncanny, a time-warped reproduction of their â90s selves, remixed with the clarity of grown-man perspective and sober-minded execution.
âIt brought back a lot of memories. I donât know about J-Ro, Iâm one of those old dogs you canât teach new tricks,â Tash said, grinning as he answered my question about going back through their older songs and rapping with the crew again. âRapping now is like breathing. Itâs like eating lunch or dinner, just part of my daily routine. So going to the booth? I do that on the regular.â
âWeâve been performing those songs for so long, it just felt like being on stage again,â J-Ro added. âAt first, it was like, alright, letâs just run through the track. But then it got challenging. We had to match the exact inflections, the backgrounds, everything.â
Daaam! isnât just a nostalgia trip. New tracks like âMJ, Pt. 2â featuring Planet Asia and the unreasonably hard-hitting Christmas anthem, âLikmas,â show the group hasnât lost its edge or sense of humor. âWe were launching our cannabis brand, and we were like, we gotta do a Mary Jane part two,â E-Swift said.
The Planet Asia feature came together organically. He was in the studio working on another song when he heard the beat, jumped in the booth, and laid down his verse before the rest of the group even heard it. âHands 2 The Ceilingâ revives material from the long-shelved Lick Nuts collaboration with the Beatnuts, while âAt It Againâ channels their classic freestyle spirit.
Thereâs no grand statement here, just three lifelong friends and battle-tested MCs reconnecting with the music that made them. Daaam! is a reminder: Tha Liks never left. They just aged like good liquor.
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