Produced by Organized Noize
(1993)

YO, I START IT OFF LIKE, UM…

Atlanta’s Dungeon Family collective has a long and storied history, starting with production crew Organized Noize and rap trio Parental Advisory. Their 1993 debut, Ghetto Street Funk (released through Pebbles’ Savvy/MCA imprint), sounds like a typical hardcore, early 90s hip-hop record, bearing little resemblance to the smoothed-out, funk-based tracks on OutKast’s landmark Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik LP.

Random Trivia: Ghetto Street Funk’s “Ghetto Head Hunta” can be heard in the background of Southernplayalistic…’s “Flim Flam” skit.

Ghetto Street Funk didn’t make much mainstream noise, but once OutKast and Goodie Mob became household names, Parental Advisory signed with DreamWorks and dropped two more albums before parting. They traded their rugged, tongue-twisting styles for the more modern, pimptastic flavor that first put OutKast on the map.

More Random Trivia: PA’s DJ, KP (Kawan Prather, originally known as K-Axe), went on to A&R and executive produce LaFace artists like Usher, TLC, and Pink. He founded Ghet-O-Vision Entertainment, which started the careers of Ray Cash, YoungBloodZ, and T.I.

The “King Mix” of Ghetto Street Funk’s first single wasn’t quite a preview of what was to come from the Dungeon, but does considerably mellow out the high-energy album track, turning an audio bum rush into a sinister creep.