Mobb Deep

Mobb Deep
Mobb Deep at the Out4Fame Festival 2015
General information
Genre (s)	Hardcore rap , gangsta rap
founding	1992
resolution	2017
Last occupation
	Havoc
	Prodigy († 2017)

Mobb Deep was an American rap duo consisting of Prodigy and Havoc . The New York duo has been active since 1992 and has released a total of seven albums, several of which were awarded gold or platinum records in the USA. Both rappers also released solo albums.

Band history

Havoc (born May 21, 1974, real name Kejuan Muchita ) and Prodigy (born November 2, 1974; † June 20, 2017, real name Albert Johnson ) grew up in Queensbridge , New York's public housing estate , from which other hip-hoppers such as Nas and Big Noyd originate. They met at Graphic Arts High School in Manhattan and discovered their mutual interest in hip hop. In 1993 they were signed to a sub-label of Island Records and released their debut album Juvenile Hell with productions by DJ Premier and Large Professor . In a review of the album, Rolling Stone called them the "evil twins of Kris Kross " . The album was not commercially successful.

Two years later the album The Infamous appeared on Loud Records with the first successful single Shook Ones Pt. II , which reached 59th place on the American Billboard Top 100 . Overall, the album, which includes guest contributions from Nas and Raekwon , is described as darker and rougher. Hard basses with piano parts and lots of loops determine the music.

The album Hell on Earth followed in 1996 . It contains the song Drop a gem on 'em, a disstrack against 2Pac , which Mobb Deep had dissed on the single Hit' Em Up . Reviewers saw the album as a continuation of the previous style of Mobb Deep.

Three years later, the fourth album by the duo Murda Muzik appears with guest contributions by Nas, on the single It's mine (Hot Rap Singles # 25), by Lil 'Kim , on the single Quiet Storm (Hot Rap Singles # 17) as well as by Raekwon and Eightball. Reviewers saw no musical development in this album either. After this album, Prodigy released his solo album HNIC in 2000

On the 2001 album Infamy Mobb Deep changed their style of music and took on elements of R'n'B . This was evident in the single Hey Luv , which was recorded along with 112 . This was the last Mobb Deep album to be released on the Loud label. In 2003, Mobb Deep came under contract with Jive Records . There they released the single Gangstaz Roll in 2003 , which also contained a song with 50 cents . It was followed in 2004 by the Amerikaz Nightmare album , which sold poorly.

After Havoc had already been producing for 50 cents and its G-Unit in 2003 , Mobb Deep negotiated with the G-Unit Records label and signed a contract there in mid-2005. The album Blood Money , released there in 2006, contained many guest appearances by artists of the label. The album was commercially successful and reached number 3 on the charts.

Subsequently, both rappers released solo albums, namely Havoc in 2007 his debut album The Kush and Prodigy in the same year his second album Return of the Mac and in 2008 HNIC Part 2 . Havoc's second solo album Hidden Files was released in February 2009 . In April 2009 the group released the eighth joint studio album, The Safe Is Cracked . The first single from it was Don't Play . The contract with G-Unit Records ended in November 2009.

In 2014 the duo released the album The Infamous Mobb Deep as a double CD, the first CD was called The Infamous Mobb Deep , the second The Infamous Sessions . On the first CD there are 13 new tracks, produced in old school style. The second CD contains unreleased tracks and skits, mostly remastered, as well as titles from their second album The Infamous with different beats and partly new lyrics. The album was released on the HCLASS-Entertainment label . It was produced by Havoc, Prodigy,! Llmind, Gabriel Lambirth, Karon Graham, Beat Butcha, Ommas Keith, Boi-1 Da, The Alchemist and Kaytranada .

After Prodigy's prison sentence

After a three-year prison sentence for illegal gun possession, Prodigy was released in 2011 and published his autobiography and then the solo album HNIC3 in July 2012. In April 2012, some verbal attacks surfaced on Havoc's Twitter page, which were directed against his partner Prodigy. Havoc later denied that these "tweets" were from him and stated that he had lost his mobile phone and that the "tweets" were created that way.

Discography

Studio albums

year	title	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes)					Remarks
		DE	AT	CH	UK	US
1993	Juvenile bright	-	-	-	-	-	First published: April 13, 1993
1995	The Infamous	-	-	-	UK- silver UK	US18th gold (18 weeks)US	First published: April 25, 1995 Sales: 700,000+
1996	Hell on Earth	-	-	-	UK67 (1 week) UK	US6th gold (16 weeks)US	Initial publication: November 19, 1996 US sales: 500,000+
1999	Murda Muzik	DE67 (2 weeks) DE	-	-	UK81 (1 week) UK	US3 platinum (17 weeks)US	Initial Release: April 27, 1999 US Sales: 1,000,000+
2001	Infamy	-	-	-	-	US22nd gold (23 weeks)US	Initial release: December 11, 2001 US sales: 500,000+
2004	Amerikaz Nightmare	DE95 (1 week) DE	-	CH50 (3 weeks) CH	UK68 (2 weeks) UK	US4 (10 weeks) US	First published: August 10, 2004
2006	Blood Money	DE38 (3 weeks) DE	-	CH42 (4 weeks) CH	UK70 (1 week) UK	US3 (10 weeks) US	First published: May 2, 2006
2014	The Infamous Mobb Deep	-	-	-	-	US49 (1 week) US	First published: April 1, 2014

EPs

• 2001: Black Cocaine

Compilations

• 2006: Life of the Infamous: The Best of Mobb Deep
• 2007: The Infamous Archives
• 2008: The Infamous Instrumentals
• 2009: The Safe Is Cracked

Mix tapes

year	title	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes)					Remarks
		DE	AT	CH	UK	US
2003	Free Agents: The Murda Mix Tape	DE84 (1 week) DE	-	-	-	US21 (9 weeks) US	First published: 2003

More mix tapes

• 2002: The Dunn Language Part 1
• 2002: The Dunn Language Part 2
• 2004: Infamous Allegiance Part One
• 2004: The Mixtape Before 911
• 2005: Mobb Deep: From Queensbridge To Kingston
• 2006: G-Unit Radio Part.17 (The Best in the Bizznezz)
• 2006: G-Unit Radio Part.20 (Still the Best in the Bizznezz)
• 2006: More Money, More Murda
• 2011: White Cocaine
• 2015: White Cocaine 2
• 2015: The Realest Duo

Singles

year	Title album	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, album , rankings, weeks, awards, notes)					Remarks
		DE	AT	CH	UK	US
1995	Shook Ones (Part II) The Infamous	-	-	-	UK- silver UK	US59 (10 weeks) US	First published: February 3, 1995
	Survival of the Fittest The Infamous	-	-	-	-	US69 (12 weeks) US	First published: May 30, 1995
2001	Burn Infamy	-	-	-	-	US99 (2 weeks) US	First release: October 30, 2001 feat. Big Noyd and Vita
2002	Hey Luv (Anything) Infamy	-	-	-	-	US58 (15 weeks) US	First release: January 2002 feat. 112
2004	Got It Twisted Amerikaz Nightmare	-	-	-	-	US64 (20 weeks) US	First published: March 30, 2004
2006	Put Em in Their Place Blood Money	-	-	-	UK75 (1 week) UK	-	First published: March 14, 2006

More singles

• 1992: Peer Pressure
• 1993: Hit It from the Back
• 1995: Temperature's Rising (feat.Crystal Johnson)
• 1996: Give Up the Goods (Just Step) ( feat.Big Noyd )
• 1996: Back at You
• 1996: Drop a Gem on 'Em
• 1996: Front Lines (Hell on Earth)
• 1997: GOD Pt. III
• 1999: Quiet Storm
• 1999: It's Mine (feat. Nas )
• 2002: Get Away
• 2002: Pray for Me ( feat.Lil 'Mo )
• 2004: Real Gangstaz (feat. Lil Jon )
• 2004: Throw Your Hands (in the Air)
• 2004: Win or Lose
• 2005: Have a Party (feat. Nate Dogg and 50 Cent )
• 2006: Give It to Me (feat. Young Buck )
• 2006: Creep (feat. 50 Cent)
• 2012: Love You More
• 2014: Taking You Off Here
• 2014: Say Something

Guest Posts

year	Title album	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, album , rankings, weeks, awards, notes)					Remarks
		DE	AT	CH	UK	US
1996	Microphone Master Hold It Down	-	-	-	-	US86 (3 weeks) US	First release: 1996 The EFX feat. Mobb Deep
1998	Deadly Zone Next Millennium	-	-	-	-	US79 (7 weeks) US	First release: 1998 Bounty Killer feat. Mobb Deep and Rappin 'Noyd
2005	Outta Control (Remix)	DE8 (19 weeks) DE	AT18 (22 weeks) AT	CH10 (22 weeks) CH	UK7th silver (20 weeks)UK	US6 (20 weeks) US	First published: Aug 6, 2005 Sales: 200,000+ ( 50 Cent feat. Mobb Deep)

Further guest contributions

• 1995: Bloodshed and War (with Da Youngsta's)
• 1996: LA, LA (with Capone-N-Noreaga and Tragedy Khadafi )
• 1997: It's the Pee (with PMD )
• 2014: Street Certified (with MOP )

Awards for music sales

Note: Awards in countries from the chart tables or chart boxes can be found in these.

Country / Region	silver	gold	platinum	Sales	swell
Awards for music sales (country / region, awards, sales, sources)
United States (RIAA)	-	3 × gold3	platinum1	2,500,000	riaa.com
United Kingdom (BPI)	3 × silver3	-	-	460,000	bpi.co.uk
All in all	3 × silver3	3 × gold3	platinum1

swell

1. ↑ ^{a b c d} Mobb Deep Music Artists. MTV .com; accessed on October 30, 2008 (English)
2. ^ Mobb Deep Biography. Rolling Stone . "On Juvenile Hell the duo of Prodigy and Havoc come off as Kris Kross' twisted evil twins"
3. ↑ ^{a b c d} Artists Chart History - Mobb Deep - Singles. ( Memento of September 29, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Billboard.com (English)
4. ^ Mobb Deep Biography. Rolling Stone. "Noisy drum samples with eerie piano and string loops"
5. ↑ ^{a b} biography of Mobb Deep at laut.de
6. ↑ Artists Chart History - Mobb Deep ( Memento from December 6, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Billboard.com (English)
7. ↑ The Safe Is Cracked on Amazon
8. ↑ 50 Cent Collabos With Beanie Sigel, Drops Mobb Deep From G-Unit . sixshot.com, November 11, 2009 (English)
9. ↑ Havoc Disses Prodigy; End of Mobb Deep… Or Hack? at egotripland.com, accessed July 26, 2015 (English)
10. ↑ ^{a b c d} Chart sources: DE AT CH UK US

Web links

• Mobb Deep at Allmusic (English)