8. October 2018 By Walter Price 0

Go Right Three-Way: Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock – “It Takes Two”

Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock are available @ iTunes.

Back in the fabled year of 1988, you were not internationally known but you were way into formulaic pop radio and the sounds of Taylor Dayne, Kylie Minogue, Poison, and you were getting a little too happy with Bobby McFerrin. You were young and that’s what was going down. No worries. But there was one phenomenal song that intrigued more than all others. A track that dominated your hooptie speakers, the backyard keggers, and your beloved MTV. That funky song was Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock’s “It Takes Two”.

Some have said this is the greatest hip hop single of all time. If it isn’t, it is very close. But, then again, some didn’t dig the sample-heavy masterpiece. At one point, critic David Hinckley, allegedly had this to say, “(It Takes Two), the equivalent of a three-year-old shooting his mother with a squirt gun in order to get her attention.”. That’s just silly if you ask me.

Needless to say, us white, middle America kids found this to be another reason to not fear rap. The door had already been cracked open by RUN DMC, LL Cool J, Beastie Boys, and DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince, but it was Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock that cemented hip hop’s place in the pop world. It changed everything…for the better.

And regardless of Mr. Hinckley’s goofy if not juvenile thoughts, this song has gone on to influence countless artists, been respectively sampled dozens of times, and can still make a set of Bose RAWK. Going down a near endless rabbit hole, I’ve found three homages that are outta sight.