By Sidney Madden
Southern female rap is making a ferocious resurgence with Gangsta Boo and La Chat teaming up on the upcoming EP, Witch. As fans of Southern rap can attest, the two femcees have been holding it down for the ladies for more than fifteen years. Both hailing from Memphis, Tennessee, Boo and Chat have garnered both separate and joint successes.
Gangsta Boo was the first and only female rapper to be a member of Three 6 Mafia and her debut album, Enquiring Minds, which spawned the break out hit, “Where Dem Dollas At,” dropped in September, 1998. La Chat also spent years mixing it up on Three 6 Mafia’s label, Hypnotize Minds, appearing on tracks with Three 6, as well as Gangsta Boo, before releasing her own debut album, Murder She Spoke, in 2001.
With such accolades under their belts separately, why would the two collaborate on an extended play now? As La Chat put it, frankly, “It was the right place and the right time.”
“We’ve been planning it for a few years, probably since 2008,” echoed Gangsta Boo, the self-proclaimed Queen of Memphis. “But we both just had other things going on in our lives; working on other projects, dealing with family stuff, and other sh– that prevented us from doing it.”
The pair thought it necessary to team up partly because of the state of rap culture at this time. In an era when it seems to be in style to show out and start beef in your rhymes, Chat and Boo aim to bring gangsta rap back to its roots, through a united front.
“There’s a lot of ‘rapping models’ now — which is cool — but back then it was more hardcore female artists that was rapping just like the men,” Boo explaining, citing the exception of Nicki Minaj as one to “go toe to toe with the men” on the mic.
“Females aren’t collabing [now]. They’d rather knock each other down because one bitch got the biggest Gucci purse and the other bitch don’t — so we felt like there’s no better time to drop it,” Boo added.
Joining forces was the name of the game for this album. Witch includes mixing and production credits from Three 6 Mafia’s DJ Paul as well as Drumma Boy, DJ Squeeky and The Colleagues. Boo and Chat also collaborated with Canadian pop singer, Fefe Dobson and Hypnotize Minds artists Lil Wyte and Frayser Boy.
The lead single for Witch is “B!tchy” and showcases the signature sexy, yet aggressive tone that their fans have come to expect. The video for this single was shot right in their hometown of Memphis and features a verse from former No Limits Records queen bee, Mia X.
“We’re just giving them straight Gangsta Boo and La Chat,” Chat said, describing the overall theme of the work.
“We haven’t changed our formula since literally since we came out because our style was so ahead of its time,” Boo added.
Witch is slated for release on May 27.
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