02. Mo Stress, No Rest
03. Losing My Grip
04. It's A Trip
05. Gotta Get The Money
06. Why Cry
Criminal Law is a group from Waukegan, IL and they were previously known as D.B.I (Def Boyz Incorporated) in the late '80s. I first saw them at a talent show at a local school in North Chicago and was impressed with their raw energy.
At that time they were producing beats on Synsonic Drums and a keyboard. I approached them about working together and they gave me a tape of one of their live shows. I was in a group called Wildstyle and we were building a decent home studio (Roland TR-808, Casio SK-5 Sampling Keyboard, and Tech 1200s), that was called the Rage Cage.
And I had wanted to start building a crew called Hardrock Posse and D.B.I was the first group I asked to join in with us. Somehow all four of them wound up working at the same MCDonald's I was a manager at, so I was their boss and we would plan out and demos and shows there. Actually, when we first connect it was right before I got the 808, so the first two songs that we produced for them in the Rage Cage were done on the Roland 505.
Eventually, we went in a 24-track studio called Talent Investment with them and did a couple tracks. As well, as a handful of home studio recordings on 4-track. They also did at least one studio date on their own, right after we met and record a demo called "Streets Of Terror" which is more in vein with the Criminal Law stuff. All the things produced by Rage were more B-boy/Battle rhyme oriented.
But, they grew up around gang culture, so that was always a part of them. In 90, one of MCs (ALB III a.k.a MC Lee) went away to college, so the crew was on hold for a bit (that's who I remember it). I wound up moving on to other projects and we lost touch. A few years later they came back out as Criminal Law. I still have all those demos back in the late 80s/'90. Great times.
-Kevin Beacham a.k.a AMC (MC Coolie Love) of Wildstyle Of Rage Cage Productions/Hardrock Posse circa '87-'90.