Sir Mix-A-Lot Sold Millions of Records Before “Baby Got Back”
When non-Seattle residents think of Sir Mix-A-Lot, they likely have a hard time naming a single song of his that isn’t “Baby Got Back”. Hate it or love it, as the song approaches its 25th anniversary this week, “Baby Got Back” maintains a strong hold on our cultural memory that often overshadows anything else Mix put out. In addition to frequent appearances and parody in film and TV, Mix’s Grammy award winning hit enjoyed a massive 2014 resurgence that included The Seattle Symphony dong a live rendition with Mix on vocals and Nicki Minaj sampling the song for her hit record “Anaconda”. And thanks to endless interpolation, repurposing, and sampling, “Baby Got Back” now boasts 35 million streams on Spotify and has earned Mix upwards of $100 million according to an interview with DJ Vlad.
Yes, we all know aboout “Baby Got Back”, but few folks outside of Seattle realize that Mix had already sold over two million records before he ever signed with a major and released his biggest hit. “By the time he came out [nationally] he was almost kind of old to the people here. He was everywhere. He had songs that were big that never even came out,” Seattle native and G-Unit/Rhymesayers producer Jake One told Cocaine Blunts in an interview about the early days of Seattle rap music.
“When I was a kid, it was like, ‘Rap, or work at McDonald’s?’”- Sir Mix-A-Lot
Before hitting #1 on the Billboard charts and winning a Grammy, Mix spent his early years perfecting his craft with a drum machine, Korg and Moog synths, and a Commodore 64 computer assembled in his bedroom studio. Though he came from modest beginnings in his Seattle apartment, Mix seemed confident from early the beginning that he could move as many units as the major players in the rap game. “I come up with stuff as good, from a musician’s standpoint, as anything by Hashim or Dr. Dre. And I do it right here in this room,” Mix told the now defunct Seattle music publication The Rocket in 1985.
As Mix built up his studio game, a fortuitous meeting with famed local radio DJ Nasty Nes of KFOX 1250 AM set the Seattle rapper on course to take his career to the next level. After Nes caught one of Mix’s legendary live shows at the Boys and Girls Club in Seattle’s Central District, he knew a partnership with Mix would be mutually beneficial. “After seeing [Mix-A-Lot] cut, scratch, mix, and rhyme at this event, and how he had the crowd rockin', I invited him to come on my show and air his material," Nes told The Stranger.
Capitalizing on his new partnership, Mix premiered a steady stream of singles on Nes’s Freshtracks show that helped him develop a rabid following. The two men furthered their partnership by forming the NastyMix label in 1985 and it wasn’t long before songs like “Let’s G” and “The 7 Rainer” became local anthems. According to former Seattle radio personality and music journalist Mike Clark, Mix was so prolific that he didn’t bother giving all of his songs proper release “ It [“The 7 Rainer”] was never released, he used to just put them on tape and he would slang his tapes back in the day. But for a lot of heads here that’s still one of Mix’s biggest songs to never be released on a national basis,” he told Cocaine Blunts.
“By the time he came out [nationally] he was almost kind of old to the people here. He was everywhere. He had songs that were big that never even came out.”- Jake One
Mix built a significant following by the mid-80s, but it was Swass, his 1988 full-length debut that proved he could be a major player in terms of sales. Utilizing an 808-heavy beat for the single “Posse on Broadway”, Mix turned a song about obscure Seattle-specific references into a bonafide hit. On the strength of “Posse”, Swass crept onto the Billboard R & B top 20 album chart and went platinum. For a Seattle rapper on an indy label in the 1980s, this was unheard of.
Proving that he wasn’t a one trick pony, 1989’s follow-up effort Seminar moved about 700,000 units, making him an unparalleled legend in the Seattle rap game. Though financial conflicts with Nes led to a parting of ways with NastyMix 1990, it wasn’t long after that Rick Rubin picked up Mix for his Def American label and put out 1992’s Mack Daddy and “Baby Got Back”.
The general public will always associate Sir Mix-A-Lot with a timeless booty anthem, but his pre-“Baby Got Back” story is an important reminder that vibrant hip-hop scenes existed all over the country outside of LA and New York. Mix proved that artists could support themselves without national recognition, even in the early years of rap records. Without a major label machine behind him, he sold nearly two million records and built a local fan base through consistent output and quality live shows. According to Mix, his incredible success was something he never could have imagined as a young man. As he told the A.V. Club in a 2003 interview, “When I was a kid, it was like, ‘Rap, or work at McDonald’s?’"
Connect with Sir Mix-A-Lot on Facebook, Instagram, and on Twitter @therealmix.
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