Founding Cypress Hill member Sen Dog and Mellow Man Ace — collectively known as the Reyes Brothers — will release their debut album, “Ghetto Therapy,” June 13 via their own Latin Thugs/Hawino label. The siblings are also working on another album with the remaining Cypress Hill members.
“Ghetto Therapy” boasts guest appearances by Snoop Dogg, Warren G and Cypress Hill’s B-Real, among others. The first single, “We O.G.’s,” featuring Snoop Dogg and Warren G, will be released to radio in May.
“It’s basically a combination of two powers,” Sen Dog tells Billboard.com of the new album. “Mellow has his fanbase, I’ve got my fanbase and this was always something we wanted to do — get back together as the original two guys from Cypress Avenue [in South Gate, Los Angeles] who started the whole hip-hop movement there.”
Mellow Man adds, “We’ve been talking about doing something as a unit for six or seven years but due to scheduling [issues] it never really happened. Now the timing is right.”
The album’s title speaks to hip-hop’s healing potential. “Hip-hop is therapeutic for us,” explains Sen Dog. “We’re able to get out emotions and feelings and talk about subjects that affect everybody’s everyday life. And hip-hop and rap itself are born from the ghetto areas, so it’s therapeutic music from the neighborhood.”
After their family relocated from Cuba to California in the early 1970s, Sen Dog and Mellow Man formed a rap group called DVX in the ’80s with local friends B-Real and DJ Muggs. The group was renamed Cypress Hill after Mellow Man departed to pursue a solo career.
For Mellow Man, whose 1990 album “Escape From Havana” spawned the hit single “Mentirosa,” the new offering is a chance to prove that he hasn’t lost his touch. “I’ve been gone for awhile and this is part of a regeneration, if you will — reintroducing myself as a portion of this duo,” he says.
The Reyes Brothers also plan to release a Spanish-language album, as well as separate solo efforts. As for an upcoming Cypress Hill album, the group is currently working out the kinks. Its last disc, 2004’s “Till Death Do Us Part,” peaked at No. 21 on The Billboard 200 and has sold 190,000 copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan.
“Everybody’s been doing their own thing, but now that all that is out of the way we plan to get in the studio and start recording some new Cypress tracks,” says Sen Dog. “There’s still a demand for Cypress Hill and we don’t plan to stop doing it. We want to continue the legacy that we started.”
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