The Fresh Prince, aka Will Smith (b. Willard Christopher Smith Jnr., 25 September 1968, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA) is now just as famous for his acting career, which started when he played the streetwise tough suffering culture shock when transplanted into the affluent Beverley Hills household of television series The Fresh Prince of Bel Air. However, this was initially very much a second career for Smith. Together with DJ Jazzy Jeff (b. Jeffrey Townes, 22 January 1965, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA), this young duo had already recorded a highly successful debut album in 1987, and charted with the hit single ‘Girls Ain’t Nothing But Trouble’. Musically the duo operated in familiar territory, working a variety of inoffensive, borrowed styles to good effect and in marked contrast to the threatening ‘street style’ of other rap artists.
Jazzy Jeff started DJing in the mid-70s when he was a mere 10 years old (though he is not to be confused with the similarly titled Jazzy Jeff who recorded an album, also for Jive Records, in 1985). He was frequently referred to in those early days as the ‘bathroom’ DJ, because, hanging out with better-known elders, he would only be allowed to spin the decks when they took a toilet break. He met the Fresh Prince at a party, the two securing a recording contract after entering the 1986 New Music Seminar, where Jeff won the coveted Battle Of The Deejays. Embarking on a recording career, the obligatory James Brown lifts were placed next to steals from cartoon characters like Bugs Bunny, which gave some indication of their debut album’s scope.
In the late 80s, DJ Jazzy Jeff And The Fresh Prince cemented their reputation with million-selling teen anthems such as ‘Girls Ain’t Nothing But Trouble’, which sampled the I Dream Of Jeannie theme, and was released three weeks before Smith graduated from high school. They became the first rap act to receive a Grammy Award for their second album’s ‘Parents Just Don’t Understand’, even though the ceremony was boycotted by most of the prominent hip-hop crews because it was not slated to be ‘screened’ as part of the television transmission. In its wake, the duo launched the world’s first pop star 900 number (the pay-phone equivalent of the UK’s 0898 system). By January 1989, 3 million calls had been logged. The duo’s second album, He’s The DJ, I’m The Rapper, contained more accessible pop fare, the sample of Nightmare On Elm Street being the closest they came to street-level hip-hop. The raps were made interesting, however, by the Fresh Prince’s appropriation of a variety of personas. This is doubtless what encouraged the television bosses to make him an offer he could not refuse, and The Fresh Prince Of Bel Air’s enormous success certainly augmented his profile.
The duo picked up a second Grammy for ‘Summertime’ in 1991, before scoring a surprise UK number 1 in 1993 with ‘Boom! Shake The Room’, the first rap record (Vanilla Ice and MC Hammer aside) to top the British singles chart. The same year’s Code Red was the duo’s final album, with Smith electing to concentrate on his acting career. He moved seamlessly into dramatic film roles, beginning with Where The Day Takes You and Six Degrees Of Separation (1993), and reaching a peak with Independence Day (1996) and Men In Black (1997), two of the highest-grossing movies of all time. In 1997, Smith also released his debut solo album, the hugely successful Big Willie Style. Townes, meanwhile, formed A Touch Of Jazz Inc., a stable of producers working on rap/R&B projects. His own production duties included Jill Scott’s debut, Who Is Jill Scott? He released his solo debut, The Magnificent, in August 2002.
