'Pants on the Ground' ripoff: Detroit's Green Brothers say they were first in 1996 →
The Green Brothers version, 1996:
General Larry Platt’s version, 2010:
I can’t believe no one else picked up on this story earlier…ever since American Idol, everyone I know has been screaming that this Platt phony stole that song from Detroit’s…nay, the WORLD’s greatest hip hop act ever, the Green Brothers.
Everyone in the tri-county Metro Detroit area remembers the summer of 1996 as the summer of “Back Pockets On The Floor.” You couldn’t go anywhere without hearing it; the Hudson’s fireworks were synchronized with this grade A prime slice of Detroit funk. The Electrifying Mojo came back to the radio just to spin this one. It was said that the only time television legend Bill Bonds cried was when he heard this song the first time.
Personally, I remember this tune as one of the most positive songs ever recorded. So much good came from this, both for the city of Detroit and the Green Brothers themselves. For several years prior to the release of “Back Pockets,” the Green Brothers were among the most socially-irresponsible gangsta rap groups ever to emerge from Highland Park. After the death of the original Green Brother lyricist Malice, the band spent 3 years or so in a turmoil trying to distance themselves from their previous wicked ways and criminal lifestyle. “Back Pockets” was their Amazing Grace, their repudiation of the negativity of drugs and the gang lifestyle.
We, as Detroiters, are forever in debt to the Green Brothers for ending crime in our utopian city.
