HOLLYWOOD (CNS) - Hundreds of fans of Cypress Hill flocked to Hollywood Boulevard Thursday for the unveiling of the star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame honoring the first Latino American hip-hop group with a recording to go platinum.
Lead vocalist B-Real called the band's fans “the best fans in the world.”
“You stood along for the ride through the good and bad times when we were poppin', when people started to forget about us,” said B-Real, whose birth name is Louis Freese. “You didn't let people forget about Cypress Hill. You kept us up.”
The rapper Xzibit called the band “our Rolling Stones.”
Comedian George Lopez also spoke at the late-morning ceremony in front of the Greenleaf Gourmet Chopshop at the Eastown apartment complex. The ceremony came 10 days short of seven months after the release of the group's latest album, “Elephants on Acid.”
The star is the 2,660th since the completion of the Walk of Fame in 1961 with the first 1,558 stars.
Senen Reyes, the band's vocalist who performs under the name Sen Dog, and Ulpiano Sergio Reyes (also known as Mellow Man Ace) -- brothers who were born in Cuba and raised in South Gate -- teamed with New York City native Lawrence Muggerud (also known as DJ Muggs) and Freese in 1988 to form the hip- hop group DVX, short for Devastating Vocal Excellence.
Mellow Man Ace left the band a short time later to pursue a solo career and the group changed its name to Cypress Hill, after a street in South Gate. Drummer Eric “Bobo” Correa joined in 1993 and continues to be a member.
Sen Dog used the ceremony to thank South Gate for “being creative that it allowed us to be creative as well.”
Cypress Hill's self-titled first album was released in August 1991 and sold more than 2 million copies. Its second album, “Black Sunday,” released in 1993, debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Top 200 and earned a triple- platinum certification after selling more than 3 million copies.
Cypress Hill received its first Grammy nomination in 1993 for best rap performance by a duo or group for “Insane In The Brain.” It was also nominated in the category the following two years for “I Ain't Goin' Out Like That” and “Throw Your Set In The Air.”
“Insane in the Brain” was 34th on VH1's list of 100 greatest songs of hip-hop released in 2008.
The band's third album, 1995's “Cypress Hill III: Temples of Boom,” and fifth, 2000's “Skull & Bones,” went platinum, each selling more than 1 million copies. Its third, 1998's “Cypress Hill IV,” went gold, selling more than 500,000 copies.
Cypress Hill is scheduled to conduct a European tour June 19-July 14.
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