A LIGHTER SHADE OF BROWN : Latino Rap Is No Longer a Disease

“Man, when we were first looking for a record deal about five years ago, people didn’t give a damn about Mexican rappers. It was like we had a disease or something,” says Bobby Ramirez, whose group A Lighter Shade of Brown has a big Southern California hit single in “Homies.”

At the end of the ‘80s, though, Kid Frost and Mellow Man Ace spearheaded a surge in Latino rap, culminating in the emergence last year of Cypress Hill and A Lighter Shade of Brown. To Ramirez, though, Latino rap still hasn’t arrived.

“Most of the labels still haven’t gotten the message about the Latino market,” explains Ramirez, whose partner in LSOB is Robert Gutierrez. “They don’t know the market--don’t realize how big it is and how much the kids buy rap and hip-hop records.”

But Quality Records got the message, signing LSOB in 1990. The group’s first album, “Brown & Proud,” sold more than 250,000 copies that year, mostly within the Latino community. But the current album, “Hip Hop Locos,” should easily top that, spurred by the success of “Homies,” a huge local hit that’s just starting to make an impact nationally.

Ramirez, 23, and Gutierrez, 19--both from Riverside--met about five years ago when they were struggling young rappers working with the same crew. The group was originally a trio, but Fabian Alfaro left shortly after the first album came out.

Although LSOB is focused on the Latino community, ethnic pride doesn’t dominate its music as it once did. “On our first album we were very Latino-centric,” Ramirez says. “But we’ve traveled around more and broadened our views. So this album is broader, with more humor and messages that aren’t so heavy.”

The infectious “Homies,” in particular, has broad appeal. “We were writing about some of the feelings two friends go through when they grow up together, from youth to old age. Everybody--Latino or not--can relate to that.”

With its focus on the Latino community, you’d think the duo might do an album in Spanish. A good idea--except, Ramirez says, “I don’t speak Spanish.”