Down A.K.A. Kilo

Chicano rapper Down, born Juan Martinez, first surfaced with the aggressive West Coast funk-rap album California Cowboys yet reached a broader national audience only after issuing the dance-oriented club single "Lean Like a Cholo" in 2007. Martinez entered the world in Oxnard, CA, the child of undocumented immigrants, and absorbed the hardcore hip-hop and stoner-funk of Cypress Hill together with the explosive gangsta rap of NWA while still young; those sounds and their associated lifestyle resonated strongly with him. He began rapping at age 13 and tracked his earliest material inside a makeshift garage studio belonging to childhood friend Edward "E-Dub" Rios, who later produced segments for the Pocos Pero Locos show on L.A.'s Power 106. The two eventually founded separate ventures—Kilogram Music Group for Down and Silent Giant Entertainment for Rios—and jointly released the 2003 California Cowboys LP, whose guest list featured West Coast stalwarts MC Ren, Daz Dillinger, and Snoop Dogg, although the project received only modest attention. Limited visibility also greeted the 2004 double-disc set Bosses and Jefes, issued on Venemusic under the Kilo moniker and split between an all-Spanish first disc and a mostly English second disc. In the months preceding summer 2007, numerous rap and R&B singles were generating new national dance trends, prompting Down to deliver the Latino-themed hit "Lean Like a Cholo." The subsequent album The Definition of an Ese followed the same commercial strategy, pairing smoother, R&B-driven productions from up-and-coming Fingazz (already credited with work for Lil' Robb, Kurupt, and Brown Boy) and appearing on Universal's Latin imprint Machete Music, where it climbed into the Top 20 of both the dance and rap charts.