Writer's Block, the duo featuring MCs Lord Zen and Dannu, first surfaced on Key-Kool & Rhettmatic's 1995 album Kozmonautz via the track "Visionaries (Stop Actin' Scary)" and soon became members of the Visionaries crew that grew out of those sessions. The pair lent their efforts to the group's 1998 album Galleries, then turned their attention to crafting their debut single as a duo, Basically, which surfaced the next year. Poetry Explains, a second Writer's Block single, reached stores in 2000 alongside the Visionaries' follow-up Sophomore Jinx. Another single, No More No Less, appeared in 2001, by which point Zen and Dannu had built a devoted following within L.A.'s underground rap community. Their first full-length project, En Route, finally arrived in 2004 on Up Above and gathered nearly every A-side and B-side the duo had issued up to that point, with Next Stop following in 2005.
