Cypress Hill has always been an easy-to-clean kit. From the glandular whine of the B-Real striker’s voice to the group’s near-insane focus on smoking weed, one can imagine younger listeners writing it off as an act of one note. But history has been kind to them, and a deep look through the clouds of smoke on the surface reveals much more than meets the eye.
They were the first Latin American hip-hop stars, and the main architects of its sound and style on the West Coast. They were among the leading advocates of cannabis legalization at a time when such a prospect seemed politically unrealistic. And they were second only to the Beastie Boys in their ability to bridge the gap between rap and rock audiences, at a time when the two genres were often at odds. The documentary “Cypress Hill: Insane in the Brain,” directed by Estefan Oriol, provides a more complete picture of this hugely popular but often underestimated group.
Oriol was an early assistant to the crew, and variously worked as a photographer, videographer, and Cypress Hill tour director for most of their three-decade run. As such, there isn’t much editorial distance between the director and the subject – it’s easy to lose track of how many interviewees have stopped the story to say “Do you remember?” or “I Was There” for the off-camera director – but it turns out to be an asset. Not only do the interviewees seem perfectly at ease under his questioning, but the film is also ultimately his story, as he wanders around his own archives, rummaging through boxes of videotapes and contact papers that meticulously document the life and life of the group. .
Born out of South Gate, California, Cypress Hill has been made up of three very distinct personalities: Cuban-born rapper Sean Dogg; Innovative Queens implant producer DJ Muggs; And the group’s eventual star, B-Real, is a former gangster who gave up that life in favor of music after surviving a shooting as a teenager. After spending several grueling years working at the Muggs’ apartment—and consciously designing themselves as hip-hop’s answer to Cheech and Chong—the group rose from underground sensations to mainstream stars with remarkable speed in the early ’90s, and their full-length second, “Black Sunday,” became One of the earliest hip-hop albums to debut at the top of the Billboard chart.
One of the film’s most pleasant surprises is the amount of time spent researching the group’s actual music, a rarity in contemporary music docs. Oriol sits down with Muggs to analyze some of Cypress Hill’s early demos, tracing the evolution of B-Real’s signature vocal tone over long periods of trial and error. (Excerpts from old versions of “Estate” and “How Can I Just Kill a Man” provide fascinating glimpses of a group about to discover their style.) There’s even some great music from Joe Butcher, founder of Roughhouse Records, Nicolo, who explains why The sloppy drum programs on “Hits From the Bong” perfectly pair with Dusty Springfield’s central sample in ways that even more sober minds haven’t necessarily grasped. (Then he adds, “I know it would be a shock to everyone if we knew we made those records stoned.”)
The film follows the group as they become a touring act, steals the show in Woodstock ’94, is banned from SNL for blunt lighting on air, and soon adds a fourth member of percussionist Eric Bobo. And when the inevitable cracks in the band’s facade finally emerge, the film takes on its most interesting turn. Exhausted by constant travel, Sean Dogg began acting, wrecking locker rooms and sometimes going uninterrupted, until he finally left the group for several years in the mid-1990s. In contemporary interviews, Sen Dog has been quite vocal about the benefits of therapy during his absence, while B-Real clips from Sen Dog’s absence display a great deal of sensitivity and support for his bandmate. Oriol may have been reticent to investigate deeply into the band’s fissures, but as shown here, the entire episode feels like a remarkably mature approach to a mental health crisis — the fact that Sen Dog now happens to be the most Zen-like, even — encourages the rebellious member of the group to see The displayed sense of brotherhood is affected unexpectedly.
Setting up a feature-length documentary after the 2020 L.A. Originals, Oriol has a real knack for speed: the film has fast momentum, yet never feels like he’s in a hurry. As close as the director is to the set, his movie never feels like glorified PR — he just wants us to appreciate Cypress Hill the way he does, and after spending 90 minutes in their candid company, it’s easy to see why.
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