June 27 in Houston is more than a cultural holiday. It’s also become more than DeMo Sherman’s birthday. It is a tipping point, a date synonymous with a 35-minute freestyle that turned out Galveston before it turned out the world. And it may not have happened had it not been DeMo’s birthday at all.
According to DJ Screw biographer Lance Scott Walker and others, June 27th is the biggest-selling Screw tape of all time, with its monumental freestyle packaged around songs including Bone Thugs-N-Harmony’s “Crossroad,” (not their chart-topping smash “Tha Crossroads”), 2Pac’s “All About U,” and the instrumental to Above The Law’s “100 Spokes Wit Shoutz.”
“No other tape was gonna top ‘June 27th’, no matter who was on it,” DeMo told Donnie Houston during a 2022 reunion of the men who rapped on the freestyle. “If my mama wouldn’t have had me, we wouldn’t have no ‘June 27th.’ It might have been something else, but it wouldn’t be ‘June 27th.'”
The story of “June 27th” as a tape and a freestyle goes back to Dancing Candy. In Screw’s catalog, it’s Chapter 23, while June 27th is Chapter 12. Sherman, who met Screw in 1994, had already cobbled together his selection of songs for a tape but famously fell asleep while making it.
Falling asleep from codeine wasn’t new at Screw’s house. Rappers often saw who was the latest to doze off thanks to the purple concoction and decided it would make for good fodder on the tape. DeMo was no exception.
“When I woke up, I heard Key-C say, ‘DeMo fell asleep but we still gon’ wreck,'” Sherman said. His main desire for Dancing Candy was to hear Big Moe sing his name in that thick, buttery tone that made him a star from Screw’s “Sippin Codeine” from 3 ‘N Da Mornin’ Pt. 2. So a redo had to happen.
Detail of all of DJ Screw’s singles written out on a board at Screwed Up Records and Tapes ( Karen Warren / Houston Chronicle ) (Photo by Karen Warren/Houston Chronicle via Getty Images) (Houston Chronicle/Hearst Newspap/Houston Chronicle via Getty Imag)
On a muggy night, as more and more people flocked over to Screw’s house for DeMo’s birthday tape, a cast of characters that would go from neighborhood stars to city-wide legends began to take shape.
The famed freestyle operates with Screw as conductor, mixing in a lurching joyride of Kriss Kross’ “Da Streets Ain’t Right,” a song with a backbone crafted by Jermaine Dupri working the conjoined paranoia of The Notorious B.I.G.’s “Warning” and The Romantics’ “Talking In Your Sleep.” Big Moe serves as both hook man and introductory guide, giving platitudes and shoutouts to whoever was next on the mic. Robert “Bird” Oliver, a tried and true lowkey member of the Screwed Up Click, DeMo himself and Key-C soon followed.
Then came Yungstar and Big Pokey.
Pokey, perhaps the most assured and confident rapper in the room, was a Jack Yates High School standout on the gridiron who played with George Floyd in Yates’ last appearance in the state title game in 1992. Blessed with a baritone and a rap voice that made him authoritative at all times, his spot on “June 27th” saw him stretch out words like “petroleum” and “marijuana” out like taffy, hilariously rhyming “rabbit” and “dagnabbit” back-to-back. In the process, his Sunday ritual of likely playing Maze while riding down 288 became the chorus for Paul Wall’s “Sittin Sidewayz” some nine years later. Pokey’s desire to rock a Starter jacket got flipped on Swishahouse’s “Drank In My Cup.”
Big Pokey, along with Yungstar, stole the show on “June 27th” (Ben DeSoto/Houston Chronicle via Getty Images) (Houston Chronicle/Hearst Newspap/Houston Chronicle via Getty Imag)
Yungstar, even at 15, had to be urged to take the moment. Right before he stepped into Screw’s famed Wood Room, he was freestyling in the living room, going back-and-forth with Pokey with a chest full of bravado.
“Man, you need to get up there and get on that tape,” Chris Cooley recalled telling Yungstar that night in A Life In Slow Revolution, Walker’s biography about Screw. After Moe’s introduction, which followed Key-C’s elongated verse that serves as the longest on the 35-minute song, the kid who repped Long Drive slowly began building his world out, gaining confidence with every bar.
By the time he decided to focus on wearing “shoes by Huarache” and “shirts by Versace,” there was no turning back. His voice grows louder as he weaves into a trance. He’s shopping at stores and locales that feel like time capsules (Mervyn’s, Randall’s), sending shout-outs to a jailed Lil Keke, ordering a baked potato with chives (and not letting you forget it), and prominently denouncing blunts dipped in embalming fluid. By the time his first verse is done, he passes the baton to Pokey, who absolutely flourishes.
Pokey only gets a single verse on “June 27th,” along with the men that followed him, K-Luv and Haircut Joe. Key-C got an additional verse, same for DeMo (because it was his birthday), but naturally, Yungstar finishes things off, capping his second verse by suggesting he’ll put swangas on a bus.
The nature of June 27th as a full-length tape is still a point of discussion among Screwheads, who say Dancing Candy had Screw’s better mixes, while June 27th had the better freestyles. In 1996, the men who understood they made history inside the 100-square-foot Wood Room couldn’t even hear it back immediately. They had to wait like everyone else.
And with that, “June 27th” became iconic
If June 27 is representative of the day Screw truly became Screw in Houston, then July 4, 1996, in Galveston should serve as the Houston rap version of “D-Day.” The day everything truly changed. With many making a pilgrimage to Galveston for Fourth of July festivities, there was only one sound that called them down there like a Greek siren. Or rather, a Third Ward maestro who lured everyone to jam one singular tape.
Dubs of June 27th began circulating after Screw sold the original copies from behind his gate. One by one, each man who rapped on the tape heard someone else playing it, namely that lengthy freestyle where Moe starts as the leadoff. DeMo says each person, from Moe to Pokey to Yungstar, got 10 copies, but by the time they trekked down I-45, everyone was blasting it.
There’s a pain in revisiting “June 27th.” Screw, of course, died in 2000 from a codeine overdose. Big Moe passed away in 2007 from a heart attack. Pokey collapsed and died in June 2023 after suffering a massive heart attack at a show in Beaumont. Bird passed away earlier this month, on June 9, a few months shy of his 51st birthday. His memorial service? Friday, one day before the 30th anniversary of the freestyle that helped solidify the Screwed Up Click.
The power of music is that all four are eternalized by Screw tapes. Every freestyle and conversation gets passed down like tales around a slow flickering campfire.
While Key-C, Haircut Joe and DeMo remained close to the orbit of the SUC, Pokey, Moe and Yungstar became part of the generation of Houston rap that evolved from neighborhood legends into regional stars, if not larger. “June 27th” certified Yungstar, who’d go on to release an album and steal the show on Lil’ Troy’s “Wanna Be A Baller” and Mista Madd’s “Down South.” Moe was Houston’s answer to Nate Dogg, a hook maestro who helped make purple one of the city’s signature colors next to orange, blue, Columbia blue, red, and yellow. Pokey, of course, joined Moe for his debut single “Maan!” and was on “Sittin’ Sidewayz” alongside “The People’s Champ.” He was a bruiser, with his own classic singles and tapes, none bigger than 1999’s “Ball ‘N Parlay.”
If you want to listen to “June 27th” in full, whether it’s the freestyle or the complete tape, you can’t do it on Apple Music. Only Spotify and Tidal among the major digital streaming platforms have the freestyle, same for YouTube. But, YouTube, which has become a treasure trove of forgotten Houston rap media, has a wide array of Screw tapes in full, even June 27th. With the swath of “originals” from Screw’s massive catalog being added to streaming services, “June 27th” might be the signature track missing. There are remixes, fledgling rappers also trying their hand at the beat and more, but the tried and true version can only be heard selectively.
The economy of “June 27th” will live on via time capsules, merchandise, wanton freestyles over its instrumental and odes to the men who crafted Houston’s most singular freestyle. Bigger than any mix, those 35 minutes are what the best of the Screwed Up Click was–loose, fun and led by a man whose vision ultimately created the definitive sound of a city.
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This article originally published at How a codeine-induced nap led to Houston’s signature freestyle.