Rob Base has passed away at age 59 from cancer. In 1988, Base and DJ E-Z Rock shot to fame with their party jam, “It Takes Two.” Featuring a sample of Lyn Collins’ “Think (About It)” layered under Base’s rap, the track became an instant hit across major cities nationwide.
The Harlem duo first met as fourth-grade students. They were encouraged to follow their rap dreams after witnessing the success of local group Crash Crew. After releasing their first single, “DJ Interview,” in 1986, they signed with Profile Records the following year.
When “It Takes Two” dropped in 1988, it quickly became a Top 40 hit on both the Billboard Hot 100 and the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs charts. The single also rose to number three on the Dance Club Songs chart and number 24 on the UK Singles Chart. The massive success of the track earned Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock credit as a major creative force in spreading hip-hop to a mainstream audience—at a time when some sectors of the music industry still dismissed the genre as a passing fad.
They followed up their initial success with “Get on the Dance Floor” and a hip-hop reworking of Frankie Beverly & Maze’s “Joy and Pain,” both released later in 1988. Their debut album, also titled It Takes Two, came out that same year and achieved platinum status by 1989. Base’s lone solo album, The Incredible Base, was released in 1989, and he later reunited with DJ E-Z Rock for their final album, Break of Dawn, which emerged in 1994.
The duo continued to perform together until DJ E-Z Rock passed away in 2014 from diabetic complications. Afterward, Rob Base maintained a busy touring schedule as a solo act, sustained by the fact that “It Takes Two” never lost its momentum, even after almost four decades.
