Lil Wayne’s celebrated his twentieth anniversary on June 29. While the album represented a sonic and lyrical shift for him, one song particularly was a nostalgic look back at a previous chapter.I miss my dogs”was his love letter to his former labelmates — and more importantly — Juvenile, BG and Turk, his Hot Boys bandmates.

“,” Lil Wayne rapped on the time. “

Two a long time later, a song was born — which Lil Wayne once done with BG within the mid-2000s — is coming full circle. All 4 members will reunite on stage of their hometown of New Orleans for the 2024 Essence Festival, which kicked off July 4. The official billing calls the show a celebration of 30 years of Cash Money Records. Label co-founder Bryan “Birdman” Williams is the headliner for the evening, and Cash Money producer Mannie Fresh may even appear. But calling the reunion of one of the vital iconic and complicated groups in rap history historic is barely half the story. It’s a story of time, aging, and, surprisingly, a reunion happening in any respect.

In the late ’90s, American popular culture was hooked on boy bands. Groups like Backstreet Boys, N’Sync, and 98 Degrees were fueled by shows like MTV, but hip-hop’s chaotic, bouncy answer to the cookie-cutter pop hits was the Hot Boys. They were young, intense, and incredibly, unapologetically black. To various degrees, each member became a star in their very own right. As a bunch, the Hot Boys were rock stars. Albums like and were relentless. Singles like “I Need A Hot Girl,” “Back That Azz Up,” and “Bling Bling” not only soundtracked the turn of the millennium, they modified the lexicon.

Great success within the music industry is usually a preamble to even greater failure. The Hot Boys disbanded in 2003 after their last album — and that is where the story gets complicated. Turk was involved in a shootout with a Memphis, Tennessee, SWAT officer in 2004 and incident ultimately was sent to prison for nine years. BG and Juvenile blamed Cash Money Records for alleged financial irregularities (a claim that dogged the label for many of its existence) for his or her departures. Lil Wayne called himself “prisoner” to the label in 2014, marking the beginning of years of grievances against the company he carried on his shoulders for most of the 2000s. BG he was sentenced to 14 years in federal prison in 2012 for possessing a firearm as a convicted felon. Lil Wayne — who eventually became the most famous Hot Boy — he served eight months on Rikers Island after being convicted of a firearms offense in New York. The juvenile is the one member of the group who didn’t serve time.

Because of this, and since of varied animosities with the record company and with one another, a real reunion has never happened until now. (All 4 members reunited for Turk’s song “Shut up” in 2012) A homecoming of this scale is an act of God. Trace the history of the Hot Boys, and the hits and albums are essentially the most famous chapters of that story. Nevertheless, it is usually a depressingly dark story at times. Drugs plagued the group and essentially eliminated much of its potential. BG and Turk have admitted that cocaine and heroin use were an inevitable problem in the interior politics of the label. They later understood how these substances warped their careers and lives.

“(Birdman and Slim) weren’t with it. They used to hate that sh—,” The Turk said in a 2022 interview “Why would anyone tolerate their money growing if it’s ruining their money?”

“It started after one of my little buddies got killed and snorted weed. After his funeral, (we said) ‘We’ll snort a bag for our partner.’” BG said in a 2009 interview, then six years clean. “I would have never started snorting pot (when I was 15) if I knew it would take me down the path it did… It played a role in my career. It made me not as creative, not as driven (as) if I was sober.”

Even today, obstacles remain. Earlier this 12 months, BG was expected to be returned to federal prison after violating the terms of his probation. A probation officer found that BG, currently a resident of Las Vegas, had not obtained the correct license to practice his career. with Lil Boosie in February. On Tuesday, the situation was announced as resolved: BG is not going to should return to prison, but he may have to send all of the texts he wrote songs to his probation officer for review. The decision undermines a protracted-standing argument, one which has only intensified over time, about rappers, rap lyrics, and the way they’re treated within the legal system. It’s one other stark reminder that nothing has ever been a straight shot north for the Hot Boys — not even their success.

“We’ve talked about (doing a tour) a few times. Everyone’s had situations — like BG just going home. So he’s got to work it out,” Lil Wayne said possible reunion. “Can he travel? Can he tour? Ready for Juvie. Ready for Turk. We just have to see if Geezy can move or not.”

But the success achieved remains to be a hit value celebrating. Juvenile’s late comeback, led by his Tiny Desk Performance 2023 AND congressional resolution in his honor, warmed my heart. Lil Wayne’s peak is within the rearview mirror, but he features on albums like “The beast got here out“prove that being a naturally gifted wordsmith will all the time be in his arsenal. And in a genre that has lost so many key figures so young, having all 4 Hot Boys on stage will be a critical moment. Bands like UGK, A Tribe Called Quest, Mobb Deep, De La Soul, and even R&B stars like TLC are ceaselessly losing a component of what made them legends. And since this event will happen in New Orleans, a city the Hot Boys helped launch on the world stage, it only sweetens this pot of gumbo.

“Me, Wayne, Turk and BG, we’re all gonna be on stage with Mannie Fresh and Birdman,” Juvenile said within the film in June. “And we’ve already started working on the Hot Boys album.”

The Hot Boys grew up in a grotesque music industry, and there’s no option to tell what was taken from them. Their music was particularly graphic, giving listeners a glimpse into the lives of 4 young black people from the underside of the map. But also they are artifacts of the Bayou. The ones who helped transform places just like the Magnolia Projects, Hollygrove, and the seventeenth Ward from places of economic deprivation to birthplaces of transformative art. The ones who made soulja rags and white T-shirts cool. The ones who had a generation of black youth and young adults far beyond the Big Easy calling themselves “hot boys” and “hot girls.” The ones who brought pride to their city—even while carrying their demons, self-inflicted and societal—long before the New Orleans Saints won the Super Bowl. And those who survived New Orleans when it was capital of murder and never town most related to Hurricane Katrina.

,” Lil Wayne rapped on the 2004 song “I Miss My Dawgs.”

It only took 20 years, but now Lil Wayne can tell them to their faces. Not every story ends this manner.