Sqad Up was an American hip hop group from New Orleans, Louisiana. The group originally consisted of Southern rappers Lil Wayne, Gudda Gudda, Kidd Kidd, T-Streets, Raw Dizzy, Young Yo, Sha Tura, Fee Banks, and Supa Blanco, with Raj Smoove as the in-house producer. In 2004, Sqad Up released their debut album Now or Never on their independent label Money Yung'N Records.

History

1999–2006: Formation, early releases and separation

In the late 1990s, Lil Wayne met Young Yo in high school and they became close friends, sparked by a shared interest in hip hop culture and fashion. "I was always fly and fresh when I was younger and that's how me and Wayne got jam tight. He was already rappin' but his shit wasn't really poppin'. It was B.G.'s time then. When Juvenile came on board and they got the Cash Money and Universal deal Wayne had to go on the road and he asked me to go on tour with him", says Yo. Yo realized the opportunity in front of him and decided to call his brother Supa Blanco to invite him on tour as well. Despite playing college basketball at Arizona at the time, Blanco accepted and joined them on the road.^{[citation needed]}

Dino Delvaille, who at the time was the Universal Records A&R known for bringing the Cash Money Records deal to the table, began urging Yo and Blanco to start rapping. When they returned from the tour Yo, Blanco, and Wayne decided to start Sqad Up. In addition to the aforementioned trio, the group consisted of some of their close friends from New Orleans: Nutt da Kidd, Gudda Gudda, T-Streets, Raw Dizzy, and Fee Banks. Gudda got an invite into the Sqad when he and Wayne met at a dice game when they were about 15, with Wayne saying, "you should be rappin', you been through a lot".^[1] Throughout 2002 and 2003, they released seven installments of their SQ mixtape series and became one of the first groups to start making mixtapes in New Orleans.^{[citation needed]}

In 2004, Sqad Up decided to work on their debut album, but Birdman, the CEO of Cash Money Records, did not feel that they were ready to release a studio album yet. As a result, they never signed to Cash Money and instead created their own label, Money Yung'N Records. Lil Wayne left the group and stayed with Birdman, heeding his earlier advice.^[2] This led to Sqad Up having beef with both Lil Wayne and B.G.^[3] They exchanged verbal jabs on a handful of various mixtapes. On June 22, 2004, Sqad Up released their debut album, Now or Never.^[4] In 2006, they met rapper Lil' Flip at The Source Awards who apparently was a fan of their music. They ended up releasing a couple of mixtapes on Lil Flip's independent record label, Clover G'z Records. That same year, Sqad Up went on a number of tours to support their sophomore album We Here Now, but it was never released and the group disbanded.^[5][6]

2015–present: Reunion

In July 2015, Raw Dizzy posted a picture on Instagram that read, "The Original Sqad Up Re-union Album" and tagged all the original Sqad Up members.^[7] In September 2015, Lil Wayne brought out Raw Dizzy, Kidd Kidd, and Gudda Gudda to perform, "We Ready", "Guess Who's Ready", and "Best of Me" at his Lil Weezyana Fest in New Orleans. In January 2016, A$AP Retro asked Raw Dizzy in an Instagram direct message if the project is still being worked on, to which Raw Dizzy replied: "We working on doing it fam".^[8] On April 6, 2016, Dizzy released a single titled "Heaven" featuring Lil Wayne. The song may end up on the Sqad Up reunion album.^[9]

Discography

Studio albums

Mixtapes