Walk Wit Me

“Walk Wit Me” is a 1997 CD maxi-single by Chicago rapper DA Smart, released on Creator’s Way Records and produced by The Legendary Traxster. It was also issued on cassette.

The story

DA Smart came up in the Robert Taylor Homes on the South Side, starting out as a break dancer before earning a reputation as a battle rapper in the early 1990s. After a deal with RCA stalled, he left the label with help from Wendy Day and the Rap Coalition and went independent, linking with Traxster and the Creator’s Way (C.W.A.L.) camp. He has said he wanted the song to represent Chicago as he saw it every day.

Sound and production

The Legendary Traxster, then building a name through his work with Twista and Do or Die, produced the release. The title track samples Marvin Gaye’s “I Want You.” The CD includes radio and street versions of “Walk Wit Me,” “Ghetto Love” featuring Traxster and Mike C., “Feel Tha Funk” and an instrumental.

Legacy

The title track became a Chicago hood anthem because it names neighborhoods across the city along with the street organizations tied to them, and it has stayed a local favorite for decades. A music video finally arrived in 2011, some 14 years after the original release. DA Smart later founded Terror Records, which reissued the single on CD-R.