The Oakland-based Hieroglyphics are an underground rap collective who, at their best, combine an offbeat sensibility with a strong grounding in battle rhyming, freestyling, and other hip-hop traditions. All the members enjoy their own separate careers – founder Del tha Funkee Homosapien, Casual, Souls of Mischief, Extra Prolific, producer/manager Domino, Pep Love, and producer Jay Biz (the latter two of which have also worked together as the Prose). Most of the members had known each other since high school (or earlier), and after Del scored a record deal with his cousin, Ice Cube's help, much of the Hieroglyphics crew wound up with major-label contracts of their own.