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Kokane
Kokane appearing in "Wrong Idea" video
Background information
Birth name	Jerry Long, Jr.
Also known as	Mr. Kane
Origin	Pomona, California
Genre(s)	West Coast hip hop
Instrument(s)	Vocalist
Years active	1989–present
Label(s)	Ruthless (1991–1996) Doggystyle (2000–2003) Koch (2006–present)
Associated acts	Snoop Dogg, Cypress Hill, Dr. Dre, Cold 187um

Kokane (born Jerry Long, Jr. around 1969), ) is a rapper from Pomona, California and best known for his work with Above The Law.

A cousin of Above The Law's main member Cold 187 (aka Big Hutch), Kokane signed with Ruthless Records in 1991 and made a cameo on NWA's Niggaz4life album. He followed this up with his debut album Addictive Hip Hop Music. Produced by Cold 187um and Laylaw, the album enjoyed limited critical or commercial success.

By 1994 he had become a more prominent member of Above The Laws extended family, featuring heavily on their album Uncle Sam's Curse. The same year he released his sophomore album Funk Upon A Rhyme, produced solely by Cold 187um and enjoyed critical acclaim for the albums diverse and fresh sound, although once again failing to make a commercial impact, a trend that would continue throughout his career. The album is now out of print, and very rare, costing over a 100 dollars on amazon.

By 1996 Kokane was a free agent, having left Ruthless the previous year after label head Eazy-E's untimely death. He released the single '4 Ryders Only', and teamed up with DJ Yella to record and Eazy tribute 4 Tha E.

By 1999 he was no longer associated with Above The Law, and living out of a trailer in California. Kokane has even gone on record with hip-hop magazine The Source as having done a brief stint in the west coast adult industry during this downtime as he sought to make ends meet. He released They Call Me Mr Kane to little interest, although did appear on Dr Dre's multi-platinum 2001 album.

In early 2000 however, Kokane hit luck when Snoop Dogg, remembering Kane's early contribution to Ruthless Records, and appreciating his contribution to West-Coast G-Funk more than most, approached him to become in-house singer for his newly-formed Dogghouse Records. Kokane featured extensively on Snoop's comeback album Tha Last Meal to great effect, appearing on no less than 7 tracks, of which "Go Away", "Pump Your Brakes" and "Stacey Adams" were perhaps the most-noteworthy.

Kokane's high-pitched, p-funk induced singing style seemed tailor-made for Snoop's funk-heavy beats and drawled delivery. Indeed such was the chemistry between rapper and singer, the combination harked back to Nate Dogg's tremendous success partnering Warren G just 5 years earlier. Kane garnered several further guest spots from his new-found notorierty and seemed briefly set to challenge Nate's reign within hip-hop as so-called "king of the hook" (chorus).

He also featured heavily, if less spectacularly, on Snoop proteges' Tha Eastsidaz sophomore set "Deuces & Trays: The Old-Fashioned Way". Following Tha Last Meal's success however, by 2002 Snoop was again working with mainstream producers on the release of Paid tha Cost to be tha Boss, and Kokane's importance at Dogghouse seemed to have subsided considerably, prompting little surprise when he parted ways with the label.

Following his sojourn with Snoop Dogg, with whom he is thought to have stopped working in 2003, Kokane signed to Koch Records forming a new group The Hood Mob. It is led by him joined by Cricet and Contraband. They released an album on July 3, 2006.

He is the son of Motown composer Jerry Long, Sr., who is listed in the credits for the Marvin Gaye album Trouble Man.

He is currently working on an album with Pomona's Suga Free entitled Suspended Animation: Suga Kane. A George Clinton collaboration is also in the works entitled Smell My Finger. Production is likely to be done by the Soundscannerz (Josef Leimberg and Quaze), who handled the production on Painkillerz.

He is currently featured on Young Buck's new album Buck the World. Kokane handles the hook on the track "Haters."

Contents 1 Albums 2 Filmography 3 Samples 4 References

• Addictive Hip Hop Muzick — 1991
• Funk Upon A Rhyme — 1994
• They call me Mr. Kane — 1998
• Mr. Kane Part 2 — 2004
• The Hood Mob — 2006
• Back 2 Tha Clap — 2006
• Painkillerz — 2006

• Old School

• Birchmeier, Jason. Kokane Biography. Yahoo Music.