Entry · catalog no. 1122
Triggerman
/ /ˈtrɪɡɚmæn/ /TRIG-ur-man
noun · New Orleans, Louisiana (from a 1986 Queens, New York record) · 1990s
✓ Verified
1.
The name New Orleans gave to one recycled beat: the syncopated drum pattern and the short mallet-and-bell figure from The Showboys' 'Drag Rap,' looped and pushed up in tempo. It functions less as a song than as public infrastructure — DJs, bounce artists and second-line crowds have run the same loop for three decades under thousands of different call-and-response chants. To say a record is on Triggerman is to say it sits on that loop. By extension the word stands in for the whole rhythmic feel of bounce.
“Every tape out the Calliope that summer was Triggerman with somebody's ward hollered over it.”
Origin & Attribution
The record itself is from Queens, New York: Orville 'Bugs Can Can' Hall and Phillip 'Triggerman' Price, recording as The Showboys, cut 'Drag Rap' for Profile Records in 1986 — a revenge story built over a quote of the Dragnet theme. It did little in New York and got adopted in New Orleans, where Price's tag and the character in the lyrics gave the beat its local name. MC T. Tucker and DJ Irv built 'Where Dey At' on it in 1991, the record generally treated as the first bounce song, and the loop has anchored the genre ever since. The standing mistake is treating Triggerman as a New Orleans invention; the record is a New York one, and New Orleans is what made it permanent.
1986
The Showboys release 'Drag Rap (Triggerman)' on Profile Records
1991
MC T. Tucker and DJ Irv's 'Where Dey At' builds bounce on the loop
2018
Drake's 'Nice for What' carries a credited 'Drag Rap' sample to a global pop audience
Region of origin
West
Midwest
N.East
South
Nationwide
New Orleans, Louisiana (from a 1986 Queens, New York record) · 1990s
Spoken by
New Orleans bounce DJs, rappers, and ward and project crowds
$TRIGGEThe Record · cultural traction
▲ Rising40 yrs
ahead of the mainstream
70/100
peak cultural energy
Introduced to English by the culture — logged here before the mainstream caught on.
Cultural usage — the recordMainstream search interest
First used
1986
in the culture
Cultural energy indexed from documented usage, search interest, and citation frequency. The recorded date is the archive’s permanent point of record.
Hear it spoken
By region — how it actually sounds
@auntiereg
Atlanta, GA
@deltasoul
Memphis, TN
Contribute your pronunciation
Citations & Sources
■
The Showboys, 'Drag Rap (Triggerman),' 12-inch on Profile Records — 1986
song · released
■
MC T. Tucker and DJ Irv, 'Where Dey At,' Charlot Records — 1991
song · recorded
■
+ Cite a sourceDrake, 'Nice for What,' with a credited sample of The Showboys' 'Drag Rap' — 2018
song · released
See also