With the death of Kris Kross’ Chris Kelly goes the life of one of those childhood stars who unfortunately could never make the full transition to becoming a genuine adult sensation. Together with Chris ‘Mac Daddy’ Smith, Kelly very briefly set the music world alight when he and his young partner dropped the hit Jump in 1992. The song was a huge smash, topping the US Billboard charts for a whopping eight weeks and going twice platinum in their home country and off the back of it their debut album Totally Krossed Out also went to top spot on the US album charts, going a whopping four times platinum. Kelly was just 13 at the time.

Yet the pair unfortunately never quite followed it up – it didn’t help that by sending up hip-hop style by even wearing their jeans backwards they ultimately became novelty act, and their subsequent albums Da Bomb in 1993 and Young, Rich & Dangerous in 1996 were diminishing returns (although still US Billboard top 20 albums). Their last single while they were together – Live & Die For The Hip-Hop – flopped in at 72 in the charts before the pair went their separate ways and tried their hand at unsuccessful solo careers.

Nevertheless for a while Chris Kelly one of the signifiers that hip-hop had truly gone mainstream, with Kris Kross a bona fide party pop act that took the genre to the masses no matter what age they were. For that he is to be respected.