"We kind of fit in a little bit in both places," Zilla said. "I feel like usually the best result is when people don't have any expectations and they're taken off-guard by us. We're kind of average-looking white guys, and we'll play on the South Side of Chicago to middle-aged, mostly African-American crowds. They seem to enjoy it.

"They think it's funny, not because of what we're rapping about, but who we are," he added.

The music comes from their own samples of other songs, not filling in the words on someone else's rap.

The ideas for the songs range from pop-culture subjects such as video games or science-fiction to their own amorous conquests, or lack thereof.

One song talks about trying to hook up with girls in supermarkets for a one-night stand, while another raps about the hardships of living with his sister when he brings a date home. And a third complains about the cramp in his style from having a loft bed 9 feet off the floor and 4 feet from the ceiling.

"We are deliberately dirty in the things we say, but we try to be playful in the way we say it," Nasty Nate said. "That's just what our group of friends finds funny, to talk about different angles of certain things."