Artist | Vanilla Ice | Biography

Vanilla Ice's Biography

For a million-selling pop star, Robert Van Winkle, a.k.a. Vanilla Ice, has had a pretty rough ride. His debut To the Extreme hit #1 in early 1991, and immediately, due to his numerous dubious claims to street cred, he became the willing punch line to any number of jokes regarding white rappers.

He has never recovered from that one blistering year in the sun. And yet his chart-topping...

With his hit single "Ice Ice Baby" and its accompanying album, To the Extreme, Vanilla Ice became the second white rapper to top the charts. Unlike the Beastie Boys, he didn't have any street credibility, so the Miami-born rapper decided to invent some of his own, claiming he had a seriously violent gangster past. Nevertheless, "Ice Ice Baby" became a number one hit late in 1990, thanks to the pulsating bass riff from David Bowie and Queen's "Under Pressure." To the Extreme also went to the top of the charts, spending 16 weeks at number one and selling over seven million copies. Ice began filming a feature film, Cool As Ice, in the spring of 1990, but by the time the film came out in the fall, his star had fallen dramatically; To the Extreme was at number one longer than the soundtrack to Cool as Ice was on the charts.
(Source: Answers.com)

Robert Matthew "Vanilla Ice" Van Winkle (born October 31, 1968) is an American rapper, known mostly for the single "Ice Ice Baby," which topped the charts in the early 1990s. At the time, he was one of the few successful white rappers.
(Source: Mog.com)