The group was involved in the first Fresh Fest tour, which was the first hip hop tour to play large coliseums nationwide. In July 1986 they appeared at Philadelphia's Spectrum Stadium in front of an audience of 18,000. They were the first Rap Act and Break Dance troop to Tour in the UK and Europe, with UTFO also appearing with them as their break dance act. They played all over Europe to full venues as no one had seen this kind of music before. By 1987, the group had earned its share of gold singles and albums. With the fourth album "Open Sesame", its final release of the 1980s, the group had turned away from their once-playful simple beats and catchy rhymes of the old school and instead became vocally more harder and more instrument-driven, with guitars and horns and bells. They even began to sample, as a snippet of Cheryl Lynn's "Got to be Real" is heard on the song "Now That Whodini's Inside the Joint". Larry Smith produced the entire album except for two tracks, "Be Yourself" and "I'm Def (Jump Back And Kiss Myself)", produced by Sinester. This new school style had been similarly done almost a year previously on the multi-million selling debut albums by L.L. Cool J and the Beastie Boys, as many groups had already turned to the kind of rap and rock music that crossed over easily, and "Open Sesame" failed to produce any real hits. Although the group was still obligated to Jive Records, for the next few years the band eked out its tenure by occasionally only releasing singles, including “Anyway I Gotta Swing It” for the "" movie soundtrack. In the 1990s, the band made an attempt at a comeback, and in that same year the group signed with MCA Records and released the fifth album "Bag-A-Trix" in 1991, which failed to have commercial impact, as it tried again to reinvent using the then-current sound of new jack swing. Larry Smith produced 6 tracks on the album, two of which co-authored with the band Major Jam Productions, which separately produced the other 4 tracks, and Fresh Gordon made music for other 4 songs. In mid-1994, the group scored a hit single with "It All Comes Down to the Money", which was co-produced by Public Enemy DJ Terminator X on his album "Super Bad". Talks with Def Jam Recordings for a new deal stalled, and in 1996, the group was signed by Jermaine Dupri (mentor-producer of Kris Kross and Li'l Bow Wow) to his then Columbia Records-distributed So So Def Recordings imprint.