David Cole and Robert Civilles met while both working at a New York underground club. Before forming C & C Music Factory, they were primarily remixers, co-writers, producers and artist managers – having worked with Mariah Carey, Chaka Khan, Fleetwood Mac, Grace Jones, Seduction and others.

Cole & Civilles decided to launch their own music project with an ever-changing cast of vocalists. When an artist they were managing turned down the song “Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now)”, the duo decided to use it as their first single. They recruited a janitor from Quad Recording Studio who was learning to become an assistant engineer named Freedom Williams to perform the raps, and hired ex-Weather Girls singer Martha Wash for the female vocals – but credited them to Zelma Davis. Davis also appeared in the song’s video. Wash later sued for being uncredited in the song and its video.

The song became an international smash, reaching the top 5 in nine countries (taking the top position in five of them). Their debut album was released a month after the single and it reached #2 in the US, #8 in the UK and the top 30 in six other countries.

A follow-up single “Here We Go (Let’s Rock And Roll)” was also very successful, reaching the top 40 in ten countries. The third single “Things That Make You Go Hmmmm….” was a top 30 hit in eight countries. Both were certified gold that year. The strength of three international hits propelled their debut album to triple platinum in the US in less than a year. It was later certified 5x platinum in 1994.

The group won Billboard’s Best New Pop Artist Award in 1991, beating out Boyz II Men, Color Me Badd and EMF. They were also nominated for a Best New Artist Grammy that year, but lost to Marc Cohn.

Freedom Williams left the group in 1992 for a solo career. The group’s 1994 follow-up album peaked at #106 in the US. It spawned one internationally successful single “Do You Wanna Get Funky”, which reached the top 40 in seven countries. In the UK, the album found further success with three more singles also reaching the top 40.

David Cole died in early 1995. A third eponymous album came out later that year but it did not chart. Its first single reached the top 40 only in the UK. C & C Music Factory then went inactive.

In 2005, Williams legally trademarked the C&C Music Factory name and was performing under the name. In 2016, Clivillés publicly posted an open letter on his personal Facebook page addressed to Williams threatening legal action to get rights to the name back, but Williams' response was just to block him on Facebook.