In 1988, Lamb was recommended by his sister Sandy Lamb San-san, a radio DJ at the time, for a job as a graphic designer at Commercial Radio Hong Kong.

Within months, his quick wit and comedic talent had been discovered by Winnie Yu Tsang, then general manager and now deputy chairwoman of the broadcaster. Tsang got Lamb and Kot, by then also a designer for Commercial Radio, to host a show together – easily done, as they were already good friends and had great chemistry.

The name Softhard is a play on a Cantonese expression that loosely translates as “an iron hand in a velvet glove”.

She wanted the two to complement each other, with Kot representing the “soft”, good cop in audience participation games and Lamb the opposite.

As Softhard, they started out as guest hosts and steadily gained popularity among Hong Kong radio listeners. They fronted 12 different programmes for Commercial Radio between the late 1980s and the mid 90s.

In 1989, the duo performed their first stand-up comedy show and recorded their first Cantonese comedic rap single. In 1991, Softhard released a self-titled debut album and have since been credited with launching the city’s hip-hop scene.

One of the tracks, “Everyone Needs to Lup”, promoted universal love and safe sex through cheeky Cantonese wordplay and slang-filled lyrics – lup being a way to reference putting on a condom.

“Nobody else will sing this kind of song with this kind of attitude,” Lamb said at the time.

He met Japanese designer Nigo – best known for creating streetwear brand A Bathing Ape, or Bape – in 1998. Soon afterwards, Lamb began incorporating branded streetwear in his stage performances.

He appeared in promotional images for Bape’s first Hong Kong store in 1999 and has since modelled for Japanese magazines.

Despite all this, Lamb has not forgotten his roots – he continues to host radio shows.

Lamb is also a stand-up comedian – he performed a series of shows at Queen Elizabeth Stadium in 2005, the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre in 2006 and the Hong Kong Coliseum in 2008; he continued to perform almost annually at the latter venue until 2019.

In 2006, Softhard reunited for a Lunar New Year McDonald’s advertising campaign and a concert titled “Long Time No See”.

Much of the rap duo’s charm lies in their relatability.

“The material comes from the street, actually,” Lamb said in a 1993 interview. “All the stuff happens around us; it’s stuff we feel deeply about. And of course it’s our attitude. All these people are doing karaoke – no one is releasing songs about things that are happening around us.”

When it comes to his personal life, Lamb has kept it mostly private. In 1998, he married then-singer Cass Phang Ling, who gave birth to their first daughter in 2000 and withdrew from the limelight after the birth of their second child in 2004.

Recent years have seen Lamb add “amateur marathon runner” to his list of talents, with much of his Instagram feed now featuring running-related photos.

In September 2023 he ran the Berlin Marathon in Germany, about which he wrote: “It can’t all go according to plan. All I can hope for is painless cramps. Life is like a box of German chocolates, you never know what you will get.”

For three evenings in December 2023, Lamb sang in his “Uncle Auntie Farewell Party” concerts at AsiaWorld-Expo in Lantau. Kot was the encore guest for the final show, during which it was announced that Softhard would reunite for a one-off Hong Kong concert this year.

Before that, Lamb will give a concert at The Londoner Arena in Macau on June 8.