At an outward glance, CRUMM seems like your everyday, typically sane, moral driven individual in pursuit of success and personal comfort; be that as it may, two Rockstar Energy Drinks and half a conversation later, you’ll find in CRUMM, a deeply complex individual whom life has provided its fair share of struggles, hardships, and tribulations.
With both West Indian and southern roots, CRUMM is able to borrow from these uniquely different rhythms, and produce a sound that is unlike anything the world has ever heard or seen. The self-described "unpredictable godsend”, is a melting pot of different types of moods and emotions that when unleashed, culminate into some of the most beautifully poetic eardrum candy unbeknownst to the tongue’s capability of delivering. Influenced heavily by Outkast and their uncanny ability to take calculated chances, CRUMM creates a new genre of music in a market that has rendered lyrical ability secondary to thumping beats.
Challenging the current paradigms that say, "The South ain't talkin about much," this wordsmith is guaranteed to change the industry's perception of what to expect from the talent below the Mason-Dixon Line by fusing his old spirited, raw emotion filled music with the lyrical storytelling of yesteryear.
CRUMM, aka Oliver Ottley III, was born and raised in Augusta, Georgia. Naturally crafty with his words, he started off writing poems in high school as a means to charm the ladies.
A talented two-sport athlete, it was always assumed that CRUMM would go on to a career in professional sports; the first stop on his collegial journey took him to South Carolina State University. There on a “presumed” athletic scholarship for Track and Field, music was not yet a major part of CRUMM’s life on account of the rigorous demands of the athletic program that required all other aspirations to take a back seat.
As time went on, running track was slowly losing its appeal due to a financial conflict of interest between the “university and student”, causing CRUMM’s once preeminent motivation for athletic greatness to steadily wane. With sponsorship contracts from the likes of Puma and Asics at one time gracing his table, alongside a whole family in the background thinking that he'd made it, CRUMM felt very contradictorily ridden with guilt when he became consumed with a burning desire to forgo his education. After having completed just one year at South Carolina State, CRUMM took the following year off before snapping back to reality and deciding to accept an invite to Ranger Junior College, a small two-year institution in Ranger Texas, expressing their interests in possibly rekindling his athletic dreams; this move proved to be pivotal because it was here the artist known as “CRUMM” would emerge.
“Screwed,” a slowed down form of song with its memorizing rhythm and pulsating energy, was and still is the champion sound of the Longhorn State’s vast music culture. CRUMM’s arrival into this new world made him realize just how much he had not been exposed to, in particular, an intriguingly quick witted form of rhyme Texans called “freestyling”.
“Freestyling is one of the most difficult forms of rhyming. It really taught me how to keep the thoughts flowing continually,” CRUMM would later recall. The entire Texas scene was full of freestylers whose quest for the “Freestyle King” crown consisted of rapping over slowed down instrumentals in true braggadocio form without “falling off”. For what seemed like hours, some could go on and on about colorful tales of “popping trunk” “pourin up”, and “comin down thowed”, while others crashed and burned at lift off.
Quickly learning the ropes after suffering some humiliating “fall offs”, CRUMM not only begin to excel at freestyling, he also started developing a reputation for being an uncannily lyrical force to be reckoned with over any rhythm. Only there for little over a year, the rigorous task of ciphering with the finest freestyler’s stretching from Dallas all the way to Houston increased CRUMM’s skill level so drastically that before he knew it, people were coming out the woodworks to prove they were better than him, only to find out the hard way that CRUMM was no ordinary rhymer; thus giving him all the confidence he would need to set out on a new found voyage.
In June of 2000, the birth of his son made CRUMM’s return to Georgia inevitable, but not prior to confirming that a star had been born. Trading his cleats for beats; CRUMM decided to apply his full energy into exploring the possibilities of a music career. Not at all afraid to go against the grain and ignore the traditional southern formula, CRUMM sought to restore some of the traditional values that once constituted Hip-Hop. Creating Riches Using My Mind (CRUMM) was now a way of life.
The consummate perfectionist, CRUMM thinks about not only what he is saying, but also how his message is going to be perceived. "Thinking is one of the hardest things to do. That’s why a lot of people don't participate."
When asked how he wants to be regarded, CRUMM states with conviction that he wants to be noted as a Renaissance MC. "Putting together thoughts that you’re responsible for is rough in a materialistically drenched society. Kids don’t wanna hear that shit man. In my personal opinion I think we’ve lost nearly an entire generation of children through hip hop misguidance because everyone knows that music is a universal language, so when something is deemed to be what it’s not, it affects not only us personally, but the entire world." remarks CRUMM. “I think that is the biggest difference between a rapper and an MC. A rapper does just that-- he raps. An MC however, is the Master of Ceremonies, the gate keeper of the culture, and right now nobody knows where the key is."
CRUMM realizes that he shares responsibility for what becomes of this art form and takes his job very seriously; this philosophy lends further proof to the reality that just because one is from the "block" does not mean that they must possess a "block" mentality, nor should he be allowed or comfortable with using that as an excuse. It is CRUMM’s belief that through music an artist is immortalized forever, "That’s how you leave your legacy,” he insists.
With timeless subject matter, it’s evident from just a couple of seconds of listening that CRUMM’s music will be as relevant 100 years from now as it is today. His music is filled with meaning that both the streets and music lovers the world over will embrace. With the same southernistic pseudo as his more popular hip hop brethren, to the contrary, CRUMM’s word play is very much characteristic of his brethren in the North. With an emphasis on lyrical content, it's no surprise that he usually finds the greatest acclaim for his vivid bodies of work in that particular region, as well as having an extremely huge overseas following.
“No disrespect to the southern artists that are lyrical,” CRUMM contends, "In the South though, lyricism predominantly falls on deaf ear’s."
With a “hustler as a daddy and a Christian for a momma,” there exists in CRUMM a balance and sincerity that is missing from much of the music today. As if to be chronicling life from his windowsill, the internal conflict that exists within one from this sort of upbringing comes through loud and clear via CRUMM’s verbal prose. "Music is a very hypocritical sport. No one gets in this business to not make money. If that were the case no one would sign contracts. The difficulty occurs when you try to balance your core beliefs with marketability."
Though deeply introspective and wise beyond his years, CRUMM is not above making tracks that the club deejays will embrace as well. As evidence by the success of his five mixtape releases, the streets are now ready for his full-length effort to drop. His resume includes performances in California, Las Vegas, Baltimore, Augusta, Atlanta, and the U.S. Virgin Islands to name a few, while still finding the time to work with super producer Dallas Austin, good friend Orlando Jones and their "Gangstir Rock" movement; a super group formed in late 2005.
Next on the horizon for CRUMM is the release of his first commercial CD which is entitled, "Was You Ready,” a question directed at all listeners. “Was I ready for what?” some might ask at first inspection; the album promises to quiet those doubts, as well as surprise all those who have “by force” come to expect the same signature southern sound, but are searching for something different. C-R-U-M-M, trendsetter from the south, ready or not, here he CRUMM’s.
