Sonny Rich

Sonny Rich



Although a small handful of artists like Raleigh rap group Little Brother and Petey Pablo proudly waved baby blue flags for the Tar Heel State, there has never been a Hip-Hop artist to fully represent the Carolinas with the everyday grit and grime of the common man’s struggles and strife. None of them adequately mirrored the good and bad, life and death, the happy and sad times associated with growing up too fast in the Cackalacks- until now.



With honest accounts of the drama of life, Charlotte, NC native Sonny Rich brings a genuine Carolina swagger to the game that the music industry has never before heard. And he finally gives the Carolinas a voice in Hip-Hop with the upcoming release of his highly anticipated sophomore album The C.U.R.E.



“With this album, I’m trying to shake the game up,” says Sonny. “They slept on my first album, and I feel like I didn’t get the respect I deserve. They didn’t give it to me the last time, so I’m taking it this time.”



Born the second youngest of six siblings to a single mother, Sonny’s story is no different than any other ghetto youth brought up on the wrong side of the tracks. At the tender age of 11, he took to the untamed terrain of the north Charlotte streets and began robbing, stealing and hustling by any means necessary to turn a quick buck. But by age 14, his momma dukes had enough of Sonny’s unruly ways and booted him out the house.



"My mother was hardly able to pay the bills. As a kid, I wanted nice things. No application, no experience was needed for the streets,” Rich remembers. "I was out of control; my mom couldn't handle me. My older brothers were in and out of jail. I was bringing drugs and guns in the house. I was doing all type of crazy things, so she put me put me out.”



After two years of running wild on his own, Rich signed up for Job Corp after an older brother came home from jail and made him go. Packed with other young, black delinquents from across the country, Job Corp was just like jail. It was during this time, though, that Sonny began to rap and developed his skills as an artist.



"We used to battle every day, so I wrote on the regular to have something new to spit at all times,” says Sonny. “Plus don't forget that I was the kid out of NC, so I had to be 10 times nicer in order to shine, and I did".



After graduation, he returned home a battle-tested rapper and formed the group Doe Boy Committee with other childhood friends. He put his musical career on hold, though, a year later when he enlisted in the Army at age 19 and shipped off to war in Iraq. “The Army was like going to prison and getting the weekends off,” Sonny proclaims.



While enlisted in the military, he kept himself grounded by constantly writing songs, recording them and selling burned CDs on the base. “The whole base would pump my mix tapes in their CD players,” he says. “The love was crazy; I was the super star on the base.”



By the time Sonny got back home, music was all he had on his mind. He got Doe Boy Committee back together and got the streets of Charlotte talking with the bubbling mix tape 85 With the Hard Vol.1 in 2007. Then, they dropped three mix tapes back to back within the next year. The mix tapes eventually worked their way up to as far Washington D.C., where Kaizer of Red I.D. Management took notice of Sonny Rich’s standout talent.



So under the direction of his new management company, Sonny signed to independent label Keeplock Entertainment and stepped into the spotlight the following year to release his Fontana/ Universal Records -distributed solo debut album "The V.I.R.U.S." The single and accompanying video "Stunners" blasted across the country on radio and TV and even crept up to Number 1 on Billboard’s Hip-Hop Video chart.



“I believe that an artist has to give the fans more than one or two hot songs; the whole album has to be hot if you expect people to spend their money on it,” says Sonny. “I put my all into every song I lay down."



And that’s exactly what he does on the with highly anticipated Keeplock Entertainment sophomore album The C.U.R.E. After transmitting his infectious flavors onto the Hip-Hop scene, Sonny Rich returns to bless the industry with all that is expected of a great artist. So get yourself a heaping dose.