Bo-G is the sound of urban America, a tempestuous blend of gangbanging, gunfire, and good times. That’s probably because the Chicago rapper developed his ghetto prose and in-your-face delivery the old fashioned way: in the streets. In a rap-music landscape littered with studio gangstas and gun-toting wannabes, Bo-G is the real deal: a true gangsta with the resumé to back it up.
Born in on the north side of Chicago and raised in one of the toughest neighborhoods on the city’s south side, Bo-G was already into trouble at a young age. Taken from his family at five years old and placed into a group home, it wasn’t long before gangbanging was a way of life for the young Bo-G. He embraced the lifestyle completely, brawling, robbing, and selling drugs by the truckload. Bo-G also started rapping at this time, drawing inspiration from the hardcore MCs who came before him.
“I grew up off of stuff like N.W.A., Spice One, Scarface, the West Coast -- Cube, MC Eiht,” Bo-G explains. “It just inspired me. I lived a similar life. I come up in a similar upbringing they came up in, and I got a story to tell.”
Bo-G’s streetwise lifestyle eventually caught up with him -- his teenage years were spent in and out of the Cook County Jail. On his 19th birthday, Dec. 8, 1999, Bo-G was found guilty of first degree attempted murder, and sentenced to six years of hard time in the Illinois prison system.
Bo-G utilized the time wisely, earning two college degrees, and hoping to improve his life on the outside. While serving his sentence, Bo-G honed and mastered his craft, writing, rapping, and battling hundreds of hardcore MC’s in front of the toughest audiences in the world. Word got around, and soon enough the Illinois prison system was buzzing about the brash up-and-comer.
“You got to be good in there,” Bo-G recalls. “It’s hard to impress somebody in prison. We used to get patio or get yard. We’d go out there and rap, and have a whole bunch of inmates wanting to come out there and see us. If you could do that in prison, then it should be easy out here. The best artists have been locked up, man.”
While in prison, Bo-G founded Raw Footage, which went on to be known as one of the hottest independent rap labels in Chicago. He also filled dozens notebooks with lyrics, dreaming of his release date. Bo-G wrote at a furious pace, crafting more than 300 songs during his prison tenure.
“Practice makes perfect,” Bo-G insists. “You ain’t gonna get no wicked jump shot if you don’t shoot 300 shots a day. You not gonna get good if you don’t write raps every day. And me being in prison, that’s all I had to do. If I hadn’t started writing every day and trying to better myself as an artist, I’d probably been back in there. That ain’t no secret, music is what saved me.”
Upon his release in early 2005, Bo-G quickly made up for lost time, issuing the first of his “prison” albums, Posted Vol 1 to widespread acclaim. A followup edition was equally successful, and the two releases went on to sell more than 10,000 copies, most of them straight from the trunk of Bo’s Chevy. Bo-G also took to the stage, performing at nearly every club and venue in the Chicagoland area over the next few years, and earning a reputation as one of the city’s premier live artists.
With the release of his third opus, Still Posted, Bo-G is taking his game to the next level. Packed with barnstorming tracks such as “Great Shape” and “Been Hustlin’,” Still Posted delivers on all fronts: musically, lyrically, and thematically. The result is Bo-G’s most varied and fully fledged effort to date, one that is sure to put him on the map in the rap game.
“You got a lot of artists that are strictly hip hop, strictly club bangers, or strictly for the women,” Bo-G says. “I won’t allow myself to stay in one realm and write and focus on one type of music. I can get hip hop with it, I can get to the ladies. There’s no topic I can’t touch upon. If I seen it, I’m gonna write about it. If I did it, I’m gonna write about it.”
This profile was edited with meandmyspace.com Editor
