BUSTA RHYMES FULL BIOGRAPHY:
Busta Rhymes was born Trevor Smith Jr. on May 20, 1972, of Jamaican heritage. He was born in Brooklyn, New York, and raised in Uniondale, New York. At the age of 12 his family moved to Long Island where he met up with other MCs from the growing New York hip hop community. Around this age is when Busta started to get involved with rapping, he started going to contests and eventually met what and who he wanted to be.
This was, MC Charlie Brown, Dinco D, and Cut Monitor Milo. Charlie Brown who at the time was a ninth grader started to rap with Busta and the pair went on and won a contest sponsored by Public Enemy. Public Enemy liked them them so much they wanted Charlie, Busta, and company, to start recording songs at the Public Enemy studio's on Long Island. They soon became a big hit and were named 'Leaders of the New School' and signed a deal with Elektra Records right out of the gate, when Busta was only 17 years old. Much respected in the hip-hop underground for their Afrocentric philosophy and tough rapping styles, Leaders of the New School debuted in 1991 with Future Without a Past but released only one more album, 1993's T.I.M.E., before breaking up the following year.
Out on his own for the first time, Busta called on some friends, appearing on A Tribe Called Quest's "Scenario," the incredible remix of Craig Mack's "Flava in Ya Ear" (also featuring Notorious B.I.G. and LL Cool J), as well as other projects with Boyz II Men, Mary J. Blige, and TLC. He also appeared in the 1995 John Singleton film Higher Learning and earned a solo contract with Elektra. Busta's first album, The Coming, proved a huge hit; the single "Woo-Hah!! Got You All in Check" hit the US and UK Top Ten and pushed the album into gold-record territory.
His second album, "When Disaster Strikes", was less successful in the US but sold well overseas, although it still debuted at number three in September 1997. The album did, however, produce two hugely popular singles and videos in America, "Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Could See" and "Dangerous". The third single, "Turn It Up/Fire It Up" was less popular, but only just failed to top the UK charts and was a top 10 hit in Germany, establishing Rhymes as an international star, a hieght some HipHop artists will never achieve in their whole career.
The same year he released "The Imperial" as part of the Flipmode Squad, a collaborative project with rappers Rampage, Lord Have Mercy, Spliff Star, Rah Digga and Baby Sham. "Extinction Level Event: The Final World Front", which took its title from the disaster movie "Deep Impact", followed a year later. The single "Gimme Some More" reached number 5 in the UK singles chart in January 1999, proving once again that in Europe Busta Rhymes was big business. Rhymes enjoyed further transatlantic success in April when the highly catchy "What's It Gonna Be?!', featuring Janet Jackson, reached the US and UK Top 10.
After leaving Elektra, Rhymes signed to J Records, a new label started by recently ousted Arista chief and founder Clive Davis. In 2001 (see 2001 in music), he released a greatest hits record, and a new effort. Continuing the apocalyptic theme of his previous albums, he titled his record Genesis. The aptly titled Genesis gave Busta Rhymes a rebirth of success with the mega-hits "Break Ya Neck", a fast spittinh hard hitting track, and "Pass the Courvoisier" produced by hip-hop uber-producers Dr. Dre and The Neptunes, respectively. This album was deifnately Busta's best effort so far!
On November 26, 2002 Busta Rhymes released his 6th studio album It Ain't Safe No More. Its first single, "Make It Clap," was a moderate hit and had a popular remix featuring a sample from Eric B. and Rakims hit song "Eric B. is President", along with a remix video, which featured Sean Paul and gave the song an even more reggae-inspired flavor. The second single, a duet with Mariah Carey, entitled "I Know What You Want" has been even more successful; having reached the top ten of Billboard's pop singles chart and the top ten in rap radio airplay.
Busta Rhymes has recently signed to Dr. Dre's Aftermath Entertainment and was set to release his newest album, The Big Bang on July 12th, 2005, the album however suffered many huge set backs and is now scheduled for a mid 2006 release, a year after its original release date. The supposed lead single off the upcoming album has already leaked to the internet, and if its anything to go by, the albums guna be hot, so make sure you stay tuned to Busta and check his new album out,,,whenever it is actually released!
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