By the time he was twelve, Wallace began selling illegal drugs. He was nicknamed "Big" because of his size by the age of ten. At the Queen of All Saints Middle School, Wallace excelled in class, winning several awards as an English student. His father left the family when Wallace was two years old, and his mother worked two jobs whilst raising him. He was the only child of Voletta Wallace, a Jamaican preschool teacher, and Selwyn George Latore, a welder and small-time Jamaican politician. Mary's Hospital on and was brought up in the Clinton Hill section of Brooklyn. 2.5 1997: Life After Death and car accident.2.4 1996: Arrests, death of Shakur and second child.2.3 1995: Junior M.A.F.I.A., Conspiracy, and coastal feud.He has certified sales of over 17 million units in the United States. Two more studio albums and a collaborative album have been released since his death. album charts and was certified Diamond in 2000, one of the few hip hop albums to receive this certification. His double-disc set Life After Death released 16 days later, rose to No. On the night of March 9, 1997, Wallace was killed by an unknown assailant in a drive-by shooting in Los Angeles. While recording his second album, Wallace was heavily involved in the growing East Coast-West Coast hip hop rivalry, which mainly involved himself (and his label, Bad Boy Records), and West Coast-based rapper Tupac Shakur (and his label, Death Row Records). The following year, Wallace led his childhood friends to chart success through his protégé group, Junior M.A.F.I.A. When he released his debut album Ready to Die in 1994, he became a central figure in the East Coast hip hop scene and increased New York's visibility in the genre at a time when West Coast hip hop was dominant in the mainstream. Wallace was raised in the Brooklyn borough of New York City. He is considered one of the greatest and most influential rappers of all time. Wallace is renowned for his loose and easy flow, dark semi-autobiographical lyrics and storytelling abilities. (formerly Biggie Smalls), was an American rapper from Brooklyn, New York. was one of the few hip-hop stars not involved in the rap peace summit in Harlem.Hip hop, hardcore hip hop, East Coast hip hopĬhristopher George Latore Wallace (March 9, 1997), best known as The Notorious B.I.G. After Shakur's murder in Las Vegas, Notorious B.I.G. The dispute festered and became an open wound between the East Coast and West Coast scene. Shakur was convinced that Wallace was somehow involved in a 1994 robbery in which Shakur was wounded and robbed of $40,000-worth of jewellery. smoking a joint in a parked car and charged him with drug possession.īut, worst of all was the long-running feud between Notorious B.I.G., Sean Combs and Bad Boy on one side and Tupac Shakur, Marion "Suge" Knight and Death Row records on the other. In the autumn, Brooklyn patrol caught B.I.G. A few months later, police checking a parking complaint found marijuana and firearms at Wallace's New Jersey home. wielded a baseball bat to autograph hunters and was sentenced to 100 hours of community service. The argument was eventually settled with a $25,000 pay-off this January. In May 1995 he allegedly beat up a man in a dispute over a cancelled performance in New Jersey. with some of his former hustler friends and appeared on their Conspiracy album. He was in even more stellar company, guesting on Michael Jackson's HIStory - Past, Present and Future Book 1.īut, if you could take the rapper out of the neighbourhood you couldn't take the hood out of the rapper. Kelly, whom he was supporting at Wembley arena. On a rare UK visit, he proved himself the equal of the swingbeat star R. was also voted Best New Artist, Best Live Performer and Lyricist of the Year by the Source, the magazine which had given him his first break. The album went platinum, selling over a million copies in the US. Singles like "Juicy", "One More Chance" and "Big Poppa" reached the Billboard top five, the last track earning the rap single of the year award from the publication. The following year the rapper completed his debut album, the prophetically titled Ready To Die, which chronicled his transition from a life of crime to the rap rhymes. recorded "Party and Bullshit", which was included in the soundtrack to the movie Who's the Man. The strategy was already paying off but, to gain further exposure, B.I.G. Blige's "Real Love" and Supercat's "Dolly My Baby". By 1993, the rapper had become Notorious B.I.G.
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