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D Block's Inmate
Thursday 15th November 2012 | Osh
David Styles aka Styles P. The formidable rapper is back with a new album - and you know its going to be hard. This guy seems to live in the studio, using the mixing desk as a pillow.
One third of The LOX - along with Jadakiss and Sheek Louch- their break finally came when, as young enterprising teens, they met Queen of Hip-Hop, Mary J Blige. Blige, impressed with the in-your-face grittiness of the trio, passed the tape on to Sean "Diddy" Combs who promptly hired the boys as writers for Bad Boy Records.
While on the label, they featured on many well-known chart toppers, including All About The Benjamins, Mase's 24 hrs To Live, and Mary J's Can't Get You Off My Mind. But their most memorable track while at Bad Boy was their Notorious B.I.G tribute, We'll Always Love Big Poppa, which was named as the most played song of 1997. In 1998, The Lox released their first album Money, Power & Respect which also went platinum.
Despite the album's success, the group felt that the pretty boy image of Bad Boy contradicted their grimy swagger and decided to veto their involvement with Bad Boy in favour of DMX's Ruff Ryder Records. Sheek Louch said of the decision: "We just needed to be with a rougher label," said Sheek Louch. "A harder label that fit our image." Leaving Bad Boy didn't come easily however, and the group used the collective force of their fans, wearing "FREE THE LOX" t-shirts at a New York rap concert and starting a "Free The LOX" movement.
After releasing The Lox's first album with Ruff Ryders entitiled We Are The Streets in 2000, as well as making appearances on records with the Ruff Ryders, in 2002 Styles released his own album A Gangster and A Gentleman before following it up with the 2006 release Time is Money, followed by Super Gangster (Extraordinary Gentleman) a year later in 2007.
After the release of numerous mixtapes including Lyrics of Fury (1, 2, & 3), Paranormal Ghost, and The Ghost That Sat By The Door, rumour now has it that another LOX album entitled New LOX Order is in the pipeline. The D-Block collective also dropped a collaborative album with Wu Tang Clan named Wu-Block, which also features Ms Afrocentric herself, Erykah Badu.
Now he returns - after just releasing a mixtape in August ( I told you he lives in the studio) - with his solo mixtape The World’s Hardest MC Project. Preview tracks from his album are available online (I recommend you listen to I Know - great track). They. Do. Not. Disappoint.
Seriously.
He may have been born David, but he's one of hip-hop's Goliaths.
