Prodigy Tribute Thread

[djchameleon]

He deserves a proper thread than the tiny mention elsewhere. Some say the illuminati killed him, some say sickle cell. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion.

In all seriousness, though, this is the saddest rapper death since Biggie imo. Prodigy was one of my favorite rappers of all time. Not only in terms of his raps but just as a person, he's in my top 8 for sure.

He was best known as the better half (in terms of rapping) of Mobb Deep, but he was famous to many of us for more than that. He was famous to a lot of people for getting robbed when he went back to his own projects after making it big.

Often accused of being a "fake thug" for the way he carried himself when he was younger. Him and Havoc lived in the Queensbridge projects and knew a lot of people who lived the street life, yet they went to art school and started rapping as teenagers and never lived that kind of life personally.

By 19 or so they were basically signed rap stars. But they decided that the street life would be the theme of their music. It's little wonder why. I remember when I was growing up, we would all idolize the local gangsters and drug dealers too. There's something about the criminal bad ass image that always appeals to adolescent males.

Anyway, Prod died at 42 as a grown man who had evolved beyond just trying to emulate the gangsters that he admired when he was younger. He came to recognize himself as an artist and saw that as something more productive than living the crime life.

Even so, he ended up going to prison on a gun charge. While in prison, prod decided to try to use the time positively to pursue an education and an excercize/health regiment, and to try to understand his conidition (with sickle cell) better. He talks about it in this lecture below at MIT.



Beyond that, he was also known for his beliefs in certain types of conspiracy theories. He often rapped about conspiracy theories (especially on HNIC2) but also he appeared on the Alex Jones show. There are tons of videos on P's conspiracy ****, but I think these are probably the most interesting ones I've seen.




Whether you agree with his beliefs or not, if you are a fan of the man you might find his views interesting. Or maybe not. It's up to you.

Anyway, I dunno. It just sucks that he died even though it wasn't that surprising. Dude actually still had it in him to release great music too. The Albert Einstein album was the best Prodigy related rap music I've heard since Hell on Earth, tbh. Top vid is from the album. The rest are just random great prod/mobb tracks.

Spoiler for dope songs:

And yea yea I didn't post Shook Ones. If you haven't already heard Shook Ones a million times then that's your fault dunn.

RIP the greatest sociopath of a rap persona that ever lived
prod once said, during his Albert Einstein album, that after he had murdered a rival of his who was picking his kid up for school, Prod got confused and thought the kid looked like her dad, which reminded him of his enemy, so he smacked her with the pistol.

That's the kind of dark **** that was brewing in his mind, and that's the craft that he and hav really mastered artistically. I would just leave you with my favorite verse from prod, in text.

I'm yawning while I'm waking to the early morning gunfire
Another day another scar to aquire
Jumped out my bed, tried to break my alarm
Took a shower, and then I strapped on my firearm
Grabbed my Pelle Pelle cause I wanna look fly when I die
But it ain't my turn to say goodbye
How do I know? Some people call it instinct
I like to call it my luck, who gives a ****
I'm stuck, in this environment and can't depart from it
And if I try I always end up back where I started
Plan A, square 1, there's no escapin'
So I've come to realize my truth
Tryna live my full life until my time is through
Clocks tickin', so I don't got no time for you
As I head outside, amongst the rest of the animals
Is where I feel relaxed and safe and I can stand still
It's sorta like a family bond
We gather up all the soldiers and form into an invincible
Swarm of kids
Now it's on again, drinking straight from the bottle
Warm gin dripping down my chin
For the people chilling, you can't win
against 25 niggas bent up with mac 10
semi-automatics, full-addicted crime addicts
So long as there is cash involved, I gotta have it
There's many different levels to the criminal mind
Either you in it for the money or you wasting your time

[Cuthbert]

The Infamous >>>

Thread deserves a bump for the effort you put into the OP.

[Mindy]

rip