J-Kwon

J-Kwon secured his breakthrough by exposing himself to Arista executive L.A. Reid while ridiculing producer Jermaine Dupri, actions that led to a recording agreement with the latter's So So Def imprint under the former's Arista umbrella. Prior to this turn of events, his existence had been markedly chaotic; evicted from his mother's residence upon reaching age 12, he navigated the streets by selling crack cocaine until a rap battle victory resulted in his jaw being fractured. The newfound label support facilitated a reversal of his circumstances. Prior to his eighteenth birthday, the introductory single "Tipsy" ascended to the upper echelon of nearly all prominent singles charts. With Dupri's supervision and near-complete production from the Track Boyz, the rapper's initial album Hood Hop surfaced in March 2004 amid the track's rising prominence and achieved platinum status. He maintained a relatively low profile in the ensuing period, save for a feature on Bow Wow's "Fresh Azimiz," which attained a Top 20 position on the R&B/Hip-Hop chart, before resurfacing in early 2009 via the solo digital release Hood Hop 2. Issued shortly thereafter, Hood Hop 2.5 came in physical format. Another independent effort arrived in 2010 under his own name. In 2013, he dropped "Pushing the Odds" as a pointed attack on Pusha-T and Odd Future.