Turk

New Orleans rapper Turk first came to the attention of Cash Money Records in 1996, when label founders Ronald "Slim" Williams and Brian "Baby" Williams heard him rhyming inside the Magnolia projects. He appeared that year as a guest on Juvenile’s debut album Solja Rags. Credited as Young Turk, he joined the newly assembled Hot Boys alongside Juvenile, B.G., and Lil Wayne; the group delivered Get It How U Live! in 1997 and Guerilla Warfare in 1999. Additional guest spots followed on Juvenile’s 400 Degreez and Tha G-Code, Lil Wayne’s Tha Block Is Hot and Lights Out, and both volumes of B.G.’s It’s All on U series.

Turk’s first solo project, Young and Thuggin’, arrived on Universal Records in June 2001. He completed Untamed Guerilla for Cash Money yet left the label for Koch, mirroring B.G.’s move; the album stayed shelved. His Koch debut, Raw and Uncut, surfaced in 2003. During a January 2004 narcotics raid on a Memphis apartment, officers and a SWAT team entered; authorities stated Turk fired at an officer, while he maintained he was unarmed and concealed in a closet. A preliminary hearing lowered the original first-degree attempted-murder charge to second-degree attempted murder, but bail was denied. Still incarcerated and awaiting trial, he saw his next album, Penitentiary Chances, reach stores in April 2004.