Thug Life Army

You’d have to have been locked underground in an undisclosed location over the last few years to miss the cementing of Atlanta as the capital of urban music. From the chart dominance of hip-hop rap artists like Outkast, Lil Jon, Ludacris and Usher, all acts hailing from the ATL are enjoying the kind of cultural clout and all around ubiquity once routinely expected by their cousins up North and out West.

To this line of dominance comes one rap MC Big Floaty—part gangsta, part charmer, all rapper. “You know, we corrupted our neighborhoods,” the charismatic MC chuckles, thinking on his hometown. “I came from Oakland City, but my roots came from East Point. Everybody know Oakland City for head-busting just like they know East Point for head-busting.”

Head-busting probably came a bit too easy for the young Floaty, a self-described bad boy as a young ‘un. Still, in Atlanta’s tight-knit environs, he came up with good folk and family, and with some good music for his life soundtrack: “Me and Ceelo from Goodie, that’s my cousin, we grew up together,” Floaty remembers. “So me and him would just walk around the block rapping bout anything. That’s how we passed the time. Rappin’. Cause we were bad. We were real bad. So that was the only thing that would pacify us. We would make them pause-button tapes back in the day, man. Get a fat loop, a James Brown, Aretha Franklin or something. Make the loop bout five minutes long, man.” 

Rapping and connecting with the folk would continue to play a part in Floaty’s development as an MC. “When I started rappin’, man, niggas in Atlanta wasn’t even rappin’,” he recalls. “They was doing that booty-shaking stuff. I came up around the first set of niggas who was really rapping: Outkast, Goodie, we all went to school together. We all came from the same clique. I was always rapping and freestyling. But Big Gip took me over to the Dungeon to get my first beat.

Pause button tapes and first beats are a thing of the past now. Today, Big Floaty is all Muscle. The record announces the emergence of a new, versatile talent in the MC game. “I’m just a creative guy. You throw on a beat, I ain''t gon never say, ‘Naw, that ain’t my style.’ I make it fit. I’m versatile. Diverse.”

“Most of my life I been rapping in a group,” Floaty continues. “This my first real solo project. I just wanted to give it my all. I didn’t want nobody rappin’ on it. I just wanted everybody to feel Big Floaty. And I don’t be rapping all about that gangsta shit all the time. I grew up with that gangsta shit so it’s gon be heard in my lyrics. But I got depth and concepts man. My record might be gangsta sounding, but when you listen to the lyrics you gon hear the message. Hell, I ain''t really trying to glorify shit like that ‘cause it ain’t nothing to glorify.”

And like any new entrant to a high-stakes game, Big Floaty’s put a lot of thought into just how he wants his public to receive him. “When the public see me they might look at my rough edges at first, but when they sit down and listen to the merits, I got something for them, something to catch they attention. They gon say ‘oh he a star, he know what he talking about. He ain''t talking about something his brother done told him.’ Man, I just want them to receive it in good harmony.”

Big Floaty’s mixtape ”The Beginning of The End” is a Mixtape instant classic claims DJ Bigga Rankin (Cool Runnings)-Jacksonville. The Hip Hop veteran has recorded with everyone from the “Hip-Hop Violinist” Miri Ben-Ari to hip-hop rap artist Juvenile.

To get Free Copies on the Mix tape, E-Mail Your Mailing Address to This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it   or call 678-481-7730.