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ife has the tendency to deal bad hands, but in the case of Fashawn, the Fresno MC made the most of the cards he was dealt. Growing up, his father was incarcerated, while his mother battled a drug addiction. By age 12, he was placed in a group home, where he began writing rhymes to escape the harsh realities of his life. When he was 15, he left the group home and moved into with his uncle, turning to skateboarding and rapping for solace. “I felt I had so much to say, so I had to let it all out somehow,” he says. He let his frustrations out in the booth, and in 2006, at age 17, he released his first mixtape Grizzly City with the help of DJ Hecktik. “I got the typical response, ‘Oh, he’s just a young guy. Let’s see if he’ll even last and be here this time next year. We’ll see if he has enough rhymes to last another mixtape,’” he says of the feedback he received. “I heard the skeptics, but I just kept grinding, mixtape after mixtape after mixtape.” But not everyone doubted Fashawn. In fact, one fan of his first mixtape turned out to be Fresno rapper Planet Asia, who invited Fashawn on tour with him. Since Fashawn was numerous credits short from graduating high school on time, he dropped out of school and hit the road with Planet Asia. “That was my favorite rapper from my hometown,” he reminisces. “That was like Rakim snatching Nas up, like, ‘Come on tour with me.’” The young rhymer learned a lot on tour, and he put the motivation to use when he returned to Fresno. In September 2008 he released a new mixtape, One Shot, One Kill, hosted by Mick Boogie and Terry Urban. He followed that with a mixtape entitled Higher Learning, presented by Hip Hop blogs Onsmash.com & NahRight.com. And with his street and internet buzz thriving, he dropped a mixtape entirely produced by the Alchemist called The Antidote. Each project was well-received. His debut album Boy Meets World, an LP he worked exclusively with Los Angeles producer Exile on, is one of the most anticipated West Coast debuts in recent years. “Somebody said if Walé, Blu, Nipsey Hussle and these guys are the leaders of the new school, then Fashawn is the transfer school,” says the rapper, who is days away from his 21st birthday. “I kinda look at it like that. I’m from a place that’s not really popular [and] I’m coming in everybody else’s ring, and they’re like, ‘What does he got?’ And I got some heat for them, man. I know it. And I’m confident in this body of work I got coming.” Words by Randy Roper
Patiently Waiting OZONE WEST // 15