In the past couple of years, teenage rising star Apex Rich has had to carry the weight of the world on his shouldes. He was almost homeless after his mother kicked him out of the house, a best friend he looked up was brutally murdered and the Jersey City, NJ native had to reevaluate his life path, quickly shifting hustles. Now with a sniper focus on his career as an MC, the 19 year-old is breaking through with mainstream kudos for his debut single, the righteous riot starter, “Killuminati.”
Serving as the soundscape for his expression is the thunderous track produced the newcomers The CoPilots. They sampled the beat from the Rampage of Busta Rhymes’ legendary rhyme crew The Flipmode Squad “Wild For Da Night.” That song originally came out in 1997.
“I remember that record,” Apex Rich smiles, when thinking back to the Rampage smash. “ I heard it a long time ago. The beat for my song, the producers sent it to us. We all realized it was from ‘Wild For Da Night,” and you know I love that style of hip-hop. Rampage was spitting that third eye seeing, that real rap. I grew up on that style of rap. I was a Big L kind of dude. I loved Biggie too.”
As a youngster, Rich says he didn’t get exposed to hip-hop until he was about eight or nine years old and heard the Notorious B.I.G.’s “Big Poppa” song in the film “Hard Ball.”
“My family played a lot of Spanish music around the house,” he details. “My family is Dominican. I have two sisters and three brothers. One of my brothers played a little Eminem around the house, some conscious rap, nothing hardcore. Mostly Spanish music. More like old school Spanish, Anthony Santos, old Ricky Martin. My family was real heavy on the culture.
Unfortunately, some of Apex Rich’s family were also heavy into the streets and played an influence on him following them down that slippery slope.
“Jersey is a wild place, it’s a jungle with no churches,” he elaborates.
Out on the streets, the rhyme Goliath had to turn to friends for shelter. Longtime friend Idris Black not only took Rich in, but he convinced him to give up hustling and dive into rap, and Black also got Rich a day job doing marketing until his skills-to-pay-the-bills, actually started translating into big dividends.
As Killuminati bubbles online, in the streets and on radio stations like Shade 45 via “Sway in the Morning” Apex continues to field offers for guest appearances, while gearing up for his second single BITG – Born in the Ghetto.
Written by Shaheem Reid
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