She was just recently featured in an article in the
Vallejo Times Herald. Talks about her album, and a little about how she got started in the the rap thing.
Ms. Lacy Article: Times Herald
Hip-hop diva rises to the top
By RICH FREEDMAN/Times-Herald staff writer
Article Launched: 01/18/2008 07:46:47 AM PST
Shannon Lacy, a.k.a. "Ms. Lacy," center, got a boost from star rappers Snoop Dogg and Vallejo native E-40 when they were close by filming their video, "Candy." (Coutesy photo / S.N. Jacobson)
Her meals were Ike & Mike's and Top Ramen. Her money was loose change. Her faith down to almost nothing. She had lost her day job and had her car repo'd.
Shannon Lacy, a.k.a. "Ms. Lacy," was at hip-hop bottom.
"I went to L.A. and what I thought was going to happen wasn't happening," Lacy said. "So I went to this church at 10:30 at night and just prayed."
When Lacy emerged, much to her surprise, star rappers Snoop Dogg and Vallejo native E-40 were close by filming their video for the song, "Candy."
Lacy knew an opening when she saw one. She approached a guard, requesting to see the rappers by their real surnames, "Mr. Broadus and Mr. Stevens."
She not only got in, she chatted with Snoop and ended up on the video that, at last count, was seen by more than 4.7 million YouTube viewers.
"Snoop gave me information. That was the best thing," Lacy said. "And they fed me."
A year later, Lacy's proved she got game to go along with her gumption. After peddling her first CD for five bucks out of her trunk to make it to L.A., she's now marketing her follow-up recording, "Ms. Lacy Presents Let's Ryde: The Ladies of the Bay," featuring 14 women doing hip hop and R&B from around the Bay Area.
"There's always something good that's ready to happen," Lacy said. "You just have to get out there."
Raised in Vallejo and a Fairfield High School graduate, Lacy was dead set on making in-roads during her stay in Southern California. She earned enough bucks to stay at a hotel by playing drums near Venice Beach "where Hollywood people's babysitters were throwing money down."
While friends in the Bay Area begged her to return, Lacy remained.
"I'm hustlin' down here," she told them.
"I survived in L.A. four days just playing my drums and selling my CD," she said, somehow getting to SoCal from the Bay Area on a borrowed $20.
And the vehicle she had? That broke down en route and the mechanic believed so much in Lacy's dreams, he said she could send the money later.
Good thing. She had $11 to her name. But the man was soon paid.
"Faith and a mission," she said of her destination.
The car problems, job problems, money woes, mechanic coming through, even police who were impressed Lacy had Sheila E's cell phone number helped create an unbelievable story. A tale, smiled Lacy, she would only believe "if it happened to me first."
"Craziest things happen to me," Lacy said. "My pastor's wife has said, 'If you can stand the stretching, the Lord will pull you through.' I think I've been stretched to the maximum of human capability."
Alas, she's pulled it off. The CD is out. And, though still peddling her work for five bucks out of the trunk of her mom's borrowed truck, the support is gathering momentum.
"It's all worth it," Lacy said. "It's right there. You just have to do the work."
Lacy's cash may have dashed, but her persistence didn't.
She produced, marketed and put the entire CD together. She convinced Suga-T, Malika, Amina, ShortyB, Lady Unique, Marvaless, Tequila, Deltrice Thorner, Synamen, Kimbe, Silk-E, Julie Brand, Carrey Drew and Tita Shae to buy into the project.
"My artists aren't just artists, but good people," Lacy said.
Harley-Davidson of Vallejo loaned Lacy motorcycles for an advertising shoot. Other local businesses obliged. Ozcat Radio in Vallejo also helped.
"People started offering to help me," Lacy said. "I felt renewed. Everything changed. People are coming to me to do ventures."
Lacy said 1,000 copies of "Ladies of the Bay" were pressed, and she's sold 600. Though Rasputin's in Vallejo said it would handle her CDs as of Feb. 1, Lacy keeps selling them out of her vehicle "because the money has to be made. I can't wait because I have to move product."
Soon, she hoped, peddling the product out of her car will end.
"The hardest part is to come," she said. "But I have many different facets. I can work with a budget. I've studied the game and the way the industry is changing the way records are being recorded, sold and marketed. I definitely have a lot to offer and I'm a workhorse."
Though, at 28, her cartwheel days may be over, Lacy accepts it.
"I guess it's the age I'm going to be," she said smiling. "I know who I am. I'm a tycoon coming about."
For more information, call 712-1938.