S. Samuel
Mobb Deep's Prodigy is not only putting out new music as of late, but the New York rap veteran is also preparing the release of another autobiography.
This time around, Capital P plans on following up 2011’s My Infamous Life with a book based on his three-year stint behind bars.
“This one is strictly and entirely about my experience in jail,” Prodigy told XXLMag.com. “I left that out of the first book on purpose, so I could put this out. … It’s basically my experience–day by day–like a diary joint, type of thing … You know, what was going on in there, what I experienced in there and what I took out of it. Just the whole story. Only a few people will know what that’s like, the people I met and how the COs (correction officers) were, just different things like that.” (XXL Mag)
Last year, Prodigy talked to SOHH about hitting the road to promote his new My Infamous Life autobiography.
“Last [month] was my biggest book reading but I’ve done a lot of phoners and other types of interviews before then. But the [powerHouse Brooklyn] reading was a packed turnout and really kicked off this whole book tour that I’m on right now. I definitely saw a lot of different people in the audience. There was different cultures, different races, different age groups and all that. I definitely seen that during the reading. But throughout the years, since Mobb Deep’s been making music, I’ve seen that a lot. Our audience has really been out at our shows and even walking in the streets I’ve been surprised. Once a 60 year-old lady would scream out from across the street, “Prodigy! I love Mobb Deep!” (SOHH Guest Star)
He also gave SOHH readers some reasons why they should support the book.
“You’ll learn about how we really stuck together throughout all of the years and made it work. Dealing with our community with black people and minorities as they like to call us, it’s a struggle to keep families together. Mostly it’s the fathers that are missing and it’s the mothers that raise our kids by themselves. So I really stress that in the book and staying together. I try to tell people to work it out as a family.” (SOHH 5 Reasons)
In light of rappers penning their own books, SOHH talked to rapper-turned-author No Malice last spring to get his take on the popular trend.
“You can’t box hip-hop in, you just can’t do it,” Malice told SOHH. “Rappers and artists are just creative. Period. It’s just that we’ve chosen this avenue [of rapping] whether it’s because we’re just good at it or it sells and were fortunate enough to get a deal. It’s what we do. But you can’t box it in. Hip-hop culture does everything. You know what I’m saying? We’re good at a lot of things from writing books to cutting hair. So you can find us in any facet and I just think as time goes on, more and more doors are going to be opening. You’re going to keep seeing a lot of rappers as actors on the big screen like Common and Andre 3000. There’s nothing that we can’t do and I think that the world as a whole is becoming more and more open, showing us more avenues that we can decide to go down.” (SOHH)
Check out a recent Prodigy interview below:
