LevelUp
Posting on THECOLI & MIND MY BUSINESS..
Curren$y’sCurren$y’s set begins in three hours, but he has a more pressing, if not unsurprising, concern in the interim. “You got a lighter?” he asks, flashing a toothy grin and offering a handshake in the lobby of the Hotel Monaco in Washington, D.C. .
Fresh off a flight from his native New Orleans, the famed weed enthusiast doesn’t want to smoke out the hotel before his performance at Karma DC, so he’s in search of a light and a comfortable place to indulge. We were supposed to meet in New York back in April, but that plan fell through—after I’d arrived at his hotel. (“It be a lot of moving parts, bro,” the 42-year-old later tells me with a chuckle.) Now, after reconvening in the nation’s capital in late June, I—a nonsmoker—have joined the hunt. Curren$y is convinced someone has a lighter on them, so he ventures outside to find one. Ultimately, he’s correct: His manager, Mousa, and I locate him in front of the hotel, where he’s posing for pictures with a couple who blessed him with the device. This man-of-the-people quality has been integral to Curren$y’s success in a volatile hip-hop landscape that’s seen many artists come and go since he broke through during the late 2000s.
“I remember seeing him at Irving Plaza—this must’ve been 2010 or 2011,” says Jeff Rosenthal, who created the hip-hop sketch comedy blog ItsTheReal along with his brother, Eric. “He left the stage, in a packed venue, and didn’t go backstage after the show was over. He went through the crowd and led it, on some Pied Piper shyt, through the streets of New York
Over the course of his winding career, Curren$y has grown into a charismatic cult figure. After stints on two legendary hometown record labels, No Limit Records and Cash Money Records, he struck out on his own in 2007 and never looked back. Across dozens of projects, he’s entrenched listeners in his purple-tinted world of weed, vintage cars, and carefully considered pop culture references. On 2010’s “Roasted,” he brags of “Olympic swimming in bytches, Michael-slash-Leon Phelps,” a hat tip to the 23-time gold medalist and the Lothario at the center of The Ladies Man. (I’ve seen him perform this live, mimicking an exaggerated yet fluid swimming stroke for comedic effect.) On 2010’s “Life Under the Scope,” he weaves a nod to an infamous Real World moment into a rumination on operating beneath the ever-scrutinous public eye. His vast catalog includes mixtapes named for Fast Times at Ridgemont High, songs named after Days of Thunder, and albums titled in homage to Weekend at Bernie’s.
To coincide with the NFL’s return last week, Curren$y released the compilation album Season Opener, which features artists from his Jet Life Recordings roster, some of his favorite producers, and Pen & Pixel cover art referencing the 1998 compilation Big Ballers. Back in June, he released Vices, another collaboration between him and producer Harry Fraud. Inspired by a rewatch of Michael Mann’s Miami Vice series, it’s packed with clips from the show and samples of music featured prominently throughout the show. The opening song, “The Great McCarthy,” borrows its title from a first-season episode and is driven by a sample of the Lindsey Buckingham song soundtracking one of its key scenes. Although Curren$y adheres to the project’s theme (the neon skylines, pastel-colored suits, and rampant illicit activity of 1980s Miami), the song’s chorus is a perfect snapshot of his attitude: “So many cars, so many broads, so many walls / I’m livin’ large, my backyard a hundred yards / So many scars, but no awards and no applause / That ain’t what I’m in it for—where my money, dog?”
More : How Curren$y Became One of the 21st Century’s Defining MCs
Fresh off a flight from his native New Orleans, the famed weed enthusiast doesn’t want to smoke out the hotel before his performance at Karma DC, so he’s in search of a light and a comfortable place to indulge. We were supposed to meet in New York back in April, but that plan fell through—after I’d arrived at his hotel. (“It be a lot of moving parts, bro,” the 42-year-old later tells me with a chuckle.) Now, after reconvening in the nation’s capital in late June, I—a nonsmoker—have joined the hunt. Curren$y is convinced someone has a lighter on them, so he ventures outside to find one. Ultimately, he’s correct: His manager, Mousa, and I locate him in front of the hotel, where he’s posing for pictures with a couple who blessed him with the device. This man-of-the-people quality has been integral to Curren$y’s success in a volatile hip-hop landscape that’s seen many artists come and go since he broke through during the late 2000s.
“I remember seeing him at Irving Plaza—this must’ve been 2010 or 2011,” says Jeff Rosenthal, who created the hip-hop sketch comedy blog ItsTheReal along with his brother, Eric. “He left the stage, in a packed venue, and didn’t go backstage after the show was over. He went through the crowd and led it, on some Pied Piper shyt, through the streets of New York
Over the course of his winding career, Curren$y has grown into a charismatic cult figure. After stints on two legendary hometown record labels, No Limit Records and Cash Money Records, he struck out on his own in 2007 and never looked back. Across dozens of projects, he’s entrenched listeners in his purple-tinted world of weed, vintage cars, and carefully considered pop culture references. On 2010’s “Roasted,” he brags of “Olympic swimming in bytches, Michael-slash-Leon Phelps,” a hat tip to the 23-time gold medalist and the Lothario at the center of The Ladies Man. (I’ve seen him perform this live, mimicking an exaggerated yet fluid swimming stroke for comedic effect.) On 2010’s “Life Under the Scope,” he weaves a nod to an infamous Real World moment into a rumination on operating beneath the ever-scrutinous public eye. His vast catalog includes mixtapes named for Fast Times at Ridgemont High, songs named after Days of Thunder, and albums titled in homage to Weekend at Bernie’s.
To coincide with the NFL’s return last week, Curren$y released the compilation album Season Opener, which features artists from his Jet Life Recordings roster, some of his favorite producers, and Pen & Pixel cover art referencing the 1998 compilation Big Ballers. Back in June, he released Vices, another collaboration between him and producer Harry Fraud. Inspired by a rewatch of Michael Mann’s Miami Vice series, it’s packed with clips from the show and samples of music featured prominently throughout the show. The opening song, “The Great McCarthy,” borrows its title from a first-season episode and is driven by a sample of the Lindsey Buckingham song soundtracking one of its key scenes. Although Curren$y adheres to the project’s theme (the neon skylines, pastel-colored suits, and rampant illicit activity of 1980s Miami), the song’s chorus is a perfect snapshot of his attitude: “So many cars, so many broads, so many walls / I’m livin’ large, my backyard a hundred yards / So many scars, but no awards and no applause / That ain’t what I’m in it for—where my money, dog?”
More : How Curren$y Became One of the 21st Century’s Defining MCs
