Lupe Fiasco - Wikipedia
Fiasco was born Wasalu Muhammad Jaco on February 16, 1982 in
Chicago, Illinois.
[3][4]Fiasco is of
West African descent,
[5] one of nine children of Shirley, a
gourmet chef, and Gregory, an engineer.
[2][4] His father, a member of the
Black Panther Party, was a prolific African drummer,
karate teacher, operating plant engineer, and owner of karate schools and army surplus stores.
[6][7][8] Fiasco was raised
Muslim on the West Side of Chicago on Madison Terrace housing project.
[7][9]
He described his father's influence over the family by saying, "After school, my father would come and get us and take us out into the world—one day, we're listening to N.W.A, the next day we're listening to Ravi Shankar, the next day, he's teaching us how to shoot an AK-47, the next day, we're at karate class, the next day, we're in Chinatown...".
[7]
In
sixth grade, he went to live with his father full-time in
Harvey, Illinois.
[10] His father lived next door to a
crack house and taught Fiasco to use guns to defend himself from drug dealers.
[2] Despite his unstable upbringing, Fiasco states that he was well-educated as a child, asserting that his parents exposed him to a diverse array of subjects and that reading was highly encouraged in his household.
[2] As a teenager, Fiasco participated in
Academic Decathlon competitions.
[4] His mother described him by saying, "He was a great spirited child. Smart, a bit complex; he kind of was a
loner; he didn't hang with a lot of people...He always had the glasses. Always had a book bag over his shoulder and some type of a writing tablet."
[4] Fiasco initially disliked
hip hop music for its use of
vulgarity, and preferred to listen to
jazz; he idolized
clarinet player
Benny Goodman.
[2][9] His struggle to learn to play an instrument led him to create
poetry instead, which led to his interest in the lyrical aspects of music.
[11]
He sounds as ridiculous as foreign blacks claiming black American/ AA.
