Biggie Smalls’ favourite rapper before fame
Biggie Smalls is widely considered one of the best MCs of all time. However, before he even recorded a demo, he was just a fan of rap music and looked up to a range of lyricists, but he did have a favourite.
The Ready To Die creator grew up in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighbourhood of Brooklyn. Akin to local lyricists like Jay-Z and Papoose, Biggie participated in rap battles on the city’s busy street corners.
Many know that the ‘Juicy’ emcee grew up during the height of the crack epidemic and sold crack to make money. Still, while he was on the streets, he brushed shoulders with some of the older, more influential rappers in the area.
After recording his demo tape, Microphone Murderer Biggie was discovered by Diddy, who was recruiting new talent for Bad Boy Entertainment at the time. However, his demo was a mixture of different styles acquired from various East Coast legends that Biggie was listening to as a teenager on the streets of New York City.
Biggie’s explosion into the mainstream followed the success of acts such as LL Cool J, MC Hammer, Run-DMC and N.W.A., who catapulted hip-hop into the charts, and Biggie witnessed the rise of these MCs. There was one rapper in particular, however, who had a massive influence on Biggie.
In the 2021 Netflix documentary Biggie: I Got a Story to Tell, his childhood friend Suif Jackson, known by many as Lil C, reflected on the Life After Death rhymer’s tastes growing up. Jackson recalled how he and Biggie used to stand on the street and quarrel over which artists were the best.
Recounting their teenage days, Lil C explained, “On the block, on Fulton Street, where we were all hanging out, kicking it, we were like fake hip-hop analysts. We would sit there and have debates all day. Each one of us had our favourite rapper. My favourite was KRS-One. [Olie]’s favourite was Rakim. Big’s favorite was Big Daddy Kane!”
He continued to unveil how they would dissect their favourites, detailing, “We would always analyze somebody’s flow, their rhymes, and all of that.” Big Daddy Kane was a big influence on Biggie but was also a big star in the neighbourhood.
Like Biggie and Jay-Z, in Brooklyn, Kane remains one of the most admired MCs of all time to this day. Speaking to MTV News, Ice-T once explained how powerful Big Daddy Kane was, disclosing, “To me, Big Daddy Kane is still today one of the best rappers. I would put Big Daddy Kane against any rapper in a battle. Jay-Z, Nas, Eminem, any of them. I could take his ‘Raw’ swagger from ’88 and put it up against any record [from today].”