Local Rapper Hakeem the Dream, the author of the Thick Wit It hit, was destined to do something in music.
“It just happened to be rap,” says the Hakeem, whose grandfather, Clayton Love, a blues musician, introduced him intimately to the world of music at a young age.
“Watching him inspired me and seeing him play at blues festivals always sparked my interest,” says Hakeem of his grandfather who played with late greats Oliver Sain and Ike Turner, when Tina Turner was still on board.
By the way, his grandfather agreed that Thick Wit It has a good melody. So good, one can hardly walk into a club without hearing it.
The radio rotation doesn’t equate the popularity of the song, but radio politics takes the rap for that one.
Hakeem isn’t one to over-extend himself to get his due. He works hard and let’s his work speak and work for itself.
Still radio can’t totally ignore such a popular hit. If so, it gives the impression that radio deejays don’t know what to play, though St. Louis deejays do know what to play.
But the deejays aren’t the political players – they’re most or less the pawns.
Of course, the club is a different story and deejays prove it.
The Thick Wit It rapper wrote his first rap at age 14 and worked then with Sonny Metcalfe (a local talent scout and promoter), doing public speaking engagements, including spitting the famous MLK speech on WB 11.
Hakeem asserts that his success with the Thick Wit it hit didn’t happen overnight.
Before his solo ride, Hakeem formed a family rap quartet called Da Acez, tightening up his stage and rap game. They put out the local hit Where She At, off the Off the Hook CD, produced by DJ Beats, one half of The Beatstaz who produced Chingy’s Powerballing and Jibbs feat. Jibbs.
When the group dismembered, Hakeem stayed on track, hooking up again – this time – with Reece Beats, the other half of The Beatstaz.
He also dabbled in music with bass guitarist Ciaccio and kept momentum with guest appearances on mixtapes and opening shows for major acts.
By 2001, he created PiMo Entertainment, the by-product of 3.14, the circumference ratio of a circle, and his area code; Mo. of course, is the abbreviation of Missouri.
All the while Hakeem has been dropping mixtapes in and out-of-state and spitting wherever appropriate to solidify his solo buzz. Today, it’s abuzz.
“I couldn’t believe how it took off – I’ve been working very long and one record put me,” Hakeem says humbly.
“You can try to force it, but when you got it you got it,” he said.
Hakeem admits that when he got the beat from producer Ronnie Notch, it already had the hook. He just had to ride the track tight, which he did.
Thick Wit It was the most spun indie song in St. Louis last year and made one of the local top 100 countdowns for best rap songs.
Hakeem is continuing 07’s momentum with upcoming shows and taking his Thick anthem on the road to other cities, deejays, radio stations and clubs.
While the song primarily salutes amply-figured women, Hakeem is anything, but a trivial rapper.
“I get lyrical instead of just telling girls to shake it,” he said.
“I’m trying to be different and not sound like anybody else, but there was something different about this song,” Hakeem said, adding that, he trying to talk about something – even if she is thick with it.
“There’s no dumbing-down my music,” he said.
Coming from the city’s Northside (the O’Fallon Park neighborhood), Hakeem has more important things in his psyche.
He lost of people to the streets and is humbled knowing that it could have easily been his own life lost.
He has hooked up with one of his friends who made it out the hood alive: Pro football player Brandon Williams (St. Louis Rams).
Williams ran into Hakeem while he was clocking dollars at retail spot in the ATL.
Though Hakeem was getting money the right way, Williams didn’t want his boy 9 to 5ing it, so they went half on PiMo Ent.
But Hakeem manages his self. It has its pros and cons, he says, but at least he knows everything that’s going on. And no one is there to rush him into a bare minimum deal.
Guess you can say the Thick Wit It rapper is smart with it.
