The unmastered tape, which Stone still has in his possession, absolutely blew his mind. He brings me into the office, shuts the door, and plays a cassette of Ready to Die from beginning to end.” “I thought it was going to be a bunch of people, but it’s just me and Puff. “I didn’t know what to expect,” Stone told Boardroom. While Stone had met Biggie in passing previously at a Clive Davis party at Trump Plaza, he had little reference of the rapper’s talent aside from that small show years earlier at The Muse. In 1994, Combs called Stone to come listen to a forthcoming Bad Boy album. Around then, Rob Stone was working at Arista and had been close to the Harlem honcho then known as Puff.
Falling in love with the theatrics of hip-hop, Combs interned his way into the industry before birthing Bad Boy Records in 1993. Also in attendance at Run-D.MC.’s Raising Hell Tour was a young kid named Sean Combs. That’s not to say the script couldn’t change. Unfortunately for those in the audience, it was an action film. The Notorious B.I.G.’s first performance in New York was literally a movie. (Photo by Al Pereira/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images) aka Biggie Smalls (Christoper Wallace) and Puff Daddy (sean Combes) perform onstage at the Palladium on Jin New York, New York. Subscribe Previously, on Ready to Die Rappers Tupac Shakur, The Notorious B.I.G. Its 1997 blockbuster sequel, eerily titled Life After Death, went Diamond. would have his 1994 debut album Ready to Die become Platinum-certified six times over. In the years that soon followed, The Notorious B.I.G. The underground audience there to see Black Moon make their mark was treated to more Buckshots than they bargained for, instead exiting the stage and getting the hell out of there.Īs gully as New York got in ’92, no one had the foresight to predict the heavyset newcomer becoming the biggest artist on the planet.
Stone and other attendees busted out of the venue as chaos erupted and the scene got dicey. Kids of all colors were rapping every word uttered by the Hollis hitmakers - throwing their Adidas in the air and having the time of their lives.Ĭonversely, B.I.G.’s first foray in moving the crowd gave different syntax to Run-D.M.C.’s Raising Hell Tour. Shutting down the same stadium that Walt Frazier famously played in, it felt like hip-hop had reached its peak in 1986. sell out Madison Square Garden roughly eight years earlier. In the audience was Rob Stone, an New York native who’d go on to co-found The FADER. Not known even as “Unsigned Hype,” the larger-than-life rapper was only one man trying to make it in a city of seven million.
performed for the first time in New York. Such was the scene 30 years ago when The Notorious B.I.G. Redman clutching an aluminum baseball bat. On the 25-year anniversary of Life After Death, Boardroom remembers the talent that was Biggie Smalls by highlighting his journey from underground MC to international icon - and the business behind it all.
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