50 Cent

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50 CENT

Born: Curtis Jackson; Queens, New York, 6 July 1976

Genre: Rap

Best-selling album since 1990: Get Rich or Die Tryin' (2003)

Hit songs since 1990: "In Da Club," "Wanksta"

In 2003, 50 Cent became the best-selling debut artist in hip-hop history. Although commercially successful hip-hop tends to be lyrically tame and heavily influenced by R&B and pop, 50 Cent has helped prove that street-oriented rap music can be widely embraced.

Curtis Jackson was born and raised in Queens, New York. While many rappers simply rhyme about having a tough upbringing, Jackson actually experienced one. He was born to an estranged father and a teenage mother who sold drugs and was murdered when he was eight years old. Jackson was raised by his grandparents but later followed in his mother's footsteps and began dealing crack cocaine at age twelve. As a teenager he alternated between serving jail time for drug possession and making a fortune selling drugs. He also began to cultivate his greatest love: rapping. He adopted the name 50 Cent as a "metaphor for change." In 1996, a friend introduced him to Run-D.M.C.'s Jam Master Jay. Jay mentored 50 Cent and signed him to his JMJ label. Three years later 50 Cent signed a deal with Columbia Records while maintaining a positive relationship with Jam Master Jay. He scored a hit and some controversy with the song "How to Rob," a clever satire in which he rhymed about stealing from famous rap artists like Jay-Z and Big Pun.

Although 50 Cent was signed to one of the largest labels in the world, he remained in financial straits. Most of his record label advance went to Jam Master Jay, and he continued to peddle crack to support himself. Months before the scheduled release of his debut album Power of a Dollar, a rival drug dealer shot him nine times outside his grandmother's house. The assault left him with a bullet fragment in his tongue and a hole in his jaw, which accounts for his signature slur.

Soon after the shooting, Columbia Records dropped 50 Cent from its roster and shelved his album. Nevertheless, 50 Cent continued to record music on his own, supplying songs to DJs who included them on mix tapes. 50 Cent built a grassroots following and attracted the attention of other major record labels and the superstar rappers Eminem and Dr. Dre. Following a fierce bidding war, Eminem and Dr. Dre signed 50 Cent to a joint-label deal, on Eminem's Shady Records and Dre's Aftermath Records, for a reported $1 million. 50 Cent's song "Wanksta," a "dis" record targeted to rapper Ja Rule, appeared on the soundtrack of 8 Mile, the film featuring Eminem, which was the best-selling soundtrack of 2002. (It went platinum seven times in the United States.) 50 Cent collected many of his mix-tape hits for an independent album, Guess Who's Back.

50 Cent's debut album, Get Rich or Die Trying (2003), entered the Billboard charts at number one and sold more than 2 million copies in its first three weeks of release, making it the fastest-selling debut album from a major label. The album, executive produced by Dr. Dre and Eminem, immediately established 50 Cent as a superstar. The beats are hardcore and the lyrics at times unrelenting and violent, as on the song "Heat," built on a sample of a gun cocking. The dance floor-friendly single "In Da Club" topped the Billboard pop charts for many weeks.

The success of 50 Cent proves that hip-hop need not water itself down to sell records and that the American public craves autobiographical authenticity from rap artists.