Notorious B.I.G was one of the most dynamic, influential Hip Hop artists of all time. Biggie crashed onto the charts and became a star right out of the box. In the process, he helped Combs' Bad Boy label supplant Death Row as the biggest hip-hop imprint in America, and also paved the way to popular success for other East Coast talents like Jay-Z and Nas. Biggie was a gifted storyteller with a sense of humor and an eye for detail, and his narratives about the often violent life of the streets were rarely romanticized; instead, they were told with a gritty, objective realism that won him enormous respect and credibility. The general consensus in the rap community was that when his life was cut short, sadly, Biggie was just getting started.
The Notorious B.I.G. was born Christopher Wallace on May 21, 1972, and grew up in Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood. He was interested in rap from a young age, performing with local groups like the Old Gold Brothers and the Techniques, the latter of whom brought the teenaged Wallace his first trip to a recording studio. He had already adopted the name Biggie Smalls at this point, a reference to his ample frame, which would grow to be over six feet tall and nearly 400 pounds. Although he was a good student, he dropped out of high school at age 17 to live his life on the streets. he made some demo recordings on a friend's four-track. The resulting tape fell into the hands of Mister Cee, a DJ working with Big Daddy Kane; Cee in turn passed the tape on to hip-hop magazine The Source, which gave Biggie a positive write-up in a regular feature on unsigned artists. Thanks to the publicity, Biggie caught the attention of Uptown Records producer Sean "Puffy" Combs, who signed him immediately. Not long after Biggie's signing, Combs split from Uptown to form his own label, Bad Boy, and took Biggie with him.
Changing his primary stage name from Biggie Smalls to the Notorious B.I.G., the newly committed rapper made his recording debut on a 1993 remix of Mary J. Blige's single "Real Love." He soon guested on another Blige remix, "What's the 411?," and contributed his first solo cut, "Party and Bullshit," to the soundtrack of the film Who's the Man? Now with a considerable underground buzz behind him, the Notorious B.I.G. delivered his debut album, Ready to Die, in September 1994. Its lead single, "Juicy," went gold, and the follow-up smash, "Big Poppa," achieved platinum sales and went Top Ten on the pop and R&B charts. Biggie's third single, "One More Chance," tied Michael Jackson's "Scream" for the highest debut ever on the pop charts; it entered at number five en route to an eventual peak at number two, and went all the way to number one on the R&B side. By the time the dust settled, Ready to Die had sold over four million copies and turned the Notorious B.I.G. into a hip-hop sensation -- the first major star the East Coast had produced since the rise of Dr. Dre's West Coast G-funk.
Not long after Ready to Die was released, Biggie married R&B singer and Bad Boy labelmate Faith Evans. Bad Boy now challenging Suge Knight's Death Row empire for hip-hop supremacy. Meanwhile, Biggie turned his energies elsewhere. He shepherded the career of Junior M.A.F.I.A., a group consisting of some of his childhood rap partners, and guested on their singles "Player's Anthem" and "Get Money." He also boosted several singles by his labelmates, such as Total's "Can't You See" and 112's "Only You," and worked with superstars like Michael Jackson (HIStory) and R. Kelly ("[You to Be] Happy," from R. Kelly). With the singles from Ready to Die still burning up the airwaves as well, Biggie ended 1995 as not only the top-selling rap artist, but also the biggest solo male act on both the pop and R&B charts.
1996 Meanwhile, Junior M.A.F.I.A. member Lil' Kim released her first solo album under Biggie's direction, and the two made little effort to disguise their concurrent love affair. What was more, during the recording sessions for Biggie's second album, he suffered rather serious injuries in a car accident and was confined to a wheelchair for a time.
Sadly, it would take another tragedy to drive that point home. In the early morning hours of March 9, 1997, the Notorious B.I.G. was leaving a party at the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles, thrown by Vibe magazine in celebration of the Soul Train Music Awards. He sat in the passenger side of his SUV, with his bodyguard in the driver's seat and Junior M.A.F.I.A. member Lil' Cease in the back. According to most witnesses, another vehicle pulled up on the right side of the SUV while it was stopped at a red light, and six to ten shots were fired. Biggie's bodyguard rushed him to the nearby Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, but it was already too late.
In the aftermath of the tragedy, the release of the Notorious B.I.G.'s second album went ahead as planned at the end of March. The eerily titled Life After Death was a sprawling, guest-laden double-disc set. Unsurprisingly, it entered the charts at number one, selling nearly 700,000 copies in its first week of release and spending a total of four weeks on top. The first single, "Hypnotize," went platinum and hit number one on the pop chart, and its follow-up, "Mo Money Mo Problems," duplicated both feats, making the Notorious B.I.G. the first artist ever to score two posthumous number one hits. A third single, "Sky's the Limit," went gold, and Life After Death was certified ten times platinum approximately two years after its release. Plus, Combs -- now rechristened Puff Daddy -- and Faith Evans scored one of 1997's biggest singles with their tribute, "I'll Be Missing You." In 1999, an album of previously unreleased B.I.G. material, Born Again, was released and entered the charts at number one. It eventually went double platinum. Six years later, Duets: The Final Chapter (studio scraps paired with new verses from several MCs and vocalists) surfaced and reached number three on the album chart.
