Fligh

This is Fligh, for Real:

Amid the legion of young rap artists slinging gangster talk, boasting their charms, flashing their bling -- up-and-coming rapper Antonin stands out as a reality rapper. After only a couple of decades on the planet, his lyrics paint a bonafide story born of rough times, bad choices and self-redemption.
Antonin spent his childhood shuttling back and forth between parents in Brooklyn and Texas. But Brooklyn's notorious East New York neighborhood is where he says he is from, explaining, "where you moved from a boy to a man, that's where your home is." Seeing the food lines, gangs and strife all around him, growing up among Biggie and Jay-Z wannabes, by the time he was in high school Antonin chose a path that moved him quickly up the gangsta ladder. But the life that looked like a road of opportunity to a kid in a world where "there wasn't even a YMCA" led Antonin directly to a two-and-a-half-year long stay, beginning at age 16, in prison on a gun charge.
Strange to say, maybe Antonin was lucky to find himself in the pen so early in life. They say that prison is where young offenders are quickly turned into hardened criminals. But rap music was Antonin's destiny, and he found his first Mic there in the big house when he signed up for a talent show. Freestyling came naturally and, after winning the competition, Antonin started down this new road of musical salvation and self-expression, and has never looked back.
After he was released Antonin made up for lost time by getting his diploma and buckling down to a 9-to-5 job. "I had been at the top and was not even at the bottom now," he says, "so I know how it feels from both sides." Avoiding any temptation back onto the path that had led to incarceration, Antonin kept on rapping and freestyling and discovered that people all around him liked his style. A cousin gave him special encouragement to get in a studio, and to take the mic at venues like Real's Lounge and PJ's Lounge in Harlem. Successfully crossing the cultural barrier between New York City boroughs, Antonin appeal held strong when he won the respect of the Harlem audience, and the more he rapped the more folks wanted to hear.
With his earliest musical influences being the R&B his mother listened to -- Stevie Wonder, Luther Vandross, James Brown -- Antonin's music has a distinct R&B push-n-pull feeling beneath his unpretentious rhymes, and you can feel his vibe when you listen to any of his songs; especially Pour It Up which shows off his burly lyrical talent. His current strong influences include Lupe Fiasco, Jay-Z and Kanye West. Antonin raps about where he lives, what he has lived, and what he has seen -- from "both sides." He talks about hard times, about self-determination ... and about stepping out into freedom, whether the hard-won kind or just free-wheeling fun doing tailspins on a BMX. He says he wants to "bring some sense out of Brooklyn" to counter the NYC borough's bad rap -- to Antonin, Brooklyn is actually a place where "you see people doing good out of nowhere."
And Antonin is for real -- no posturing or fronting to be found in his music: "If I said it, I did it."