J.R. King

Jr King is pretty much an enigma when it comes to music. His versatily in everything he can do gives him the power to resurrect what is left of hip hop and carry it on his shoulders. Born in Chicago, IL on January 21, 1987, J.R. began his music venture in 1998 simply writing poetry. By the year 2000 he was part of a local R&B group out of Hazel Crest, IL called Innovation (with other group member A.W.) signed to independent label, Verse-A-Tyle Entertainment. The group made a smash hit called 'R U Still Down' featuring Indiana rapper Lil Cash. J.R. and A.W. would go their separate ways in late 2000 and J.R. would embark on a rap career with Verse-A-Tyle Entertainment. He began recording his debut album 'Rebel 4 The Hell of It' in early 2001. In February 2001, J.R. got into a violent confrontation with then mixing engineer Kris Dawson over financial issues. Dawson jumped in J.R.'s face and CEO of Verse-A-Tyle Entertainment, Vik Vallo stepped in between the two. Vik's brother Vincent kept J.R. distance as Dawson pushed Vik into a glass window and charged at J.R. J.R. not wanting to fight Dawson tried to restrain him and bodyslammed him to the ground with full force and proceeded to hold him down. Tremaine Thomas, a friend of J.R. and Vik, would rush over and grab J.R. off of Dawson. Dawson then grabbed a computer chair and threw it at Gio Vanni which resulted in J.R. throwing a series of punches at Dawson. Vincent and Tremaine would restrain J.R. from doing more damage and Vik escorted Dawson out of the studio. Because of that incident, J.R. would leave Verse-A-Tyle Entertainment leaving his album 'Rebel 4 The Hell of It' unfinished. In March 2001, J.R. signed to Diamond Cut Productions who was then owned by CEO Steve Sampson and Barry Gist (who is now CEO). He took songs from 'Rebel 4 The Hell of It' and collabed them with a series of new songs and released his debut album 'The Gameplan of a Changed Man' in April 2001. Receiving positive mass reviews on the album, he was quickly compared to the late Tupac Shakur. Many believed that with his swagger on the records, he could possibly be either the next or even better than Shakur. In September of 2001, he began recording his 2nd album entitled 'Against All Odds' which was released the next month. That album did not get as many good reviews as his first but he still created a buzz and people new who is was. At the time, his stage name was, Terra' Rhyzn' (Terror Rising). In a shock to many on January 1, 2002, J.R. would re-sign with Verse-A-Tyle Entertainment re-inventing himself and his image into a more dark lyricist. On January 21, 2002, he released his 1st album under V.A.T. and his 3rd album overall called 'Genesis'. He went under a new stage name and called himself "Prophecy". D.C.P. and V.A.T. would soon merge and create a super label. The album Genesis created such a buzz that J.R. immediately begain working on his 4th album 'WorldWide'. In June of 2002, J.R. embarked in an industry beef with fellow native Chicago rapper, Nett. Nett took shots at J.R. for mimicking Tupac Shakur and making the deceased rapper look bad. Gio Vanni never responded to Nett, figuring that it would just boost his ego. His album 'WorldWide' received alot of negative reviews because the album basically was based on death. J.R. would take a break from music for awhile. On January 1, 2003, he released his best album to date, entitled 'Guess Who's Back: A Change is Coming'. The single of the track was a dedication song to close friend (Scott Sims) who tragically died on a field trip to Hawaii with fellow waterpolo teammates. The song was entitled 'Missing U' and it sampled Usher's song 'Nice and Slow'. Chris Herring (fellow classmate of J.R.) would sing on the hook. In June of 2003, he released his 6th album (a sequel to his 5th) 'Guess Who's Back: A Change is Coming Vol. II'. In this album, J.R. along with his new labelmates (A-Guttah, Chainz, & SJ) took shots at the rapper Nett on the song, Kingz of the Streetz. Gio Vanni and his new labelmates would create a rap group called B.N.I.C. (Baddest Niggaz In Chicago). Nett would respond to all the rappers. J.R. then made a solo subliminal diss to Nett and his labelmate N-Famous P (a former friend of J.R.) called 'They Don't Want It'. The beef between Nett and Gio Vanni would soon die down, as they both collabed on one of Nett's songs called 'Reaching Chicago'. J.R. would also collab with N-Famous P on a song called 'War' which also featured V.A.T. artist SJ. In 2004 J.R. would create his own artist label called "One Nation". In 2005 J.R. left the group B.N.I.C. to continue his solo career. He started working on his 7th album, but decided that it was time to take a break. He had officially retired from making albums. He still featured on other artists songs like SJ & Chainz song 'Breath', DCP artist L.O.'s song "Why", and V.A.T. artist A-Guttah's song 'Da Sirens'. He never made another album until the year 2006.