Rhyspect

Born a Toronto native March 8th 1988, 23 year old Rhys Downey is a northern star in the making. Coming from a strong black Canadian background, his mother’s heritage hailing from North Preston, Nova Scotia; this is a famous place in black history known as a refuge for runaway slaves via the Underground Railroad and home to the first indigineous Black Canadian people. Add to that his father a Jamaican whom had immigrated to Canada at a young age. Rhys Downey was born in the likeness of urban Toronto culture. As the oldest of 4 in a single parent household, Rhys has seen his share of struggles for families in Toronto communities, having lived the life in a majority white neighborhood as the only black kid in the school, to growing up in high risk communities such as Crescent Town and Malvern. Music has always been a big influence in Rhys’ life from an early age memorizing songs like “rappers delight”, Slick Rick and Dougie Fresh’s “The show” and Wu-tangs triumph lead towards an obsession with lyrics, word play and the instrumentals that go with them. On his 9th birthday the soon to be emcee received from his mother his first uncensored rap album, “Notorious B.I.G’s Life after Death. It wasn’t long before the humble young fan of hip-hop begun writing rhymes taking on the local competition.
High school is where things began to get serious. Problems in school, at home and keeping a job seemed to become a regular issue with the heavy “weed smoking” teen. Meanwhile, there were a few individuals getting into even more trouble but shared the same passion in rapping, background and extended family. His God brother Buckshot aka T.Gramz, and extended family Buck’m Beezy and his longtime partner in rhyme Dre Barrs. Over the years the super-group was formed and an onslaught of unreleased underground music had been recorded. Being the only member without a criminal record, Rhys has met another cross-road in his life. Whether it be to follow in the footsteps same footsteps of his peers, the working-student life like that of his mother or the life he had dreamed of since march 9th 1998 a day after his 10the birthday and a year after the death of the late great Notorious B.I.G.
Rhys’ first mixtape is probably going to be titled Sorry I’m late because, he has been long awaiting a chance to showcase his talents on a much bigger scale. His music illustrates the life of a young man growing up in Toronto pressured by the positive as well as negative effects of the environment he has grown up in. Well known for his always positive outlook and easy to get along with attitude, Rhys targets troubled youth as an audience with messages of guidance and hope for a better future. The biggest goal for the emcee is to have his city and the people of it truly represented as well as respected within the hip hop community; Not only as a cornerstone but also a contributor in times of releif to the music genre as a culture. There are very few rhymes from native Canadian spitter that do not contain a representation or a mention of the place the artist so very proudly calls home, Toronto.