One day I was listening to the Xzibit song “My Life, My Word” and realized that I could probably make that beat.  I gave it a shot and showed my friends.  They played it at parties and we’d all freestyle.  It was a pretty amateur attempt but I had gotten my first taste of hip hop production and I wanted more.  I started making rap beats everyday.  I loved hip hop.  I grew up on Death Row Records, Wu Tang, and Black Market Records.  I gravitated toward music with a cinematic quality and charismatic performers.  And I totally bought into the East Coast/West Coast feud as a kid.  Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, 2Pac, Cypress Hill, and E-40 were my early heros.  When the internet became accessible I discovered that there were many artists making music in my own city.  Brotha Lynch Hung, X-Raided, Mr. Doctor, Gangsta Dre, Loki, Hollow Tip, etc.  I made it my mission make Sacramento music and bring it to the mainstream.  I chose the name Filthy Rich.

After high school I was working on music with my friend Dan almost everyday.  He was doing kind of a combination of Christian rap and spoken word poetry.  I would make gangsta beats for him to flow to.  We wrote some songs and showed some people but it went nowhere.  I wasn’t that into that style and he wasn’t that interested in rap.  I think we just did it because it was fun.  After Dan I tried out my other friends.  Having them write verses on my beats.  I got interest from a few but none were as motivated as I was.  So I started writing my own rhymes.  Soon I had a handful of songs and felt like it was time to hit the studio.  My first recording session was at Parker Studios in Oak Park.  Tre-8 was the engineer.  I found him advertising studio time on the siccness.net forums.  He had a recording partner named Cov who I would continue to work with after Tre left the studio.  I only started rapping because I couldn’t find anyone else to rap for me.  I worked at it for a couple years while putting together an album.  I received positive feedback but I didn’t feel at home on the mic and eventually opted for production as my main focus.  So I went back to the siccness.net forums and to MySpace seeking artists from all over to work with.  At first I could hardly give away my tracks.  Admittedly the music was not up to par.  I didn’t know it then.  I just kept making beats and kept networking and eventually hooked up with Jack Tracks in Santa Rosa and Rap4Rights in San Francisco.  Jacks Tracks used three of my beats on the Pat Rich compilation West Coast Renegades, my debut.  Rap4Rights used two for his group, The Backcourt, on the album Soul Gossip.  Both of them mailed me copies.  I saw my name in the credits and was hooked.

In 2005 I got in contact with Gangsta Reese.  He was preparing an album with his friend Convic and they needed beats.  They named the group Enemigos.  I sent disk after disk of beats in the mail.  They asked me to produce the entire album and I accepted the offer.  They named it Agony & Ecstasy.  This was the first time I would produce a whole album.  I was there for the whole thing and learned a lot about how the rap game works.  By then Reese was a veteran and he exposed me to a side of the industry that I hadn’t seen before.  In a lot of ways Reese and Vic put me on the map.  They were the first to provide me with a forum to showcase my music.  Through Agony & Ecstasy I developed many lasting connections in San Jose and I still feel very connected to the Southbay scene. 

Around the same time I hooked up with C-Dubb.  I was buying verses from him for projects I was working on but we spent a lot of time on the phone talking business and plotting on ways to come up.  C-Dubb had put out several albums by the time I met him so I took the opportunity to learn from his experience.  From a distance I watched him conceive, produce, record, manufacture, and promote his own albums year after year.  We always had more of a friendship than a business relationship but I was inspired by his dedication.  He showed me how an underground artist can do it all by himself and that the music industry is made up, entirely, of other people who are just trying to make it anyway they can. 

It was also in 2005 that I first wrote X-Raided.  I had read about his case and believed what he had to say.  I sent him a letter saying I was a fan and offering moral support.  I told him I was interested in working with him and he wrote back asking me to send beats.  Thus began my relationship with X-Raided and Bloc Star Entertainment.  He picked four of my tracks for an album called Speak Mo Evil.  We negotiated and settled on a deal.  For months we wrote back and forth while he was getting ready to make that album.  In 2006 he told me an ex-cell mate of his, a rapper named Shahqim, was getting out of San Quentin and asked me to produce his album on Bloc Star.  We immediately went to work.  I enjoyed working with Shahqim and I admired his talent.  Of Bay Area rappers I consider him among the best.  His freedom, however, was intermittent and the relationship eventually faded.  After Shah I continued to stay in contact with X.  In 2007 I got a called from B. Parker asking if I’d be interested in producing all of X-Raided’s next album, The Unforgiven Vol. 2.  I was ecstatic.  The Unforgiven was one of my favorite albums and to be considered for the sequel was an honor.  I became X-Raided’s producer and we made Eternally Unforgiven first, and then Unforgiven 2.  It was me, X-Raided and B. Parker handling it all.  In 2009 Bloc Star was ready to sign some new artists.  X and Reese had worked together in the past so our mutual friendship provided the path for Reese to sign on.  Later I presented C-Dubb to X who signed him immediately.  That year we made Bloc Bizniz, all five of us, and the team was born. 

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