Leaders of the Carolinas 2017 (Rapsody) carolina mag rapsody | Page 16

Petey Pablo is a perfect example of the business sentiment, “it’s never too late
to start your dreams.” His rap career takeoff at 27, after five years of
incarceration, backs up that statement up perfectly. I’m getting ahead of
myself though, let me track back to the pre-rap Petey Pablo to give you an
idea of where he came from and why we’ve barely heard a sound from him in
almost 10 years. Welcome to "Lost Ones". Petey Pablo, born Moses Mortimer
Barrett in North Carolina, started his ascent into popular hip hop at age 26.
He’d just come off of five years in federal prison beginning in 1993 and met
hip hop gurus Busta Rhymes and Black Rob. As an aside, Black Rob was a huge
up and comer at the time with Bad Boy Records and was essentially dropped
from the label along with a number of similar acts around the same time.
Mark Curry, a writer and semi-signed rapper ended up writing a great memoir
about his time at Bad Boy that I think everyone should give a read to called
"Dancing with the Devil: How Puff Burned the Bad Boys of Hip Hop.“Back to
Petey Pablo; after Pablo met up with the two artists he was soon signed to
Jive records and released the single “Raise Up” with legendary producer
Timbaland which eventually hit 25 on the Billboard urban charts. It wasn’t