Master P

P is one of the most successful rappers in the history of the game. His first three records sold a combined 1.5 million copies before any mainstream music publication knew who he was. He's already made one movie that, after being rejected by distributors, went on to sell hundreds of thousands of copies on video and continues to be a consistent rental since its summer of 1997 release. And, with his No Limit Records label, he's created one of the most profitable franchises in rap music—without the benefit of any radio or video airplay. His name is Master P, and he's firmly established himself as one of the most shrewd businessmen the music industry has ever seen.

Master P was the oldest of his parents' five children. He grew up in the Calliope Apartments (now called the B.W. Cooper Apartments), a housing project infamous for being one of the city's most violent places to live. "Calliope was one of the worst neighborhoods you could even think about," P told Vibe magazine last year. "[When] people think of New Orleans, they think of tourism and Mardi Gras and all that. But there's another side. I had to grow up never having nothing, and in life, you gotta be down to survive." P's parents divorced when he was eleven. Four years later, he moved with his mother to Richmond, California, a city just north of Oakland, and he began living part of the time there and part of the time at his grandmother's home in New Orleans. He eventually became a scholarship basketball player, earning a walk-on spot with the University of Houston Cougars.

In 1989, Master P opened the rap-based retail record shop No Limit Records in Richmond, using $10,000 he inherited from his grandfather. Within a couple of years, he transformed the modestly successful business into a record label of the same name, releasing his own debut album, The Ghetto Is Trying to Kill Me, in 1991. In running his own retail shop, P learned firsthand what it was kids in the hood desired, and his album was tailored to fit that demand. The Ghetto Is Trying to Kill Me hit, making a huge impression in the Bay Area and in New Orleans, where P had begun to notice a burgeoning underground music scene. He was one of the first people to recognize that the music engendered in the South was very similar to the popular gangsta-rap music coming from the West Coast, and the production on his album highlighted that similarity.