Black Voices

Issue date: 9/13/07 Section: Entertainment

Media Credit: www.t-pain.net

Summer passed by too quickly but evidently artists such as T-Pain had enough time to release a number of top-10 hits and work with some of the biggest names in the music game.

T-Pain, born as Faheem Najm, has been recording music ever since he was 10 years old but he was ready to give up just a few years ago.

At that time, he was so broke that he was eating mayonnaise out of the jar and asking people for money to buy him cheeseburgers from McDonald's. He even hoped to work at the "golden arches" but fortunately, on the day he went to get an application, he received a phone call that would soon change his life.

Although he was beginning to lose sight of his musical dreams, T-Pain had recorded his own version of Akon's "Locked Up" and caught the attention of the hip hop and R&B community, including Akon himself, who later signed T-Pain to his record label, Konvict Music.

In 2005, T-Pain released his debut album Rappa Ternt Sanga, which featured the hits "I'm Sprung" and "I'm N Luv (Wit A Stripper)." The next year, he was featured on E-40's hit "U and Dat," produced by Lil Jon.

More recently, T-Pain released his sophomore album, Epiphany, which included the two chart-topping hits "Buy U A Drank (Shawty Snappin')" and "Bartender." Along with these poppin singles, some of my favorites from the album include "Put it Down," "Tipsy," "Yo Stomach," "69," and "Right Hand."

In addition to his own material, T-Pain has collaborated with some prominent hip-hop stars. He recently worked with Bow Wow on "Outta My System," R.Kelly on "I'm a Flirt," Plies on "Shawty," Birdman and Lil Wayne on "Know What I'm Doin," Chris Brown on "Kiss Kiss," Kanye West on "Good Life," and the list continues.

My personal favorite is his collaboration with rapper Fabolous on "Baby Don't Go." It has been rumored that T-Pain produced several tracks for Britney Spears' new album.

With all of the mentioned success as well as the many other tracks he recorded with up-and-coming artists, T-Pain is undeniably one of the hottest artists in the industry. Let us not forget that he is only 22, which means that we can expect many more hits, and based on the ones we already know and love, his future singles are bound to be better than the ones before.

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