A few years ago I was interviewed on a radio show about Weekly Music Commentary and parent company Ejeff Media. Much of the interview dealt with my background in music however, the portion about blogging provided insight into how the music blog is created. It all starts with an editorial calendar where I choose what goes into the blog three months in advance. That timetable might sound like I am always writing behind the story, but that’s not true at all. In fact, many times the story that I was planning becomes secondary to a much bigger story by the publication date. This is one of those weeks for sure. This week we feature as scheduled American rapper and songwriter O.T. Genasis. He was bringing a story of a nine year career with some new music and the birth of a son. I was ready to write about a successful music career that was heading for more success. Then came a song called Never Knew that sampled Keyshia Cole’s hit song Love, and now we have a full family feud. There is more to the story, but it would be good to now highlight the life and career of O.T. Genasis.
Odis Oliver Flores was born on June 18, 1987 in Atlanta to Belizean immigrants. Since my time living in Miami I have had several friends and associates from Belize. Very nice, hard-working and family oriented people overall. Belize has a diverse society that is composed of many cultures and languages that reflect its rich history. English is the official language of Belize, while Belizean Creole is the most widely spoken national language, being the native language of over a third of the population. Over half the population is multilingual, with Spanish being the second most common spoken language.
Belize has relatively high rates of violent crime. The majority of violence in Belize stems from gang activity, which includes trafficking of drugs and persons, protecting drug smuggling routes, and securing territory for drug dealing. We will speak more about gang activity later in this post.
Raised in Long Beach, California, O.T. Genasis (real name, Odis Flores) had to learn how to navigate his hometown’s notorious streets at an early age. Through his adolescent eyes, he would see the crime in his neighborhood and eventually be lured into the underworld lifestyle. Many people wonder how young folks get involved in a life of crime. Well, in a word – survival. O.T. Genasis explains how it all happened in his case. I think most might understand why he chose the life of a hustler.
“When I was growing up, I was a follower,” O.T. Genasis says, reflecting back on his past mistakes. “I saw a lot of followers get killed. Music definitely saved me.” His love of music however, took a temporary backseat to necessity as O.T. Genasis shifted his focus on his family suffering through harsh times. His teenage years found O.T. Genasis in the muddy underbelly of his hometown learning the dynamics of hustling for survival. By 19, O.T. Genasis mastered his nefarious craft.
“I just started attacking the streets with my music, utilizing the same aggression I did as a hustler,” O.T. Genasis explains, “I knew I had to get my buzz up.” The gutter grind eventually caught the attention of music mogul, 50 Cent, who in 2011 signed O.T. Genasis to a single deal for his track, “Jackie Chan.” The song was met with moderate fanfare and he was soon back on the streets as a free agent pounding the pavement with his new release, “Touchdown”.
Busta Rhymes took notice of O.T. Genasis and it provided another boost for his career. O.T. Genasis explains: “He saw me perform at a club and I killed the stage so bad, he asked me about possibly doing some business. The next day, I came by the studio and played some music, we had a deal in place not too long after.”
Rhymes went on to speak about O.T. Genasis and what he liked about the young rapper. “I love how he attacks the stage with such ferociousness. He’s on a seek-and-destroy mission every time he’s on the mic. He’s already one of the best performers. Then when I heard his music, I realized this guy is one of the most versatile songwriters I’ve ever come across. He’s fearless on stage and in the booth.”
After being signed to a Conglomerate label, he has been putting out some songs and singles such as “Touchdown (Remix)” featuring Busta Rhymes and French Montana, and “CoCo”. The former single became a successful song to chart, peaking at number 20 on the US Billboard Hot 100. Beyoncé used his song Everybody Mad as part of her Coachella 2018 performance and as part of her and Jay-Z’s On the Run II Tour.
At this point the story of O.T. Genasis would almost be a Disney feel-good story with a happy ending. However, that other story we mentioned earlier in this post has dominated news surrounding the rapper. Yes, it started a few months ago as O.T. Genasis made a song and video using the Keyshia Cole song Love. Keyshia Cole expressed her dislike of the rappers take, and the online war began.
With so much going on, the global pandemic and the birth of his son, it’s hard to believe that Keyshia Cole would be first in the mind of O.T. Genasis. Nevertheless, Cole was on his mind. In fact, he appeared on Instagram Live, where he made rude and inappropriate comments about her personal hygiene. This escalated the war to include others, now many are blasting him and telling him to stop with the cruelty.
Keyshia recently did an interview with Ari Lennox where she spoke about the situation. Keyshia stated: “That’s why I was so…like honestly—I’m just not going to talk about that situation—but it just pissed me off so much because you know, at a time that everybody was going through so much in the Black community, getting killed and all that and you want to do a whole song that I wrote about love and make it about shooting and killing and bang-banging. Like Yoooo, sir. And then get mad that I say that I don’t like what you did that I wanted to preserve the integrity of my music. And then just bully and bully and continue to bully.”
If you thought Cole’s statement brought things to a close, think again. O.T. Genasis Her brother and sister have now joined in to defend their sibling and mother, who Genasis also went after. This has become a social-distanced war that I hope comes to a close sometime soon. Otherwise, it might come to violence which would be way too far.
Anyway, life is too short for this kind of back and forth. I like Keyshia Cole’s music, and O.T. Genasis as well. I would love to see both go back to making the music that fans want to hear. Perhaps this war escalated because of the time on our hands. Hopefully, the COVID-19 pandemic allows just a little opportunity to go back to some distractions in life.