In 2014 Complex released an article stating that the largest notorious housing projects had fell off the map and had nothing but past generations of rappers to show for it.
As an Alumni of the development this was a big smack to the face for me. I felt highly disrespected about what these random people put out there about my home.
“For a kid growing up today in Queensbridge, the largest public housing projects in North America, it might be difficult to fathom that the neighborhood was once a seedbed for rappers.”
I thought to myself; “What the fuck does that mean!?” Everybody thats somebody from QB knows the history of The Bridge. We all knew Roxanne Shante, Marly Marl, Metta WorldPeace, Mobb Deep, Nas and The Bravehearts are the pioneers of Queensbridge’s popularity. We knew this because our older relatives knew them before they were stars, so why does Thomas Gollanopoulos feel it is ok to put this out there?
As I continued to study the article he made a case stating “the next generation of Queensbridge artists has yet to materialize.” Which I thought was pretty accurate. At a time in the bridge I felt as if Queensbridge struggled to identify itself in music because lyricist were becoming less popular and everyone wanted to chase the quick hit.
During the time of Bobby Shmurda’s biggest song “Hot N****” it seemed as if Queensbridge artist had enough, so they created a blueprint to obtain a piece of the pie. That blueprint was going digital
Throughout the years, Queensbridge has produced more than just rappers, there has been a huge spike in videographers, entrepreneurs, fashion designers, dancers, coders and more.
So why hasn’t any of this been covered? When people think about Queensbridge they think about what it use to be like; grimy, gritty, and standoffish. It is, but although its style is nasty its still willing to clean itself up for opportunity.
Kiing Shooter an artist on Street Dreams records is the perfect example. With his hard upbringing he was able to link with Nas brother Jungle and produce a series of Mixtapes that captures the sound of Queensbridge’s energy today.
Derrick Lawson is another example of Queensbridge innovation. Before graduating college Derrick was able to start his freelance web design business building multiple websites for small businesses and non profits. He is also the founder of DLDigital and currently works as a Youth Mentor and Digital Public Relations Consultant.
With so much Talent coming from the projects I’m still not sure how it can be overlooked. Maybe sometime in near future someone like Havoc or Nas can paint the right picture of the creative energy here but in the meantime somebody had to change the narrative about it being over because the bridge can never be over when there is someone there to represent it.