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Radar Report
It's been a very good year for Miami's own Pitbull, a Cuban American rapper whose debut album, M.I.A.M.I, spent 27 weeks on Billboard's Top Independent Albums Chart and reached gold status for more than 500,000 copies shipped. The feat gives Pitbull the biggest selling bilingual hip-hop debut since Cypress Hill's 1991 self-titled debut and puts him among a select group of Latino rappers who have gained major success in Anglo radio. Pitbull's album is now making strides outside of the U.S. as well, with its release in the UK, Spain, France, Germany and Australia.
The 24-year-old rapper combines crunk, hip-hop, reggae, reggaeton and dancehall, with English and Spanish lyrics. His rise to fame came, seemingly, out of nowhere when he was featured during an MTV awards show in Miami last year, an attempt by MTV to showcase what Miami had to offer in terms of local talent. Since then, everything snowballed, and the news kept getting better and better for Pitbull. He just completed a highly successful European tour, bringing bilingual hip hop to the other side of the Atlantic for the first time.
As if that were not enough, Pitbull has recently been tapped by hiphop mogul and entrepreneur Sean "P. Diddy" Combs, for a joint venture, the new label Bad Boy Latino, which will have offices in New York and Miami, with a focus on Latin rap, Latin soul and tropical music. Pitbull will sign artists, handle the marketing and help run the label.
by Karl Avanzini
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Cuban American rapper PITBULL unleashes a hot hip hop debut
