Before A Boogie With Da Hoodie would have himself a number 1 album on the Billboard
200 charts Before A Boogie was named a 2017 XXL Freshman
Before he would collab with everyone from Chris Brown, 21 Savage, Kodak Black, Tory
Lanez, NBA Youngboy, Juice Wrld, Young Thug, PNB Rock, 69 and many more
Before he would have close to 500k followers on Twitter, 3 million subscribers on YouTube
and more than 4.3 million followers on Instagram at the time of this recording.
Before A Boogie Would “Pull Up” looking “Way Too Fly.”
He was just an “Artist” from the “Jungle” who was “Unhappy” and “Drowning” in
his thoughts, looking for “Somebody” to give him his shine.
He may seem “Nonchalant” about it now, but when we “Look Back At It” A Boogie
has one hell of a story.
A Boogie has quickly become one of the most influential artists for an entire new generation
of fans and artists alike.
If someone coming up making music now says that their sound isn’t influenced by A Boogie,
I might say they’re lying.
I have a feeling when it’s all said and done, we’re going to look at Boogie the
same way that many people are starting to look at Chief Keef.
A legend.
His latest album dominated the charts and continues to spawn hits.
But before all of the fame, he was just a kid named Artist writing raps in his bedroom.
This is the story of A Boogie.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BsoXgYPFtMo/
What’s going on good people in the comment section?
Shoutout to the toilet gang, My name is Jeremy Hecht I hope you’re having one Hecht of
a Day, and I’ll be your host today documenting the life of A Boogie prior to fame, here for
you of course on Before They Were Famous.
If you’re new here, I’m the LA host for the channel and I’ve recently done videos
on DaBaby and Lil Nas X so be sure to check those out after you finish watching this one
and let me know who you want to see next in the comments down below.
Feel free to roast me feel free to give me a compliment or just let me know what your
favorite color is.
I’ll respond to as many people as I can.
Also I was going to wear a hoodie because that would of course be a funny joke and I
filmed it but I was sweating buckets, so I had to wear this shirt, mesh workout thing
so you can probably see through.
Before we start though I’ve got a trivia question for you:
“What Was A Boogie’s Nickname in the 7th Grade?”
Alright, let’s get into the show!
Also stick around after the video because I have an announcement for you guys.
I messed up and I need to apologize for something.
A Boogie was born on December 6, 1995 in the Bronx New York and from day one, he was destined
for superstardom.
With his real name being Artist Julius Dubose, there was no chance that creativity wasn’t
in his blood.
Although he said that people would make fun of his name as a kid and he originally hated
it.
Artist grew up in the neighborhood of Highbridge with his parents and brother.
Highbridge is also the same neighbordhood that Cardi B grew up in.
And A Boogie also grew up with fellow Highbridge native Don Q. In Highbridge, the summers were
hot and everybody was always outside.
When he was 9 years old he would listen to Beanie Seagal and Cassidy, taking in their
lyricism along with the throwback music his dad would play in the car.
When he was 12 years old, inspired by artists like 50 Cent and Kanye’s “College Dropout,”
Artist started to live up to his name and began writing songs in his notebook.
Artist was a shy kid who sat in the back of the classroom and kept to himself.
He was always too nervous to show anyone his real work so he would find a quiet spot alone
in the gym and write down his thoughts in his notebook.
Artist loved the movie “Paid In Full” so much, watching it nearly every day, that
his friends started to call him A Boogie based on a character in the movie.
And in high school, he was wearing a Hoodie to school every day, so they added that onto
his name and it stuck.
He would carry his notebook with him everywhere he went, even taking it to school.
It was in high school that he rapped publically for the first time during lunchroom cyphers.
And when it was his turn to spit a verse, he killed it, impressing everyone else in
the room.
But even though he was a quiet kid, that didn’t mean he wasn’t getting into trouble outside
of school.
He would constantly get into fights and even had a machete pulled on him right outside
To keep him on the right path, his parents shipped him off to the performance-based “Preparatory
Academy” in Florida.
Although… he was set back a year because his New York credits didn’t transfer over.
After graduating from high school, he worked 3 random jobs in 3 weeks including construction
jobs and as a pizza delivery guy to make some money.
But that money didn’t take him very far so he began to find other ways to make money.
And while it did get him a little change, it also got him arrested 5 times and 2 year’s
probation with a year of house arrest.
But it wasn’t for nothing because it was during that time alone in the house, that
he made the decision to take music seriously.
His dad bought him a basic microphone and Boogie learned how to record his vocals on
his computer.
It was in Florida that he met a producer named Mister Whyte and together they made his first-ever
studio song called 'Temporary'.
After that, he spent every single day in the studio.
What really inspired the pain in A Boogie’s music though, was heartbreak.
He was dating a girl for three months, but came to find out that she had been pregnant
for the whole time.
So he was going through the emotions of preparing for fatherhood, and writing some songs, but
then he found out some even more shocking news, that the baby wasn’t his.
That’s when he started to really write emotionally charged music from his heart about the experiences
of love.
And that’s the same music that the world fell in love with.
Once he had that down, he started putting some of his work on Soundcloud but was not
seeing the results he wanted so he knew that he needed a real strategy.
So he began to plan out how he would use social media to his advantage, and he started to
see some real results.
Within just a few months, he blew up on Pandora.
His songs received more than 5 million plays on the side within just a few months, which
lead to 10,000 people clicking like on his Facebook page.
Facebook was the first social media platform that A Boogie blew up on.
He told Forbes:
“Before I was even famous, I was famous on Facebook.”
People were quoting his lines in their statuses and sharing his videos at a rapid pace.
So much so that DJ Khaled and Meek Mill both gave him co-signs.
When A Boogie dropped his first mixtape, it was a very polarizing sound.
Especially being from New York, old school hip-hop heads grew up on a certain classic
NY boom-bap sound that A Boogie definitely deviated from.
But people started to recognize his talent and his unique sound caught on.
Even New York radio stations began to come around and play his music.
A Boogie decided to take his online fame into real life with his first ever live show, which
he sold out.
It was that sold out B.B. King Blues Club show that got the attention of major labels.
Atlantic Records inked him to an official deal shortly afterwards.
Him and his childhood friends had created a label together named after where they grew
up, called Highbridge The Label.
They used to sit on the couch and plot about how they could make a lot of money one day.
Atlantic signed the entire label to a deal also and Boogie went from house arrest to
studio arrest, spending every single day in the booth perfecting his sound.
In less than a year after recording his first mixtape Boogie had raked in over 120 million
Youtube views and got asked by Drake himself to open for him and Future at their sold out
Madison Square Garden show.
Since then, A Boogie has dropped a lot more music and continues to dominate the chart.
Most recently he dropped the video for his song “Swervin.”
And although Tekashi is featured on the song, as you can guess he is nowhere to be found
in the music video.
As for his message to all of you guys who are out there working on your music, I think
he had some really good advice in his Montreality video that might be able to help one of you
out there:
His
first nickname was A-Real in around the 7th grade.
And there you have the answer to your question from the beginning of the video.
But now, it’s time for a public apology, to you guys, the fans of this show!
As for the rest of the story, well you know the story, because this is Before They Were
Famous.
As always, my name is Jeremy Hecht and I’ll be covering more artists for this channel
so please let me know down below who to cover next and if no one has told you
yet today, I love you!
Dream Good Live Better and I’ll see you in the next video.