On Think Free’s swaggering first single “All The Way Live” (produced by Philly’s own Biz & EST.), the grizzled vet shows himself to be in fine lyrical form over a Trap-infused banger. And then of course, I want the listener to think FREE…to think about me and the music.”
STATE PROPERTY 2 FREE
“If you want to be free, which most of us have an illusion of being free from oppression, you have to think free. “There’s double entendre meaning behind the album title,” he explains. With the much-trumpeted Roc Nation release of his sixth studio set Think Free (June 8th), a revitalized Freeway solidifies his storied legacy. With ‘1-900-Hustler’ I knew I had finally arrived.” “I just felt like if I could get a fair shot, I could make it happen.
“I was already around the music industry and in the mix with Beans when he was recording The Reason while JAY was working on the Dynasty project,” Freeway continues. He would go on to drop his critically acclaimed gold-selling debut album Philadelphia Freeway (2003).
“That verse took my dreams to a reality,” recalls a still blown away Freeway, who at the time was a little known member of buzz-heavy Philly spitter Beanie Sigel’s crew. “First thing first, watch what you say out your mouth when you talkin’ on the phone with hustlers/Never play the house, think drought, keep heat in the couch when you sitting in the presence of customers!” he proclaimed with all the subtlety of a sledge hammer. With his fitted Philadelphia 76ers cap and signature Sunnah beard, Freeway, a practicing Muslim, presented himself as a sneering yet complex figure on his song-stealing debut on Hov’s classic ‘hood survival testimony “1-900-Hustler.” It’s the reason why genre-defining hip-hop mogul and otherworldly Brooklyn emcee JAY-Z first recruited the two-fisted rhyme pugilist for his 2000 The Dynasty: Roc La Familia. Since his days as a kid battle rapping on the streets of his native North Philadelphia, Leslie “Freeway” Pridgen has always stood out amongst his peers, with every throat-grabbing tone and verse sounding like his last will and testament. A combustible mix of hunger, ferocity, unvarnished honesty and brazen cockiness.
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