Rapper T.I. is currently incarcerated after the rapper willingly surrendered to authorities last month, because of various open court cases the Atlanta resident has accumulated through the years.
T.I., who currently has a hit song called “Rubberband Man,” was supposed to perform at “Wildsplash,” an event hosted by a Tampa radio station.
Before going to jail, T.I. phoned the radio station to explain to disappointed fans why he couldn’t make the show.
“I was doing a little living on the wrong side of the law, so I gotta a lot of loose ends to tie up legitimately before I can further my career,” T.I. told Tampa’s Wild 98.7.
Continuing, he said, “Sometimes the past comes back to haunt you, you just gotta deal with those skeletons in your closet. I been hearing a lot of nonsense as far as a cat having bodies and it ain’t really like that. Its just cases that I caught a minute ago that I never dealt with. I didn’t even know the cases were open. Years go by, but the paper work is still there. We got the best lawyers in the city on it and we are just trying to work it out. Once that happens, it’s back to ballin.”
While he didn’t specify the nature of the charges against him, the Grand Hustle CEO said that the charges were without merit.
“Cats saying ‘I heard T.I. doing this, I heard he got his hands in that.’ Eventually if your name keeps coming up, then you are going to be the spotlight of an investigation sooner or later. I done been off that side of the street for a long time. It don’t matter how much snitching a hater think he do, it don’t matter how much investigating the FBI does, they ain’t gonna find nothing, so I am not really worried.”
The rapper said he felt that a person rising in society can at times be more harmful than racial discrimination.
“Older people see younger people doing better than them, they don’t like,”
T.I. said. “Cats 45-50 years old still working, ready to retire, then they
see me balling. I’m riding on 24’s, got $70,000 worth of jewelry on,
carrying $12,000 worth of cash at a time, they hate that. There’s a lot of
stuff to over come.”
T.I. said that hard work is what led his success and that he was bred to go
out and make money for himself, not for others.
“It ain’t my fault your parents taught you to go work for someone else for
years to get a little money to be able to not go to work the last 3-4 years
of your life. I was taught to go out and get it. There’s a lot of money out
there to be got one way or the other.”
Unlike other members in his family, T.I. said that his work ethic allowed him to create something positive out of his gritty surroundings in Atlanta.
“Whatever I had to do to get to where I am, that’s what I did. Bottom line
is I came from nothing. My Momma was on welfare, my uncle did ten years, my
daddy was away, I bought my first car at 14, bought my Momma her first car
at 14,” he said.
“What I am is what the streets made me. I am a product of my environment, good or
bad. I don’t anticipate doing any time. It ain’t like I stand a chance of
doing 10 years or any of that.”
T.I.’s second CD Trap Muzik approaches certified gold status.
Atlantic Records had no comment.
