Living a complicated life and overcoming trials and tribulations is hard to explain through simple discussion....but not through music. Peezy "AKA Antwon Pinkston" has made that possible for himself and others who are following his lead with his current "Blood Money Movement." The 25-year-old has recently launched his own independent label "Blood Money Recordz" and just signed a lucrative joint deal with his Detroit native friend Dizzy, "Halfway House Ent."
But as far as putting in work for the love of his craft.....the answer is unquestionable. Peezy's not your ordinary average emcee who has a story to tell about what hood he's came from or how he popped a cap in somebody's azz. He's more interested in telling you the truth and his struggle and hustle to the muscle. He's more interested in telling you how he came to be influenced to do what he did or does.
"Blood Money is a movement," Peezy said. "It comes from the struggle of living in this world having to literally bleed for everything we could possibly need to survive."
"Everything that I've done or accomplished throughout life, I've worked blood, sweat and tears for," he said. "Now the blood shows on the outside and not just within.....I wanna show my struggle, my hustle, my sin."
Growing up in Lexington, Kentucky, Peezy became involved in music and the streets by way of his own. He was fortunate to have a mother and father living under one roof, but not fortunate to witness the hard-ships of others. Although a 3.0 student in high school and an all-star athlete, Peezy wanted more.......he wanted money.
"I can't say that the shit that I did was because I needed the shit....I always had a family who was there for me....but my niggaz that I looked up to, or hung around was niggaz that understood me and I understood them because we all had our own story of how we got the way we were."
In the year 2000, Peezy got a full scholarship to play football at Western Kentucky University. He played for four years but also went through four years of hell during his college years.
"For people to even start to understand me...they got to know that that was the first time I ever met my biological father...when I was 18," Peezy said. "And then football...I learned real quick that we still in the slave days and its all about politics...them mothafuckaz will pumpl yo' head up so quick and make you think you can make it to the league and then you fall right back on ya azz!"
Using football to pay for his college education, Peezy took his love for music to another level.
"It was from there that I knew I couldn't just do this shit for fun anymore," he said. "I lived just like a lot of niggaz I grew up around but only that I was fortunate enough to make it."
In 2004, he did his first mixtape and sold it on his college campus for $5.
"Man I didn't have no type of original beats, art cover, shit nothing at all. I just did my shit off my dudes computer and printed out black and white cover posters of my cd. When it got around campus, it got some pretty good feedback so I thought I could take this shit further.
But when Peezy took it further, he got the unexpected. Time after time he was let down by local DJ's to be featured on their mixtapes or shows...and least to say, other local rap acts.
"When nobody reached out to me, I said fuck it, I can still do this shit by myself."
After graduating college and moving to Huntington, West Virginia, Peezy had no other option but to trust on word that a local producer name Michael "Mr. Mike" Crawford was the best the state had to offer.
"When I met M.R. Dot, he let me listen to some beats and I spit a few tiimes for him, but that was all I had to offer because I had no original beats. He still went on instinct and believed in me and produced my mixtape."
In 2007, Peezy released his first official mixtape on his own independent label entitled "Blood Money Recordz," called "A Gangsta and a Gentleman."
"I hit all angles on a mixtape cause' I make'em like they albums. I have original beats and mixtapes but I spit on the mixtape ones like I own'em. My pops always told me to come out with something real and not fake...you know...don't tell people lies and be like a fake gangster rapper...he still don't like what I do...but that's only because he don't understand."
Since then, Peezy has created his movement and then some. From selling his mixtapes from all across the state of West Virginia, to opening up for the Ying Yang Twinz and performing at local nite clubs...Peezy is on his way...no matter what anybody says.
