From the moment you hear Kasino you get hit with seductive beats, and uncompromising street lyrics that dig deep into his soul and flow out with biting rhymes and thumping sexuality.
Kasino’s love of music was influenced by his Mother and Father’s Puerto Rican heritage. His parents separated when he was seven years old leaving his mother to raise his sister and him on her own. Much of his childhood was spent hanging out on the streets in the NYC area listening to hip-hop with kids that were much older than he was. “I got in a lot of trouble those days†says Kasino “but hangin’ with those guys is what made me fall in love with music like I did.â€
By the age of twelve Kasino wrote his first rap to Channel Live’s “Madizm†beat and Grave Diggers “Diary of Mad Man†beat. He continued to hang in the streets while honing his writing skills until he met some street rappers that weren’t writing down lyrics at all but were instead freestyling their raps. This inspired a whole new concept of rap for Kasino and he soon found himself incorporating writing and freestyling into his own music. While mastering his freestyling skills with street friends and in Safia’s at school, Kasino was introduced and absorbed into a love of Latin underground music that eventually developed into today’s Reggaeton music. Combining these two genres, Kasino eventually found his sound in the studio as part of the Reggaeton duo La Union. Taking their music to the public in 2005 La Union performed with such notables as Don Omar and Hector El Father and he admits to initially being uncomfortable with the attention he was getting and the differences La Union began to experience internally.
La Union eventually broke up and Kasino considered stepping out of the music industry. After spending about a year with music on the shelf he received some advice from his closest friend. “He sat me down and gave me a heart to heart†Kasino explains, “he said to me you have a gift that not everyone is born with and when you waste it, you disrespect that gift and the people that love you.†Stunned and inspired, Kasino put his heart and soul back into writing and performing and the outcome was an amazing composition of his Hip-Hop inspirations with songs such as: Feels Good, Every Hood and Amen.
The once timid kid from New Jersey has grown quite comfortable with crowds and attention; Kasino has been featured on the Spanish broadcast network Telemundo Channel as well as New York City’s television news magazine, “The Spot NYCâ€.
Whether he’s performing in front of a thousand fans at a club or his current record arena audience of over 18,000, Kasino’s lyrics and beats makes the room hotter and the ground rumble.