Priest was born in Louisiana, and raised in Las Vegas. As a child growing up in the inner city of Vegas, he found out what the streets had to offer, and became a first hand witness to the fast life of Sin City. His mother also came from a broken home, losing her father at a young age and giving birth to him at a tender age. Although it was difficult raising children alone, she worked hard, and with the help of her hard working mother, they made due. Priest grew up on different music, inspired by the younger and elder members of his family, but never looked at it as a career. At sixteen he began writing as a form of anger management, which transpired into poetry, hip hop and other forms of expression. While living in the DC Metro Area (DMV), he recorded his demo titled Euthanasia in 2003. Two songs from the demo were aired on XM Radio (66Raw), and another track was featured on www.rhythmplaza.com under the name Payshence (a moniker he adopted as an internal journey). Around the same time Priest won the Sprite Rap Remix contest for 93.9 WKYS, allowing him to perform at the MCI Center in Washington DC. After returning to Las Vegas he recorded L'Casino in 2005 becoming the staple mix-album for Las Vegas. He added "L'Casino is my new born, the theme stems from The City itself, and the other portion is a tribute to corporations," said Priest. Around the same time period another story was forming in Sin City. The Sheriff, Mr. Bill Young didn't want Hip Hop or any forms of Rap in local venues or at any Casino nightclubs or lounges. Now this move wasn't just an injustice and random move, Mr. Young was responding to the fact that one of his deputies, Sgt Henry Prendes was killed on Feb, 1, 2006 while responding to a domestic incident call; his killer was Amir Crump aka Trajik of the local rap group Desert Mobb. Mr. Young was arguing that hip hop is a bad influence and therefore, should not be a part of the image that Las Vegas wants to cultivate. At the time it was a decade since Tupac Amaru Shakur was gunned down in Las Vegas, since then, dozens of rappers have been the cause or the victims of deadly violence in Vegas. To much less fanfare, the Las Vegas Chapter of the National Hip Hop Political Convention (NHHPC) has been fighting its own battle against a Sheriff determined to ban Hip Hop. Vegas activists gathered for an event called Impeach the Sheriff on Monday June 26, 2006 at the Winchester Park Auditorium (XXL did a minor piece on the Impeach the Sheriff event). Even with all the controversy surrounding the local scene and its local players, Priest managed to perform inside the Aladdin Casinos’ V-theatre for Showtime in Vegas: He also managed to judge several Hip Hop battles, host several shows, and put on several shows at the Take One Nightclub downtown, all the while under scrutiny from the local law enforcement. Due to politics Priest wasn’t given the Unsigned Hype award in the Source Magazine, and to quote a editor from XXL “he’s got some tight songs, but right now I’m going to pass on putting him in the Show and Prove section, sorry.†Even through that Vegas managed to pull off the 2007 NBA All Star Game, which Priest was very much a part of. He is currently working on the Chocolate Sin album, which bridges DC (Chocolate City) and LV (Sin City) together, all the lyrics are from Priest, and all the production is from Ozone an upcoming producer from Washington DC. That album will debut in the summer of 2009 shipping double platinum, also Priest Pepone just received artist of the month (Mr. October 08) on the DC based website www.lifeatwar.net and he’s currently working on a mixtape with XM’s DJ Furious Styles. Here’s a guy from the bottom and he puts himself in top places to meet the elite people of this industry, to name a few he’s crossed paths with, T.I., Young Jeezy, DJ Drama, Nick Cannon, DJ Warrior, Akon, Tigger, Beanie Siegel, DJ Irie, Nelly, Bow Wow, Beyonce, DJ Khaled, Ciara, Shock G, Ray-J, Russell Simmons, Dame Dash, Kimorra Simmons, Ace Hood, Suge Knight, DJ Quik, Sean Paul, DJ Kool Herc, EMPD, Paul Wall, Mistah FAB, and etc, so with that said Priest is a star in his own right. With this being the Olympic and Election year all VOTES 4 THE POPE.
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