Plies Comes Home

Looking at rapper Plies’ Myspace.com profile page, you’d never know that he’s a local boy, born and raised in Fort Myers, Fla.

“Pakistan, Florida,” reads his profile, right next to a close cropped shot of the rapper’s face, a sneer displaying a mouth full of solid gold grillz capping his teeth.

“It’s a small town, but it’s a town that reflects so much to me,” says Plies who grew up in the rough East Dunbar neighborhood of Fort Myers. “You’ve got two separate sides – you’ve got the serious side, then you’ve got the gutter side. I called it Pakistan because young kids 11, 12 years old were running around with choppers and (expletive),” he says of the widespread gun culture he experienced growing up in the Michigan Court Projects.

Photo courtesy of Atlantic records.

Hometown rapper Plies has scored big with his single "Shawty" featuring T-Pain, which is currently in the No. 2 spot on the Billboard Hot Rap Tracks chart.

This past Tuesday, Plies, born as Algernod Lanier Washington, enjoyed a very different view of his home city when he returned to Southwest Florida to kick off a national promo tour for his debut album “The Real Testament”.

Fresh off a morning interview with local rap and hip-hop radio station 105.5 FM the Beat, Plies’ turquoise tour bus pulled into the parking lot of the For Your Entertainment (F.Y.E.) record store on Winkler Avenue just after 10 a.m. Despite the glaring August sun and already intense heat, well over 100 fans, friends and neighbors had gathered and stood in a long, snaking line, clutching posters and waiting to welcome Plies back to Fort Myers.

Officially released on August 7th, “The Real Testament” has already produced one highly successful single, “Shawty” featuring T-Pain. The song, which has climbed to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot Rap Tracks chart has sold over 500,000 ring tones to date, and its companion video debuted in the Top 10 on the popular BET video countdown show “106 & Park”. Plies’ second single, “Hypnotized,” featuring hip-hop phenomenon Akon, has also been released recently.

But the 31 year-old rapper never set out to be the ice-dripping, household name that he’s rapidly becoming.

Rapping, Plies confesses, “wasn’t a dream of mine.” Rather, Plies got his start in the music business working behind the scenes on Big Gates Records, an independent label based in Fort Myers that he started with his older brother in the late ‘90s.

It wasn’t until one of Plies’ artists struggled with a hook he was learning that Plies took the mic for the first time.

“He never could get the hook down, so the next day I let my brother hear the hook, and he told me to stay on there,” Plies remembers.

It was that very song that would serve as the launching pad for Plies’ career. When the track found its way into the hands of Slip-N-Slide, a nationally distributed record label based in Miami, Fla., Plies signed shortly thereafter.

“I’ve been in the music business for a minute now,” says Slip-N-Slide CEO Ted Lucas. “I’m confident that Plies has the potential to be one of the game’s top players. The success of “Shawty” is only the beginning. Plies represents a new energy in hip-hop.”

However, as Plies signed posters, T-shirts, CDs, a baby’s jumpsuit and even a pack of Newport cigarettes for hometown fans at the F.Y.E. in-store event, there was little evidence that the rapper is one of hip-hop’s fastest emerging stars. Dressed in long, wide black jean shorts, a black and white striped polo shirt, a White Sox cap and a pair of chains hung with heavily jeweled medallions (including one in red, white and blue mimicking the interstate 75 road sign), the short rapper stood in front of the signing table, greeting fans and friends with hugs and a few quiet words.

On a momentary break from the onslaught, Plies even spent a brief moment hugging and shaking hands with the security guards hired for the event. Though they looked slightly stunned by the attention, Plies thanked them graciously in a barely audible whisper. In total, approximately 300 people attended the CD release.

“I think the response is beautiful,” said 105.5 the Beat’s DJ First Lady Niki, who was recording live from the F.Y.E. store. “In hip-hop culture he’s pretty much laid the groundwork,” she said of the affect Plies success would have on struggling local rappers. “He’s put Fort Myers on the map.”

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