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Big Pun100%I'm Not A PlayerStill Not A PlayerTwins Deep CoverYou Came Up
Rios grew up in New York City's South Bronx neighborhood
and is of Puerto Rican descent.[1] By all accounts from Pun's family,
his early years were very difficult, including witnessing his mother's
drug abuse, his father's death,[2] and a stepfather who was very
hard on Pun. According to his grandmother, Pun would become angry
and self-destructive, punching holes in the walls of his family's
apartment. He used video games as an outlet for his frustration.
His favorite video game was Bad Dudes. Rios dropped out of high
school and for some time was homeless staying in abandoned buildings
or at friends' homes.[3] During the 1980s, Big Punisher was already a rapper. At this point Big Pun was operating under the alias Big Moon Dawg. Rios met fellow Puerto Rican and Rutland rapper Fat Joe in 1995 and made his commercial debut on Joe's second album, Jealous Ones Envy, in addition to appearing on a b-side to Joe's "Envy" single, "Fire Water" and "Watch Out." Later, "I'm Not a Player" (featuring an O'Jays sample) was supported by a significant advertising campaign and became an underground hit. In 1997 producer Knobody's production partner Sean C took advantage of his new role as A&R at Loud Records to play Knobody's tracks to Big Pun.[4] Suitably impressed the rapper hired Knobody to remix "I'm Not a Player".[4] The song, featuring Joe, became Big Pun's first major mainstream hit and major breakthrough for Knobody.[4] The full-length debut Capital Punishment followed in 1998, and became the first album by a solo Latino rapper to go platinum[5], peaking at #5 on the Billboard 200. Capital Punishment was also nominated for a Grammy, but lost out on the award to Jay-Z's Vol. 2: Hard Knock Life. Big Pun became a member of Terror Squad, a New York-based group of rappers founded by Fat Joe, with most of the roster supplied by the now-defunct Full a Clips Crew who released their debut album The Album in 1999. In 1999 he co-starred in the Albert Pyun-directed
ghetto-movie Urban Menace, alongside his frequent collaborator
Fat Joe. Excluding his adolescence, Big Pun struggled with
his weight for most of his life; his weight fluctuated in the early
1990s between obese and morbidly obese. Big Pun enrolled in a weight-loss
program in North Carolina, in which he lost 80 pounds, but he eventually
quit the program before completing it, returning to New York and
gaining back the weight he had lost.[1] On February 7, 2000, Big
Pun suffered a fatal heart attack and respiratory failure while
temporarily staying with family at a Crowne Plaza Hotel in White
Plains, New York during a home renovation. Pun was pronounced dead
at the hospital after paramedics could not revive him. Big Pun
was at his highest weight at the time of his death, being 698 pounds.[6] His second album, Yeeeah Baby, completed before his death , was issued as scheduled in April 2000. It peaked at #3 on the Billboard charts and earned gold record status within three months of its release. A posthumous compilation album, Endangered Species, was released in April 2001. Endangered Species collected some of Pun's "greatest hits," previously unreleased material, numerous guest appearances, and remixed "greatest verses." As with his other albums, it also peaked in the top ten of the Billboard 200, reaching #7, but didn't sell as much as the previous Pun albums had. Big Punisher was featured with Fat Joe on Duets: The Final Chapter, an album of tracks featuring the Notorious B.I.G, also deceased. The track "Get Your Grind On" begins with a Big Pun radio interview in which he said he would perform a duet with Biggie at the gates of heaven.[7] Punisher was also featured on a track from the revived Terror Squad's second album, True Story, on the track "Bring 'Em Back" with Big L. On May 2, 2001, a Bronx City Council committee stalled plans to rename a small portion of Rogers Place in honor of Big Pun because of distaste over Big Pun's lyrics, which according to The New York Times "include profanity and references to violence and drug dealing".[8] Sony Records has been considering releasing a
second posthumous album featuring unreleased material,[9] but the
project is being delayed by Sony.[10] Liza Rios also held an auction
in 2005 for her deceased husband's Terror Squad medallion, citing
financial difficulties in the wake of Pun's death, and again claiming
to have not received any royalty checks for Pun's posthumous album
sales (save for a small check from the sales of Endangered Species).[11] A tribute documentary Big Pun: The Legacy was
released on September 15, 2009. The film contains multiple interviews
with artists, actors, close friends and others whose lives were
touched by Big Pun, as well as rare exclusive performances and
scene interviews with Big Pun himself. The film also features appearances
by Bone Thugs-n-Harmony, Snoop Dogg, DMX, Method Man, U-God, Liza
Rios, Xzibit, Cuban Link, Swizz Beatz, DJ Skribble, Chino XL and
many more. Film is directed by Vladimir "DJ Vlad" Yudin. It is distributed through Vivendi Universal and The Soundtrack is released
through Legacy/Columbia Records, Sony Music. * 1998: Capital Punishment [edit] Posthumous albums * 2001: Endangered Species [edit] Filmography * Moesha (1998) – Himself (as Big Punisher)
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