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The Adventures of Bobby Ray
Why B.O.B. deserves his flowers now
Nowadays everybody wants to be a rapper, a couple of years ago everybody was a trapper. Honestly, money is what everybody’s after. B.O.B.
The year was 2007. Crank that by Soulja Boy was tearing up the charts and Shop Boyz’s record Party Like a Rockstar was on repeat across the country and in particular at our high school prom.
Atlanta’s ascent to the top was in its bubbling stage. Groups like Dem Franchise Boys and the Shop Boys scored hits that changed the trajectory of rap music. It would be some years before Future, Young Thug and others would project Atlanta into the stratosphere, however.
On the east side of Atlanta though, there was one artist who released his first record that following year. B.O.B. known as Bobby Ray released his first song, Haterz, off his mixtape Cloud 9 in 2008.
Far from a legendary hit, it was the opus for his career, a career that is underappreciated. Names like J.I.D., Young Nudy, Future, 21 Savage, Gucci Mane, and Childish Gambino come to mind when we think of East Atlantans.
But it’s because of careers like B.O.B. that we can see East Atlanta rappers like J.I.D. and even Future flourish with both street and commercial success. I wrote this article to give the proper attention to the one name left out that conversation. That’s B.O.B.
Old Atlanta
Atlanta’s rap history extends further back than the trap music beginnings of T.I. and then others in the early 2000s. The Atlanta bass scene that drew its inspiration from Miami saw men like Kilo Ali, Shy D, and DJ Toomp usher in the first offerings of music from Atlanta.
What’s known but not acknowledged is that while Atlanta grew, regions emerged in that time and dominated that conversation. The S.W.A.T.S., a reference to Southwest Atlanta, saw groups like OutKast and Goodie Mob come onto the scene later to be joined by Ludacris and others in the 2000s.
