LEVEL Q
T.I. at 40: Candor, Slander, and Hunting for a Battle With 50 Cent
Turning 40 doesn’t mean you retire — it means you’ve got nothing left to prove
Update 6/7/22: Level has a new home. You can read this article and other new articles by visiting LEVELMAN.com.
Clifford “T.I.” Harris always had a crown hovering above his head, even before he rocked it with a tilt. Like his extensive vocabulary, the Atlanta rapper/thespian/entrepreneur is continuously growing, expanding, and coming up with new ways in which to make his mark on the world. Today he turns 40, and he’s set to build a grown-man blueprint for his younger peers to follow — one he’s been crafting since 2001, when he dropped his first studio album, I’m Serious.
As music editor at The Source at the time, I received an advance copy (a relic from a bygone era) that nearly knocked me off my seat when I heard it. The sharp-tongued rapper from Atlanta was self-assured, lyrical, and unapologetically Southern. I’m Serious quickly became one of those albums I played on repeat, filling the halls of the magazine’s office with this young dude’s cocky proclamations: “To play me/Baby, hey he/Gon’ need a track from God featuring Jesus and Jay-Z.”
