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Christopher Wallace was born in Brooklyn, New York on May 21, 1972. He was a very poor as a
child, and similar to many other poverty ridden males in his time, turned to drugs and hustling to
improve his financial status. As Biggie himself put it:

     "I was a full time 100 percent hustler. Sellin' drugs, waking up early in the morning,
     hitting the set selling my shit 'til the crack of dawn. My mother goin' to work would see
     me out there in the morning. That's how I was on it."

Aside from hustling, Biggie was pretty well known from his talent in another art. That being his rap
skills. Thanks to a bit of help from some friends in his neighborhood, Biggie was able to create some
mix tapes of his rhymes. These tapes were circulated throughout his neighborhood, and eventually
one ended up in the hands of Mister Cee, who was at that time DJ for Big Daddy Kane. From there, the tape was introduced to Source Magazine who included it in their "Unsigned Hype" column. Plans for a compilation of those who appeared in the column occurred but were never completed, but soon after Biggie Smalls landed himself a record deal with Uptown Records, and his producer? None other than Sean "Puffy" Combs.

Together, they completed Biggie's first album. However, before the release of the new album, Puffy
decided to leave Uptown, and start his own label. Without Puffy, Uptown decided against handling
B.I.G., and he was dropped soon after that. But this was no problem for Biggy, as he was quickly
picked up by the newly formed Bad Boy Records, owned by, you guessed it, Sean "Puffy" Combs.

This was the lift off point for the Notorious B.I.G.'s career. 1994 marked the appearance of Biggie
Smalls's debut album Ready to Die.  The success of Ready to Die was everything that Biggie and Puffy expected. At this point in time, the album has sold over 1.5 million copies. It not only launched the career of Biggie Smalls, but also introduced the world to another new young group of artists, known to the world as Junior M.A.F.I.A. Junior M.A.F.I.A. was made up of a few of Biggie's friends (Capone, Chic Delvico, Nino Brown, Lil Ceasar, Bugsy, and Lil Kim) to whom he promised would blow up with him if he ever did. Biggie kept his promise, and sure enough, Junior M.A.F.I.A.'s first album entitled Conspiracy also became a great success.  Over the next 2 years, Bad Boy continued to rise with the additions of great artists such as Faith Evans (Biggie's wife), 112, Total, and Craig Mack. And by 1997, Puffy himself launched his solo career. Everything was going wonderful for Bad Boy Entertainment--and for the Notorious B.I.G. He continued success with appearances on many songs with artists such as Da Brat, Junior M.A.F.I.A., 112, Total, Jay-Z and Lil' Kim.

By 1997, the Notorious B.I.G. was ready to release his highly anticipated second album, which he
entitled Life After Death.... The album is yet to be released, but his first single off of the new album,
Hypnotize has already hit radio stations, and is on it's way to becoming yet another hit for Big
Poppa.

In September of 1996, Rap lost one of it's great young talents, when Tupac Shakur was the victim of
a drive-by shooting in Las Vegas, Nevada. The rap industry was stunned, and saddened by this loss.
His death caused many people to begin to wonder about the content and direction of which rap was
heading. Mourning began for what was known as a great man to many. But no one could be
prepared for what was to come.

On the morning of March 9, 1997, Christopher Wallace a.k.a. the Notorious B.I.G. was himself,
shot and killed in a murder very similar to that of Tupac Shakur, whom seemed like many to be
B.I.G's biggest enemy. However no one expected words to end in something as brutal as this. For
now, the Rap industry is not only mourning one loss, but another as well. Sean "Puffy" Combs had
this to say about the Notorious B.I.G.:

     B.I.G. was one of my closest friends. Words can't express my pain. He was one of the
     greatest artists I've ever had the pleasure to work with. I love him and will always miss
     him.

Notorious's killer is yet to be found as well as Tupac's. That is the main problem with all of this. The
fact that out of the many witnesses that were present at both murders, very few, if any, came
forward. There was a sketch of the suspect at Notorious's killer.

The truth of the matter is that this killing has got to stop. If Tupac's death wasn't enough to show this,
Notorious's was indeed. It isn't about East Coast - West Coast, because that is all media hype, and
the problem didn't really go that deep. The problem was people taking conflicts to seriously, and
dealing with them in the wrong manner. Until people learn how to solve their anger through other
methods other than killing, things like this will continue on, and the problem will never be solved.