This was also a time when John witnessed abuse, drug use and financial hardship that his mother had to endure.

“My mom was young and wild. Sometimes, we’d be skipping rent. Sometimes, she’d be in love with a young man who lived in L.A. We’d just be moving a lot. A lot of partying, a lot of drugs…” he says of his mother’s early problems. He also saw a man “do a lot of dirt” to his mother. But, as he noted in his poetry book "The South Bay Blues" and in this interview, he holds no real hatred for him or his mother. When speaking with me, he opened up about this "man".

“Growing up and seeing him do a lot of dirt to my mom…And he was young himself, a lot of drugs, a lot of verbal and physical abuse and stuff like that like stealing money…But seeing him grow out of that and stop the drugs and the drinking and kind of get his life straight- It really opened my mind to kind of, almost forgive him for the stuff he did when he was younger and see him in a hopeful way like maybe things can change and get better,” he confides.

In the midst of this perplexing childhood, John was able to find solace in music.

“I think what really got me over it was Hip-Hop and writing songs and going to The Good Life Café,” he adds. The Good Life, a legendary spot in Los Angeles for influential artists of the area including Jurassic 5, Freestyle Fellowship and Black Eyed Peas, heavily frowned upon biting and openly displayed distaste by booing biters off the stage. This forced him to find his own style.

“I gave up trying to be someone else. That helped me say ‘I’m Pigeon John.’ And I accepted who I was racially, and who I was socially and artistically…all of that…my past, what made me up. And I started celebrating that, in my music and in my life.”

He was forced to find his niche. After all, what MC would want to hear Please Pass The Mic!? Or an onslaught of boos?

Honing his skills, he began recording and performing for his first album Pigeon John Is Clueless, made from “demos,” which led to his “first professional record” in Pigeon John Is Dating Your Sister. Both LPs received critical notoriety, as well as a national underground buzz. Slowly but surely, his stock kept rising as PJ kept touring, grinding over stages across the nation next to the likes of Atmosphere, Brother Ali and The Living Legends.

In 2004, he finally released a book of poems, the aforementioned "South Bay Blues", followed up by an album, Pigeon John Sings The Blues. And suddenly, the press came knocking. With critical praise from Entertainment Weekly, Spin and various other publications, John’s years of hard work in the UG seemed to be working to his advantage. But he never stopped the grueling tours or hard work ethic, which led to an encounter with Lyrics Born during one of his many tour dates. Continued on page 3 »