PLYING TO THE TOP: Rapper Plies Puts Fort Myers on the Map

By Ronda racha penrice

Even for an industry wrought with independent success stories, Atlantic’s latest rap addition Plies seems to have come out of nowhere. Perhaps that’s because his native Fort Myers isn’t exactly on anybody’s radar. Located more in a tourist/retirement area near cities such as Sarasota, Naples and Sanibel, Fort Myers is just over 2 hours away from Miami but, according to Plies, far from a hotbed of musical activity.

“From Fort Myers’ standpoint, we never really had a major face in terms of hip-hop that made it out of that city so I think I’m kind of the first one that kind put our city on the map per se,” states Plies via telephone in between a hectic promo schedule. Plies’ moniker has been explained as relating to the tool with multiple meanings such as “putting the squeeze on” or to “pull things out.” It reportedly also has an Ebonic meaning as in “it ‘plies to me.” Plies, curiously enough, never aspired to become a rapper or enter the music industry at all. The music industry was his older brother, better known as Big Gates.

“It was kind of like an accident situation,” he says. “We had a label that my brother started, Big Gates Records, he was federally incarcerated and he wanted to do something positive when he came home so when he came home we became business partners, but I was more of a quiet investor. This was his vision in terms of being a major player in the hip-hop industry. For me, I never had any aspirations of being an artist.” He became an artist, however, while helping one of the artists nail a hook. When he couldn’t, Plies jumped on the cut and his brother insisted he stay. That spurred the underground banger, “Tell Dem Krackers Dat,” which attracted the attention of Slip-N-Slide Records, home to Trick Daddy, Trina and Rick Ross. Other street hits followed. One of them, “I Want To F*** You,” spawned Akon and Snoop’s “I Wanna Love You.”

Plies insists that not only did he never consider becoming a rapper, he never idolized rappers either. Even today, as his Atlantic Records’ debut album The Real Testament hit stores on August 7 and grabbed the #2 Billboard position during its first week of release, Plies chooses to blaze his own trail. “For me, I think it’s important to speak about issues that I’m personally familiar with, that I’ve done personally been through and personally witnessed. I try to embody my music around that,” he states passionately. “I don’t try to get caught up in the fantasy world of hip-hop, which is talking about things you don’t have, talking about things you haven’t been through. Me, I don’t get caught up in the trends of hip-hop. I try to stay in my lane and do what I feel that’s meaningful to me, which is talk about issues that I think are important. That’s what I like to call reality music.”

That reality music doesn’t exclude relationships and “Shawty,” a cut featuring T-Pain, who continues to ascend up the charts, has raised Plies’ profile all the way to the top of the charts. Hooking up with fellow Floridian T-Pain was only natural for Plies. “By us being both from Florida. He is from Tallahassee; I’m from Fort Myers,” explains Plies. “He was a fan of my underground situation for the last four years and I was a fan of his mainstream situation. He had another record that was big probably about five or six years ago that everybody in Florida was on so we thought it was the right time to get in the studio and give the state of Florida a good representation. I feel like it worked out for the best.”

Unlike many rappers who land a major deal, Plies didn’t insist on using producers who are proven hitmakers. “I think now I’m big on trying to support the cause and give other people opportunity,” he says. “I don’t really follow the direction of a lot of artists and they go working with the $50,000 track makers and those kind of people. I like to stick to my roots, man, and I don’t like to change something if it ain’t broke. A lot of the underground cats in terms of the folks that hit me every day with CDs, those are the cats I try to listen to and find something on there that’ll suit my type of music and go from there.”

Known producers aren’t completely out of the equation. “Obviously I had the pleasure of working with Nitty,” continues Plies, referring to “Got ‘Em Hatin’,” “and I think that was a real, real good look. He kind of caters to the type of music that I do. I’m keeping my ears open, man, and making sure that I always allow myself to grow as an artist so I’ll always be looking for the next hot thing that’ll fit inside my situation.”

Plies is learning a lot of things about being on a major label like Atlantic and admits that before he had a major label situation he had a false perception about how much control an artist had. “Yeah musically I thought artists had a little more freedom, but that’s not really the case,” he notes. He doesn’t begrudge the labels though. “I do kind of understand it. A lot of times when you have anybody that’s investing high-end dollars into you a lot of times people want to be hands-on with the situation. So I think for me, the biggest surprise so far from my opinion, (which I kind of respect a little bit better now from the Atlantics of the world,) which is my other business partner, kind of give me a little freedom. But that was my biggest thing. I thought once you signed a major deal it was all peaches and cream, but it ain’t really like that.”

Others’ perception of his success has become a challenge for him. “I tell my friends all the time that, when you become successful in the eyes of the consumer, everybody’s problems become your fault,” he shares. “That’s something I learned, whether it’s the people around me every day, they personal lives, their personal financial struggles, their actually become my fault because they feel like I’m financially in position to help with all those problems. I think a lot of times it ain’t fair, but that’s kind of how we are culturally so I think that’s one of the biggest surprises I learned about.”

That reality hasn’t dampened his generous spirit, however. One thing that is passionate to him is bringing hope as well as attention to the nation’s prison population. “I feel like it’s important to me to use my semi-successful situation and be a support system for the people who really, really are at the worst point in their life right now,” he says, referring to his 15-city prison tour.

“That whole prison system set-up, you don’t really hear about it,” he continues. “It’s mostly institutions off in the woods somewhere and people are away from their surroundings. You can be from Florida and they send you way to New York to do your time. I just want to shed light on they situation and try to be [as much of] a support system as possible.” Still, he doesn’t lose sight of his goals. “I’m in this business to sell records,” he says, before ending the call and resuming his promotional schedule to do just that.