Small town kid with a big dream, Don Zio P – a budding independent recording artist coming out of Connecticut talks about how his lifestyle and influence led him to his style of rap and how his brand ‘Young Tatted Homies came together. Being multi-cultural made his style unique and has attracted a diverse audience. The nature of Don Zio P’s name hints at the diversity of both his heritage and his music. “My mother is Jamaican, and my father is Italian.” “My real name is PJ, so my niece always calls me ‘Uncle P.’ ‘Don’ comes from the Jamaican side; my grandmother gave me that nickname. ‘Zio’ is Italian for ‘Uncle.’ “P’ is me. The name is every side of who I am.
Lady Demon or Diamond, talks about losing her child’s father and the struggles of keeping his legacy alive in new interview during A3C weekend in Atlanta, Ga.
At just 19 years old, Hadii is a strong example of the aforementioned point about rap being the modern day blues. Even at such a young age, the level of emotion present in Hadii’s songwriting and singing is designed to offer strong resonance with listeners, personal in inspiration yet universal in thematics. In this way, the Jersey teenager displays a level of artistry and introspection far beyond his years, guided by soul-stricken lines like “I thought you was here but you not” — simplistic yet deeply impactful when rounded out by detailed verses of life around him in New Jersey. These traits and more lend to the fact that Hadii is building on a massively interesting blues-influenced style, which impresses in direct correlation with the honesty of the artist — a cornerstone part of the Jersey talent’s music.
I began my music career as a college freshman in my dorm room. I had just received my refund check and I used the money to purchase my first mic and piano. Initially, it was just a hobby and my goal was to build a team of artists around me that would use me as their primary producer. But at the time my talent level didn’t match my expectations (I sucked lol) so it was difficult finding artists who wanted to work me. So after about 6 months of rejection, I decided that I would teach myself to rap, that way I could just use my own beats. Over the course of the next four years, I spent my between class, music, and building my name around the state as a college party host/promoter. Everything was going good and then the pandemic hit. It was during this time that I made the decision to focus solely on music. Since then I’ve dropped 2 EPs and been on two nationwide tours.
I’m not really from the city of Atlanta, I’m from the county which is Riverdale, Clayton County the south side. Growing up, I was in sports a little bit. I really was optimistic. I never really knew what I wanted to be when I got older, I knew I wanted to be bigger than my situation. I constantly was going through trial and error, trying stuff. I went to school, high school, college as well. I had a fun childhood, I can’t complain. Turn the struggle into fun times. *Biggest influences?* Growing up, I was in the Nicki era. I fell in love with music through R&B, so I always say Jodeci and Tank. The 2000 hip-hop scene of Atlanta which was Outkast, T.I. D4L, people of that nature. *At what point did you realize you could do music for a living?* Once I started doing it. Music like anything else, when you get into your passion and what your calling really is, you start to grow in it and you can’t do nothing else. After really venturing out and learning myself with music, I couldn’t go backwards. *Your dad was in the music industry, what did you learn from him?* My dad still does AD work so he works on a lot of videos, mainstream artists’ videos.
