Bow Wow
Many people would say that American actor and rapper Bow Wow (Shad Gregory Moss) is a lucky one. They may be even right – not every young star manages to get noticed by Snoop Dogg himself at the age of 6. Such things leave their mark, and meeting of a young performer with famous producer Jermaine Dupri was a matter of time rather than a coincidence. Still, the fact remains: Shad was only 13 when he released his first album «Beware of Dog» (2000) which quickly became platinum in the USA and Canada and finished its bedut at #8 in charts. «Beware of Dog» had four singles: «Bounce with Me» (written for movie «Big Momma’s House»), «Bow Wow (That's My Name)», «Puppy Love» and «Ghetto Girls».
Second album «Doggy Bag» was released in 2001, also got platinum status – this time just once and only in the USA– and had two singles: «Take Ya Home» and «Thank You». A year after the release of the second album, Bow Wow dropped the Lil’-prefix he had before. He said that he got older and there were «too many lil’s». Around the same time, Shad started getting leading roles in movies, so he spent some of his time not in the recording studio, but at the movie sets. Whether it was the reason, or the fact that Dupri wasn’t around, but third album «Unleashed» (2003) was rather modest, peaking at #3 in the American chart, but failing to sale million copies.
The next studio record resumed its normal course, though, and joint efforts resulted in album «Wanted» (2005) featuring Snoop Dogg and J-Kwon. Three successful singles «Let Me Hold You», «Like You» and «Fresh Azimiz» brought the album platinum status and international fame. This album set the stage for other trends, though: the following albums showed worse sales despite high positions in charts. Thus, album «The Price of Fame» (2006) hardly managed to sell half a million copies. «New Jack City II» (2009), which was the first album of Bow Wow to include parential advisory, failed to sale even hundred thousand copies. Shad even had to ask fans to make him a birthday present and get the album to the top chart positions, but the fans didn’t follow, they had new favourites by that time…
Album «Underrated», which underwent the change of the recording studio on the production stage, is scheduled for release in March 2012. It will be the second album of the performer released without Jermaine Dupri. Will Bow Wow manage to proceed without his mentor and get back to the world of rap? This question remains open…
