I met Un Pacino around the same time I met Das Efx. When I first got with Das it wasn’t as a Dj, it was as a producer. They had taken a liking to my beats and I had become an in house producer of sorts. They put together a roster of artists they would attempt to put out and they were called The Ressless Clique. It was comprised of Dray and Skoob themselves, an R&B singer from Atlanta named J Dirty and 2 MCs from Far Rockaway, Queens. They were Scott Caine and Un which was short for Unforgettable. They were kind of a duo and had great chemistry together on a track but Un always showed that he could also be a solo artist. There was no denying he was lyrically gifted and had a unique voice.
We recorded a few Ressless Clique songs that weren’t released and eventually hit the road together. When I began to dj the shows for Das Efx we went on a nationwide tour with Black Sheep and the whole crew came. We hit just about every state in the continental US and we lived on a tour bus for over a month. We all got really tight from that experience.
After the tour Das Efx and the Ressless Clique would record some freestyles for my mixtapes and they even got released as underground white labels. We would continue to do shows together while working on new material. When we were together there would be a steady menu of blunts and beats. After one session with the guys there was a beat I played that while it wasn’t quite Das Efx’s style Un was feeling it and wanted to record a song to it. At the time I was putting together a compilation project of songs I produced so I figured I could use it on there. We hit the studio and “It’s Gangsta” was born. This was probably Un’s first solo song. It would later be on my “Dangerous Minded” album and dvd.
Un would add “Pacino” to his name and began to come into his own as an MC. I featured him on many of my mixtapes and his name began to spread. He was featured on a few songs on Das Efx’s 5th studio album “How We Do” and he did some work with Mic Geronimo before becoming a fixture of the mixtape and dvd scene. His “Hard White” mixtape series with Scott Caine and H. Brando became some of the hardest out and his freestyles and songs would appear on countless DJ mixtapes. This led to him working with Prodigy from Mobb Deep. They created many songs and eventually went on to release an album together called “Product of the 80’s” before Prodigy’s untimely death.
Since then Un Pacino has gone on to “underground legend” status. With no record deal he has released a catalog of mixtapes, albums and music videos that rival many artists signed to labels. While his style may never be commercial it’s nice to see him maintain a certain lyrical integrity that is lacking in the game today and make a respected name for himself by doing so.
#unpacino #mobbdeep #djrondevu #hardwhite #unpac #prodigy
