A little more than a month after being appointed President of Urban Music at Island Records, Jermaine Dupri has hit the ground running by signing Compton,CA/ Hattisburg, MS rapper Hot Dollar.
According to the music mogul, Hot Dollar’s talent was too good to pass up.
“Yeah, he’s my first Island artist,” Dupri told AllHipHop.com. “His record was just one I couldn’t stop listening to and then I had him send me more songs and he had some s**t with him. I was like ‘Let’s Go.'”
Dupri believes Hot Dollar represents his ability to find quality talent, which will lead Island Records Urban Music in a solid direction.
The label is a new division of the Island Def Jam Music Group (IDJ).
“This record is one of the hottest I heard this year,†Dupri continued. “I wasn’t only brought in to make the hits, but find them as well. And I found one from the first listen as a true lover of Hip-Hop. You can tell soon as it drops, that it’s that s**t.”
Hot Dollar, who recently released his new DJ Nik Bean- hosted mixtape, Money, Respect and Techs Vol. 1, is currently working on his debut Def Jam/Island album.
The first single from the release will be “Streets on Lock. The album is slated to hit stores in the fourth quarter of this year.
As for Dupri’s So So Def label, the executive revealed that things are continuing to progress with new music from Johnta and Young Capone coming out soon.