T.I. has regarded himself as the King of the South for quite some time – but he sought out permission from the legends who came before him before doing so, including OutKast, Scarface, Bun B and more.
Talking to AllHipHop in a conversation published on October 16, Tip recalled the reactions he got when he first asked, noting that had he gotten any opposition, he would not have adopted the moniker.
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“The first time I called myself the ‘King of the South,’ I went and asked everybody that I had access to for their blessings,” he said. “I asked Big Boi from OutKast, I asked [André] 3000, Cee-Lo, Khujo, T-Mo and [Big] Gipp [of Goodie Mobb], 8 Ball, MJG, Bun B and Scarface. So I asked all of them how they felt about it, what they thought about it and all of them for the most part gave me their blessings.
“I remember Scarface said, ‘Hell yeah go ahead. I don’t wanna be king! You could have that shit.’ Then I asked 3000 and he hit me with, ‘What does it really mean to be king?’ And Big Boi said, ‘Aight now, be careful what you ask for because you known as the king, they gon’ put the target on your back. Ain’t nobody going to be trying to help you out with nothing. So just be careful what you ask for.’
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He concluded: “It took me later in life to really understand what he was telling me. He was really telling me that I was causing myself to have more anguish than necessary — like in chess, the object is to kill the king.”
The convo begins around the one-minute mark below.
T.I. is ready to put the moniker to bed with his 12th and final album, Kill The King. Talking to TMZ about the project last year, he explained how he came to the decision to leave his famous nickname behind.
“I feel like the King of the South moniker is very egotistical, self-gratuitous and it’s a persona that kinda enters the room before I do physically,” Tip said. “And Big Boi, actually, he cautioned me of this back when I was just coming onto the scene.”
The first recorded instance of T.I. calling himself “King of the South” appeared on the Beanie Sigel-assisted track ” “2 Glock 9’s,” which was featured on the soundtrack to Samuel L. Jackson’s reboot of Shaft in 2000.
The Atlanta native explained that he first decided to stake his claim after hearing Mystikal refer to himself as the “Prince of the South” on one of his songs.
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“When people heard it, the visceral reaction that they had, that’s what made it more personal for me,” T.I. said. “When people started telling me ‘You can’t call yourself that.’ I said, ‘Who the fuck are you to tell me what I can and can’t call MYSELF.’ And that’s when I began to feel more ownership; I felt like, ‘Well now, I got to stand on this.’”
