June 27, 2003 @ 8:14 pm

HARLEM KNIGHT

Benjamin Meadows-Ingram

The honey-colored cutie in the front row has been rubbing her chest ever since Cam’Ron took the stage. Fighting for attention in Hartford’s packed Club Pyramid, she fingers the thin material of her loose black top, teasing Cam with eyefuls of flesh every time he looks her way. When the drum kicks of Cam’s current banger, “Oh Boy,” shoot through

In case you've been sleeping, Cameron Giles is back on his grizzly. Anticipation started building a year ago, when the 26-year-old MC signed with rap's reigning dream team, Roc-A-Fella. "Cam coming to the Roc is like Jordan going to the Lakers," said Damon Dash, the label's CEO. "It's just that big of a deal." Dash's sales pitch may be a bit over the top, but with rap suffering through a vicious drought, the buzz surrounding Cam'Ron has grown intense. "Cam is the hottest cat in rap right now," says DJ Kay Slay, who worked on Diplomats, Cam's self-released mix tape featuring his Harlem-based crew of the same name. "On the streets, he's surpassed Jay-Z." Riding back to New York after the Hartford show, with the album release still three weeks away, Cam'Ron is inclined to downplay the attention. "I haven't even sold one album on Roc-A-Fella yet," he says while rolling a blunt in the back of a black GMC Yukon. Cam may be smoking more trees since he quit drinking two years ago-and he's slimmed down drastically after a long bout with a hernia and an ulcer-but he remains fixed on his goals. "Maybe after I sell some records I'll get hype," he says, "but right now I'm just working." Then the record drops; Cam's third LP, Come Home With Me, led by the Just Blaze-produced single "Oh Boy," moves north of 225,000 in its first week. It's the most impressive album of his career, the home run every artist on the brink is looking for. Cam'Ron has been chasing dreams for as long as he can remember. The only child of Fredricka Giles and a father he won't discuss (who died of AIDS in 2000), Cam was raised by his mom and retired grandmother Dorothy Barfield in a five-room East Harlem apartment, just down the block from a slightly older Damon Dash. While young Dame hustled to get his foot in the music-industry door, Cam made a name for himself on the basketball court. According to Dermon Player, who coached point guard Cam'Ron (and teammates Mason Betha and Stephon Marbury) at Manhattan's Riverside Church program, Cam could have had a future in basketball if he had spent more time on his academics. "Cameron was very good," remembers Player, now an assistant coach at St. John's University. "He wasn't as talented as other players, but he was a tremendous leader and always felt he could compete with the best." But after his sophomore year, Cam realized his potential for stardom was limited, and his interest in ball began to wane. A Harlem hustler at heart, he started searching for other ways to acquire wealth. "I ain't gonna lie," Cam says. "When I realized I wasn't going pro, I went to my second option, rap. Just like basketball, it was still for the money." Under the guidance of Harlem rap legend Big L, Killa Cam, Murder Mase, and Cam's cousin Bloodshed formed a group called Children of the Corn. But then Bloodshed was killed in a car accident in April 1996, and Children of the Corn dissolved. After briefly attempting to resurrect his basketball career at Navarro Junior College in Corsicana, Texas, Cam'Ron returned to New York in 1997, determined again to become a successful rapper. Just two months after hooking up with childhood friend turned shiny bad boy Mase, Cam found himself kicking raps for Biggie Smalls in the Notorious One's apartment. Impressed, B.I.G. called his partner, Lance "Un" Rivera, and Cam'Ron made a long-term commitment to Rivera's Epic venture, Untertainment Records. "Mase was my business counselor at the time, and he had signed a seven-album deal," says Cam'Ron. "So I was like, Fuck it, he's got a seven-album deal, I got a seven-album deal, we're both gonna get money." It was a move he would live to regre When Cam dropped his 1998 debut, Confessions of Fire, all signs pointed to success. But when Mase demanded $40,000 to appear in the video for Fire's breakout single "Horse & Carriage," Cam took it as a personal and professional insult, and the two started a feud that would last until Mase ended his career in 1999. "Mase was at an all-time high then," says Kay Slay. "And Mase not being in the 'Horse & Carriage' video played a big part in preventing Cam'Ron's first album from going where it was supposed to go." After selling more than 100,000 units in its first two weeks, Confessions of Fire stalled at a gold plaque. Things got worse in the summer of 2000. Just as Cam was preparing to release his sophomore effort, S.D.E., Rivera moved Untertainment to Interscope without warning. As part of Rivera's exit agreement, Cam was left stranded on Epic, bound by his seven-album deal to a label famous for promoting pop acts like Celine Dion and Michael Jackson. "Epic and Cam'Ron were a mismatch from the beginning," says a former Epic employee who worked closely with Cam on S.D.E., and agreed to speak with VIBE only on condition of anonymity. "Epic never really had a plan for the record. After the first couple of meetings about the project, Cam realized that the label executives weren't going to fight for him, so he began fighting for himself." According to sources, Cam bum-rushed a regular meeting of Epic executives just weeks before S.D.E.'s release and demanded a private audience with the label's head of black music, Dave McPherson. Immediately after, Epic beefed up its security and permanently banned Cam'Ron from the Sony building. Faced with this uncomfortable situation, Cam asked Dash for help. "I really don't like managing," says Dash, "but if your brother asks you to do something, you do it." Dash convinced Epic that Cam'Ron was more trouble than he was worth, then signed Cam to the Roc last August for a reported $250,000 and a few album points. "Epic never understood Cam," says Dash. "They were trying to follow behind Mase and get Cam to be a radio artist, but you've gotta let Cam be Cam." As Phil Jackson and the Los Angeles Lakers know all too well, too much headstrong talent on one team can quickly become a front-office nightmare. Dash may need to take some lessons in Zen ego management from the Lakers' gray-haired guru. Cam was taking lyrical shots at Jay-Z long before other New York rappers started throwing rocks at the throne. Although he saved his sharper barbs for local mix tapes, Cam brought his dislike for Brooklyn's finest above ground on his aggressive 2000 hit "Let Me Know." Responding directly to Jay's breakout single "Can I Get AÂ…," Cam growled, "When the fuck we start bouncing?" Dash has denied any tension between his marquee players. But as Cam'Ron finished recording Come Home With Me, it looked as though it would be the label's first major release without a guest vocal from Young Hov', making the strain in Cam and Jay's relationship rather apparent. Then, at the eleventh hour, the two artists somehow found a way to work around their differences. "We don't speak much, but we both have respect for what the other is doing," says Cam'Ron. "I was sitting in the studio about to finish the album, and I told Jay that I really wanted him to be on it. We went into the studio that same night and did it." The result was "Welcome to New York City," a street anthem that lives up to the Cam'Ron meets Roc-A-Fella hype. With such starry support, Dash sees a limitless future for la Familia's Harlem representative, and has already signed Cam's Diplomats to a label deal. He also cast Cam as Harlem's infamous crack kingpin Alpo in the upcoming Roc-A-Fella Film release Paid In Full, and set Cam'Ron up with Rocawear to distribute his new cologne, Oh Boy. "I definitely think Cam can be as successful as Jay-Z," Dash says without reservation. "He's gonna do it all. Period." Crossing the Third Avenue Bridge, which links the Bronx and Harlem, Cam'Ron settles back in his seat and asks the driver to turn up the stereo. As the first few bars of Jay-Z's "Can I Live" disturb the city's 5 a.m. tranquility, Cam lights up a blunt and begins rapping along bar for bar with his new fam: "I'm watching every nigga watching me closely / My shit is butter / For the bread they wanna toast me...." "Yo, bring that back one time!" Cam shouts to one of his boys over the bass rumbling through the giant SUV. As the song begins again, he grows more excited. "Yo, this is my life right now, this is my life!" he says. It seems like after years of struggle, Cam'Ron has finally found his home.

Article tags: Cam'ron 

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