FIRST PLACE: Finest Native Hip-Hop Artist
Though he gained the class for finest hip-hop artist, Larry Barron — in any other case recognized by his stage identify LB the Poet — considers himself a spoken phrase artist first.
“I’m a poet to the core and that’s the place plenty of my recognition has come from,” he says in an interview.
Barron has been lively within the Winston-Salem neighborhood for years, working to infuse poetry and spoken phrase into the general public faculty system and has been placing on story slams through Zoom in the course of the pandemic. In November 2019, Barron dropped his first full-length studio album, Transitions, which bridges the hole between his love of writing and efficiency. However in contrast to many hip-hop albums and artists, Barron says he needed to maintain his album “clear” and made positive to not use profanity and flipped the thought of a “parental advisory”, as a substitute calling it a “optimistic affirmation”.
“I need you to have the ability to activate my music within the morning and really feel good,” he says.
Earlier than the pandemic hit, Barron had deliberate a small tour for Transitions however says he needed to postpone that till subsequent yr. He’s additionally acquired one other venture that he says is ready to drop subsequent summer season.
“It’s been superb to witness my development from the opposite facet of the mirror,” he says. “Truthfully, you develop increasingly more on a regular basis and as an artist, we’re ever evolving.”
And to be picked his metropolis’s favourite hip-hop artist means rather a lot as a result of he was born and raised in Winston-Salem, Barron says.
“I actually wish to lengthen my honest gratitude as a result of I’m a poet first,” he says. “Nevertheless it’s fairly clear that my supporters and my tribe have moved genres with me. I do know I’ve gained some new followers and that’s cool, I get pleasure from each little bit of it. However to know that my core fan base, my core supporters haven’t gone wherever, that’s superior, and it’s solely gonna develop.” (lbthepoet.com)
— SM
