Actors - Ice T

	Actors - Ice T

Tracy Marrow (born February 16, 1958 in Newark, New Jersey), better known as Ice-T, is an American rapper, author and actor. He is one of the pioneers of gangsta rap and was also instrumental in creating rapcore. His subject matter stands as a mixture between the political awareness of Public Enemy and the hedonism of N.W.A.

Career

He was born in Newark, but grew up in Los Angeles. After high school, Ice-T joined the Army and served as a ranger in the 25th Infantry. He did not enjoy the experience explaining "I didn't like total submission to a leader other than myself."

Musician

Ice-T started out with other West Coast rap pioneers such as Kid Frost, DJ Flash, and Egyptian Lover with Electro recordings. Later on, he changed his style and was the first West Coast rapper to be accepted by the East Coast. "6'n The Morning" is sometimes seen as the track that triggered the whole gangster rap movement. It was produced by The Unknown DJ, who produced electro funk tracks before and went on to produce Compton's Most Wanted. The song was inspired by Schoolly D's "PSK" and became itself the inspiration for Eazy E and N.W.A.'s "Boyz N The Hood." Ice-T went on to work with Afrika Islam, the man behind the beats on 1987's Rhyme Pays, 1988's Power and 1989's The Iceberg/Freedom of Speech... Just watch what you say.

As the title of this third album suggests, Ice-T was from the start not merely a gangster rapper—although he was one of the driving forces behind the new style—but also used rap music as a platform for social and political activism; Seymour Stein called him "the Bob Dylan of rap." On "Freedom of Speech," Ice-T attacked Tipper Gore for introducing the Parental Advisory sticker. In 1991, Ice T's fourth album, Original Gangster, came out; including raps about child abuse and drunk driving as well as the theme song from the movie New Jack City
by Mario Van Peebles, the movie that re-launched Ice's career as an actor.

In 1991, Ice formed the rapcore/crossover band Body Count. Their debut self-titled album contained a song called "Cop Killer", which led to the "Cop Killer controversy". This escalated to the point where death threats were sent to Warner Bros executives and stockholders threatened to pull out of the company. This eventually caused the album to be re-issued with "Cop Killer" removed, and Warner Brothers Records to drop him from the label. He answered the controversy by saying the song was written in character, and that "if you believe that I'm a cop killer, you believe David Bowie is an astronaut." Indeed, Ice-T has portrayed police officers many times in his acting career.

Virgin Records released his next album Home Invasion (1993), a politically-oriented album that featured a new female rapper named Grip and Ice T's longtime DJ Evil E as a rapper himself. On VI - Return of the Real, Ice returned to his gangsta rap roots. His 7th Deadly Sin (1999), one of the first records to be distributed via mp3 before appearing in record stores, continued in this vein.

In 2000, Ice-T teamed up with East Coast rap pioneer Kool Keith from the Ultramagnetic MCs to form the Analog Brothers, widely considered an artistically successful experiment. The same year also brought Ice-T's Greatest Hits: The Evidence. More recently, Ice-T formed a new group called SMG (Sex Money and Gunz) with East Coast gangster rappers Smoothe Da Hustler and Trigger The Gambler.

Ice-T has written and performed songs for many movie soundtracks including "Big Gun" for Tank Girl
as well as title tracks for Colors
, Dick Tracy
, New Jack City
, Ricochet, and Trespass (with Ice Cube.) (He starred in all of them, save Dick Tracy'and 'Colors.) He teamed with Kid Frost to perform "Tears of a Mother" for the film No Mothers Crying, No Babies Dying.

Actor

He debuted as a rapper in the films Breakin'
and Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo
in 1984, only two years after his first 12" ("The Coldest Rap," 1982) appeared. In 1991, he embarked onto a serious acting career, playing a police detective in Mario Van Peebles' film New Jack City, followed by a notable lead role performance in Surviving the Game
in addition to his many supporting roles. He has also appeared in films such as R'Xmas by Abel Ferrara and Tank Girl. He also starred in 3000 Miles to Graceland in 2001. In more current and recent acting engagements, Ice-T plays Det. Odafin "Fin" Tutuola on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, perhaps an ironic role, considering the early controversy surrounding his group Body Count. Another TV series that features Ice-T is "Players." Ice-T also appears in the movie Leprechaun in the Hood.

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Actors - Ice T

Career

Musician

Actor

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