Business Versus Pleasure

Lil' Troy keeps on ballin', on CD and video, at least

A A A Comments (0) By Craig D. Lindsey Thursday, Aug 2 2001

Although he keeps his playa-rific reputation intact on the mike, he tries to hip kids to the difference between a baller and just playing a baller on CD. His feature-film (well, straight-to-video) debut, the aptly titled Wanna Be a Baller: The Movie, stressed this theme. In it, Troy plays the baller all ballers wish they could be, and his teenage son, Troy Birkett Jr., plays his visiting nephew. While Troy's character spends most of the movie luxuriating in the baller life (having a three-way with twins, hitting the parties), he tries to instill a sense of morality in his younger kinfolk.

"I wanted [audiences] to know there's a better way," he says. "And my nephew in the movie…he's thinking that I'm out selling drugs and this street life 'cause I got all the girls, women, clothes and all that. So he wanna go off and sell drugs too, 'cause he believes that's what I'm doing. So I have to show him that there's a better way than selling drugs." Troy also recently took part in a program, exclusively for HISD schools, in which he and his son (who raps under the moniker T-2) visit different schools and talk to kids about the dangers of drugs. The title: "Real Ballers Don't Do Drugs."

Melvin Dixon

Don't expect any public service announcements from a Lil' Troy CD.

Details

Saturday, August 4. For tickets, call 713-629-3700.

Compaq Center, 10 Greenway Plaza

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You have to admire Troy's candor. While other MCs live the baller lifestyle to the hilt, Lil' Troy just plays off the image of it, simply because he knows it's good for business. "Buy my record for enjoyment, just to listen to it," declares Troy. "Just like you go to the movies and watch Arnold Schwarzenegger kill all these folks…My music is entertainment -- that's it. So don't listen to my music thinking you're gonna get a public service announcement out of it."