Lupe Fiasco

In grade six, Lupe Fiasco moved out of Chicago to the suburb of Harvey, Illinois. He lived with his father who taught him how to use guns because they lived next door to a crack house.

Despite an unstable upbringing living between his divorced parents, Lupe Fiasco was a very smart child who excelled in a variety of subjects in school. As a teenager, he was also in athletic decathlon competitions.

At first, Lupe Fiasco hated rap because of its vulgarity. He preferred to listen to jazz music and idolized clarinet player Benny Goodman. He struggled to learn how to play an instrument however, which led him to writing poetry and eventually turning his poems into rhymes.