Sixties Guns: Atypical Weirdos video
Chad Deal 9:17 p.m., May 25
The Toven
- Joined: Sept. 6, 2012
- Gender: M
- Neighborhood: Mount Hope
- Hometown: San Diego
- Occupation: Songwriter/Rapper/Producer
- Website: http://www.themilliondollarmixta...
- Comments posted: 0
- Last log-in: Dec. 10, 2012 | See activity
Biography
Born and raised in San Diego, CA.The Toven grew up as so many others did in the drug,and gang infested Mount Hope Neighborhood of Southeast San Diego and at a very young age became a product of his environment being initiated into the Neighborhood 41st street Crip gang by his older friends. This life ultimately led to numerous stints behind bars, drug sales, gang related crimes, and several near death experiences, including a shooting which left the then ray dog wounded after a drug deal went bad. The Toven is no stranger to poverty, and what it means to grow up in a single parent home which was raided several time by SDPD, and was once shot up by Cuban drug dealers due to an unpaid debt by his stepfather whom was a drug dealer, and user. Music however has always been a positive motivating factor in The Toven's life since a very young age. Listening to old school Hip hop, r&b, jazz, and rock n roll music that was played on the radio or by his elders, Toven would often pick up on the lyrics to songs very quickly, and mimic artist spending many of nights falling asleep with the radio on. In 1981 at the age of 7 The Toven did his first voice over for a Pete Ellis dodge commercial which was set up by his stepfather Shaw who influenced The Toven to sing & rap at a young age and was also a singer & musician with the local r&b group Sequence. After coming of age in the early 90's toven began actively pursuing a career in music performing on several tours as a hipeman for childhood friend Jayo Felony who was then signed to the late Jason Mizell’s (Jam Maser J) label JMJ Records The Toven was mentored by Jam Master J before his passing.The Toven is a original member of the Du Lo Gang After several failed attempts to breakthrough and a appearance on Jayo Felony's "Underground " album on the song titled "Do Lo Gang" released by Eureka Records in 1999 and on DJ Rectangle's mix tape mortal combat, The Toven began pursuing a solo career, as both a rapper,and a producer going on to record countless unreleased songs including several recorded with well known San Diego DJ, DJ Fingaz. In 2001 after being laid of off his job as a warehouse supervisor due to the 911 tragedy,Toven took his severance pay, and went on eBay, and purchased his first synthesizer keyboard an alesis qs7 bought a computer, a microphone, and cakewalk, and began recording himself despite being low budget, which led to a lot of repetitious work, but made for good practice and development (netting the self produced underground ep "The Dago City Double ep"released on consignment to a few stores in 2005) later preparing The Toven for what was next to come in the future which is The Toven's Groundbreaking long anticipated debut album and official Million Dollar Mixtape Due out in 2012 & 2013.
