New music from rapper Coolio released posthumously, album coming later this year
The estate of Grammy Award winner Coolio released new music from the late rapper on Friday.
“TAG ‘You It’,” featuring Too $hort and DJ Wino, is the first single from the “Gangsta’s Paradise” star’s posthumous album, ”Long Live Coolio.”
A Ken Francis and Kniknotti- directed music video, in which Coolio appears, also debuted on YouTube.
The sexually-explicit track was originally intended for release while Coolio was still alive, according to a statement.
The Pennsylvania-born rapper rose to fame in the 1990s and scored a huge hit in 1995 with “Gangsta’s Paradise” featuring L.V. The Stevie Wonder classic-sampled single was featured in the Michelle Pfeiffer film “Dangerous Minds” and spent three weeks atop the Billboard Hot 100 chart.
The Grammy-winning song was ranked No. 98 on Billboard’s Greatest of All Time Hot 100 Songs in 2021.
A former crack addict, Coolio, whose real name is Artis Leon Ivey Jr., gained his first taste of mainstream success with 1994′s “Fantastic Voyage,” which hit No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100.
After the success of “Gangsta’s Paradise,” the Tommy Boy Records superstar scored other Top 40 hits including “1, 2, 3, 4 (Sumpin’ New),” “It’s All the Way Live (Now)” and “C U When U Get There.”
His television work includes composing the theme for the popular Nickelodeon sitcom “Kenan & Kel,” starring Kenan Thompson and Kel Mitchell and voicing the character Kwanzaa-bot on Cartoon Network’s “Futurama.”
On the big screen, the father of 10 appeared in the movies “Dear God,” “Batman & Robin” and co-starred in the 2012 indie comedy “Two Hundred Thousand Dirty.”
Coolio died at 59 in September 2022 of suspected cardiac arrest.