By Jae-Ha Kim
Chicago Sun-Times
December 20, 2000
Lil’ Bow Wow is 13, loves basketball and has gone on tour with ‘N Sync. And when he made an appearance at Evergreen Plaza in southwest suburban Evergreen Park recently for a CD signing, more than 10,000 fans showed up.
Not bad for a kid still in grammar school.
“I thought that things would take a little longer before I would get to do all this,” Lil’ Bow Wow says, phoning from Los Angeles prior to a guest appearance on “Moesha.” “One minute I was just a 6-year-old from Columbus, Ohio, who got onstage and rapped at the Chronic Tour. The next thing I knew, Snoop Doggy Dogg invited me backstage to meet with him and talk about music.”
That’s right. Lil’ Bow Wow (known to his family as Shad Moss) was 6!
“I don’t really think about my age a lot,” says the rapper, who will perform in Chicago Friday as part of WGCI’s “Big Jam.” “I just think about the music. I think that’s why I wasn’t too nervous when I first met Snoop. He was really nice. Plus my mother was with me and she was really happy for me.”
After guesting on Snoop’s 1993 “Doggystyle” and Will Smith’s 1999 “Wild Wild West,” the 13-year-old rapper is proud to finally have an album of his own to tout. Released in the fall, “Beware of Dog” has sold 716,000 copies, according to SoundScan.
A spokesman for Evergreen Plaza said that Lil’ Bow Wow drew the largest crowd for any artist there in the past 20 years. And those fans are all likely humming the catchy hit singles “Bounce With Me” and “Bow Wow (That’s My Name).”
Lil’ Bow Wow isn’t the only kid hitting the charts. Twelve-year-old Aaron Carter, baby brother of Backstreet Boys heartthrob Nick, has toured with Britney Spears and has a pop album out as well. And add to that number country star Billy Gilman and opera phenom Charlotte Church.
“There’s a novelty to someone like Lil’ Bow Wow or Billy Gilman that catches people’s attention,” says Geoff Mayfield, director of charts at Billboard magazine. “I heard a Top 40 DJ introduce a song by Billy by setting it up for two minutes. They’re captivated by who this kid is and don’t seem to mind that he’s country and their radio format is pop.
“There’s not as much fascination with Aaron Carter, because he’s a kid making music for other kids. But with rap, country and opera, you tend to associate those genres with older artists. So when kids do it, it kind of adds to their attraction.”
Still, fans took Aaron’s album title to heart, snapping up 638,000 copies of “Aaron’s Party (Come Get It)” since its Sept. 19 release.
A look-alike of his older brother Nick, Aaron says that if it wasn’t for his loose-lipped sister, the neighborhood kids back in Florida wouldn’t know that he was in show business.
“Most of my friends don’t know what I do,” he insists, phoning from New York. “I’m just Aaron to them. But my twin sister has a big mouth. She goes around saying my big brother’s Nick Carter and my other brother is Aaron. So some people know who I am.”
Both Aaron and Lil’ Bow Wow say they’re in music for the long haul. And that they can imagine themselves doing the same thing 10 years from now.
Of course, by then, they’ll only be 22 and 23 years old.
