Ja Rule

Steered to rap superstardom by producer Irv Gotti on the Murder Inc. label, Ja Rule found a killer crossover formula by blending his bassy and gruff vocal stylings with a sweet array of backup divas, notably Ashanti and J-Lo. He began his assault on hip-hop immortality with the single "Holla Holla" from his 1999 debut, Venni Vetti Vecci.

Ja Rule made a lucrative habit of splitting his interests between the thug side of his rap persona, the tortured street poet, and the sensitive lover man. Once he realized the huge potential of his less abrasive crossover material, he knew he had captured lightning in a bottle. Even so, slammin' thug jams like "So Much Pain" keep him real.

Is it all about the Benjamins? Or the streets? That's been the central question hurled (notably by former accomplice DMX and rival 50 Cent) at Ja Rule, whose records fly off shelves in impressively gargantuan numbers. What you get with Ja is a mix of rough and smooth. Connoisseurs of the rough should not overlook "The Warning."

The first two years of the millennium were meteoric for Ja Rule. Backed by the shrewd hard-meets-soft production smarts of Murder Inc., he not only conquered East Coast rap, but also muscled his way onto West Coast celluloid in The Fast and the Furious. Naturally, the voices of street authenticity cried foul, but Ja continues to please most of the people most of the time. Collaborations like "Wonderful" (featuring Ashanti and R. Kelly) are untouchable.