Photo by TK Atakora
Atlanta MC PeeWee Longway is often credited as “your favorite rapper’s favorite rapper,” a distinction that commands respect from other artists, though doesn’t always provide a commercial boost. Longway’s influence extends far beyond his own career, however, as Migos rapper Offset reminded us in a recent interview with i-d.
“We actually recorded with PeeWee Longway, since he had a studio [in Atlanta],” Offset explained about Migos' early days in hip-hop. “Everyone would hang out there, even Lil Baby from the Lil Baby and Gunna duo would hang there before he became a rapper. PeeWee has done a lot for Atlanta rap, he’s also the one who introduced us to P, the other head of the Quality Control label, and it’s with them that we signed a deal which allowed our career to take off.”
Migos inked their QC deal in 2013, and the label helped mold the group into stars. More than just cosign Migos, however, Longway also rapped with them. He has at least one feature on each of the first three installments of Migos' Streets On Lock mixtape series, rapping on songs like “Switch A Roo” and “Dirty Stick” dating back to 2013.
PeeWee also appeared alongside Migos on “Sloppy Toppy,” a standout cut from Travis Scott’s critically acclaimed 2014 mixtape, Days Before Rodeo. The mixtape features a separate appearance from Young Thug, which coincides with another important PeeWee cosign.
Young Thug and PeeWee grew up in the same apartment building. As PeeWee explained in a 2017 interview with VladTV, it was Thugger who first convinced him to try rapping. In return, PeeWee leveraged his longstanding friendship with Gucci Mane to get Thugger his first record deal with 1017.
“I met Thug through PeeWee Longway,“ Gucci Mane said in a 2016 XXL interview. "I know PeeWee from when I used to rap at a local spot in East Atlanta…I was trapping then and and PeeWee was trapping too. So that was our connection. I never even knew he did music.”
Years later, Gucci heard that PeeWee had started rapping, and invited him to the studio to check out his music. He planned to sign PeeWee to 1017, but PeeWee insisted that Gucci sign Thugger instead.
“PeeWee was like, ‘Gucci listen, they hard, they the ones that got me to start rapping. Sign them,‘” Gucci told XXL. “I had a bag with some money, I got $25,000 out. I gave it to him right then and signed Thug right there. I never heard a song. Just because he told me to sign him. I value PeeWee’s opinion so much.”
PeeWee notched multiple appearances on early Thugger releases like 1017 Thug, Young Thugga Mane La Flare, and Rich Gang: Tha Tour Pt. 1. One such feature came on “Loaded,” one of Thugger’s earliest hits alongside “Danny Glover” and “Stoner.”
Although PeeWee ceded his initial 1017 deal to Thugger, he still built a relationship with Gucci Mane. He would become a mainstay on Gucci’s World War 3 and Brick Factory mixtape series, and the two rappers linked up with Young Dolph for the Felix Brothers joint project in 2015. At one point, Gucci even claimed that PeeWee was a better rapper than him. PeeWee signed to 1017 shortly before Gucci’s 2014 incarceration, but he ended up a free agent not long afterwards.
The Atlanta MC built bridges beyond his home city, too. Longway nabbed a feature from A$AP Rocky in 2014 on the remix of “Servin' Lean,” a cut off the first installment of his signature mixtape series, The Blue M&M. In his VladTV interview, PeeWee explained that A$AP Yams was planning to shop him to labels before the A$AP founder’s drug overdose death in January 2015.
“Those folks believed in Longway before Longway believed in himself,“ PeeWee said about A$AP Mob. “[Yams] was talking about taking us straight to the label… He was just connecting all the pieces to the puzzle.”
The label deal never came together, and PeeWee remains an independent artist to this day. Despite associating with and facilitating the careers of several of Atlanta’s biggest artists over the past decade, the rapper hasn’t experienced the same breakout success. Some have criticized him for sounding too much like Thug, while PeeWee himself has reflected on how the lack of support from a label has held him back. His biggest solo moment came in 2017 with “Rerocc,” a cut off The Blue M&M 3:
Regardless of his own prominence, PeeWee’s influence continues to play out in Atlanta’s rap scene. As Offset pointed out to i-d, the city’s latest ascendant star Lil Baby got started hanging with PeeWee in the studio, too. Baby even recently cited PeeWee as the reason he started smoking Backwoods. He also continues to put out his own music with his projects Spaghetti Factory and State Of The Art dropping in 2018.
While PeeWee Longway may not be a household name, he’s proven to be an influential force on the development of Atlanta’s rap scene, in some cases promoting his friends' talents ahead of his own. Whether it was helping Migos and Young Thug score record deals, laying down features with Gucci Mane and Travis Scott, or catching the ear of A$AP Yams, PeeWee Longway’s influence is undeniable.
