Kardinal Offishall, Def Jam’s Newest Exec, Says Canada’s Music Industry Needs ‘Radical Change’: ‘We’re Decades Behind Other Countries’

etcanada.com:

Kardinal Offishall still remembers a time when nobody wanted to hire him. And he means nobody. “Everybody turned me down: Gap, Foot Locker,” the Toronto-born rapper and music executive tells ET Canada. “The only thing I never applied for was McDonald’s, and that’s because there’s no way I was going to work at McDonald’s.

But everybody fronted on me, so you know, it was music or bust.” Thankfully, the music turned out alright. Today, Offishall is a Canadian hip hop god, gifting us some of the nation’s most groundbreaking and unimpeachable hits, from the Rascalz’s 1998 classic “Northern Touch” (which celebrates its 25th anniversary this year) to 2008’s “Dangerous” with Akon, which made him the first Canuck rapper to land on the Billboard Top 100 chart.

At this year’s Juno Awards on March 13, Offishall will lead viewers through a celebration of the 50th anniversary of hip hop, taking a special look at the genre through a Canadian lens.  READ MORE: Kardinal Offishall, Haviah Mighty, TOBi & More Give Flowers To The Black Icons Who’ve Inspired Them Offishall, who began releasing music in the mid-’90s, made a name for himself with his bombastic, uniquely Caribbean-Torontonian sound back when there wasn’t a blueprint for success for hip hop musicians in Canada. “Of course, we had Maestro and Michie [Mee], but it seemed like those were unicorn avenues, as opposed to like, if you follow these steps you would get to a certain place,” he says. “It was like being dropped off in the middle of the Brazilian rainforest and having to chop your way through, hoping that once you get to the other side, that’s where the water supply is.