II Crunk 4 Jesus

Rickie Bradford “II Crunk 4 Jesus” was born on the island gulf coast city of Galveston, Texas in September of 1977. Fifty miles from Houston and seeking refuge from one of the Texas coasts most costly hurricanes, Alicia, forced his family to relocate inland to the metropolis of Houston in 1983, settling in the urban neighborhood of Acres homes. He acquired the nick name “II Crunk” from friends who doted on his enthusiasm during half time high school football games.

In Houston, “II Crunk” attended a variety of schools. He attended such elementary, junior and high schools as Osborne, Hidden Valley, Stovall and Aldine.

From early childhood, “II Crunk” was charismatically extroverted and loved to perform. At age 7, he was quickly noticed as a young virtuoso of lyricism. He started rapping and dancing with Acres Home dance team, performed at the Apollo Theatre in New York twice, appeared on PBS Kids’ Show, black history programs and numerous talent shows.

Dealing with the divorce of his parents, lead him to seek attention with unlikely characters and fall in and out of local street gangs. After high school he went on to attend Prairie View A&M University with a scholarship in drama and football. Still pondering the dissolution of his parent’s marriage, he fell back into local street gangs, fighting, selling drugs, and thereby forfeiting his scholarship.

“II Crunk” had a short stint in the military, he returned back home to Houston where he hooked up with other local rappers, whose ambition were to become the first Houston based rap group to represent the city and not one specified “hood”, so together they formed , “Houstunnaz”.

Gangster rap, the artist admits was never cut out for him, leaving him unfulfilled with his craft and the fact that he wasn’t being a powerful voice of positivity for youth. He heard the voice of God calling him to the ministry. Not in the conventional pulpit prose, but combined his talent of creating auditory art plus the word of God.

The pivotal moment came when he changed his name from “II Crunk” to “II Crunk 4 Jesus” and formed Christian rap group, The Jesus Boyz.

Knowing the troubles and pressures of being a youth, one of his main goals is to create a non profit organization for male youth between the ages of 10-18 yrs old. After school programs like sports, tutorials, self improvement and esteem classes all while spreading and teaching the legacy of Jesus Christ.

Keeping his heart for Christ, his testimonial is powerful. Often asked if he is a hypocrite for performing with secular rappers and in night clubs; he simply replies that, “Jesus went into the belly of the beast to preach the word and save the world.”