Arts & Entertainment
Borough President Gives Foxy Brown the Key to Brooklyn
"It's OFFICIAL! BK Is #MINE!" the Brooklyn native wrote on Instagram.
Photo via Foxy Brown/Instagram
DOWNTOWN BROOKLYN — Inga "Foxy Brown" Marchand, 37, a rapper who came up in the Park Slope/Prospect Heights area of Brooklyn in the 80s and early 90s, and whose fame (arguably) peaked in the late 90s, was handed a big, gold "key to Brooklyn" on Feb. 29, according to a photo of the key and accompanying certificate that the artist posted to Instagram.
"Wow!!!!!!!!" she wrote. "Only ONE Chick Alone Got The 'KEY' To Her HOME #BROOKLYN!!!!!!! It's OFFICIAL! BK Is #MINE!"
"I can confirm that honor was given," Stefan Ringel, spokesman for Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, said in an email.
According to the Village Voice, Brown was born to a single mother schoolteacher in Park Slope. And according to the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce, "as a teenager she won a talent show in Park Slope for rapping."
Her 1996 record, Il Na Na, was considered a breakthrough for female rappers in a genre dominated by men.
In 2001, Brown wrote and recorded "B.K. Anthem," a song about birthplace. In it, she called Brooklyn "the wildest borough," and rapped: "It's Brooklyn, where niggas lives was tooken/ Rich cats got knocked and they wallets was tooken/ Fort Greene and Hemlock, the fifth been cocked/ We cried when they killed Lenox and popped them rocks."
Brooklyn Borough Hall's latest honoree reportedly still lives in the same area where she grew up. (Although she doesn't always get along with the neighbors.)
But Brown hasn't released an album for going on a decade now. (Her last, Brooklyn Don Diva, dropped in 2008.) Ringel, the borough president's spokesman, could not offer an explanation for the timing of the key ceremony.
"There are a countless number of talented Brooklynites whose contributions have warranted recognition from Brooklyn Borough Hall over the years via various accolades," the spokesman said.
The whole key-to-the-city concept has been trending in hip-hop this year. Within the past three weeks, Kendrick Lamar received the key to his hometown, Compton, and Drake received the key to Toronto.