Violator Drops Compilation Album

What is Chris Lighty if he wasn't such a baby? A mogul. While "Baby" Chris Lighty may not have the inflated profile of other hip-hop mega-moguls|, for the last twelve years the 30-year-old Bronx native has quietly been making power moves.

Now the original Violator and manager of Noreaga, Missy Elliot, Q-Tip, Cam'ron, Mobb Deep and Busta Rhymes is releasing Violator The Album through his own Violator/Def Jam imprint. Those artists will be featured on the 16-song record, alongside other past and present Violators Fat Joe, The Beatnuts, Flipmode Squad, LL Cool J as well as newer artists Thugged Out, L-Boogie and Mysonne.

The album drops on July 27 but anxious fans can cop the first single on the MP3.com right now. "Vivrant Thing," Q-Tip's first solo single is downloadable for free.

The record has been a long time coming. In the late eighties Lighty turned down a University of Maryland basketball scholarship for a more vocational form of education. "I grew up in the Bronx and ran with [Kool DJ] Red Alert," he remembers. "I used to carry his crates to the clubs."

In his quest to learn the business, he became a jack of all trades. "I was a slash," he laughs. "slash DJ, slash road manager, slash...." Lighty then became the fourth Jungle Brother and witness to the Native Tongues legacy.

He went on to manage Tribe and De La as a member of Rush Management. Under the tutelage of Rush Management head Lyor Cohen he learned that it was best to keep a low profile. "Lyor Cohen is just as big as [other record executives such as Puffy and Russell Simmons,] Lighty says. "I'm just trying to get the job done and not be in the limelight. We're trying to build the company [Violator]; I'd rather be respected than idolized."

He has also parlayed that prowess into movies: He is currently in negotiations with studios such as Paramount and MTV to put Busta and Missy in the movies.

In recent years he has managed artists such as CNN, Fat Joe and The Beatnuts who didn't follow the Native Tongue's model of positivity. He seems to understand that hip-hop is cyclic. "I love what we did back then," he says, "but you have to change with the times."

With two recent protest songs about Mumia-Abu Jamal and Amadou Diallo, the times appear to be changing. Still he doesn't see a return to the overtly positive Native Tongues. "I don't know that it's going to be as blatant," he says. "Sometimes you have to-and that's what I've learned from the Natives Tongues situation-beat them in the head a different way. You just can't beat the drum and say we have to do good, we have to do good. Sometimes it's just the little subliminal things will make a person look up and take heed."

ADAM MATTHEWS