Bobby Sessions was born and raised in Pleasant Grove, Dallas Texas, a predominantly Black, low-to-lower middle income neighborhood southeast of the metroplex — a place that prepares better for survival than stardom. Midway through his formative years, Bobby and his family relocated to Rowlett, a suburb 20 miles northeast, and it can be argued that Bobby’s proximity to both realities are essential to the development of the perspectives illustrated in his music. The absence of police sirens and helicopters allowed a young Bobby Sessions to develop a passion for learning and an imagination bordered only by the limits of language. Poetry became his preferred and most celebrated medium but a few years of college in Denton, TX would repurpose Bobby’s creative strengths into what would bring him more personal fulfillment than he ever imagined. It was at the University of North Texas in 2010 that Bobby first penned a poem over a beat, and he hasn’t looked back since.

A growing profile in the pre-pubescent, area rap scene swelled Bobby’s confidence and proficiency, but bills and basic necessities don’t accept lyrics or clout for payment. Bobby spent 2010 through 2014 bouncing between jobs he hated, preparing for a destiny in which he was confident but not always certain. In 2013, he stumbled across The Secret, a documentary that is a collection of testimonials to the law of attraction. Moved and inspired by this ideology, Bobby Sessions wasted no time making the first of his many self-fulfilled promises – there is no Plan B. “What you think you become,” a quote pulled from the documentary, became Sessions’ mantra. Everything he desired, he spoke and wrote, including the words “DEF JAM” on his refrigerator in 2014.

With $50 in his bank account, Bobby set forth on a journey of self-realization, agonizing honesty and ritual denial in a life-changing effort that would ultimately produce results in the form of signing to High Standardz, under the guidance of industry veterans Vince Chapa and Jeremy “J Dot” Jones; and his first label-backed project: LOA (Law Of Attraction) in late 2015. The project was applauded widely as thought-provoking, bar-raising and a proper introduction for a still little-known Dallas act whose lead single Black America contorted necks at the Source, XXL and other media outlets that summer.

Just a little over a year after LOA, Bobby’s sophomore project Grateful, debuted and revealed an even more musically-inclined, confident and vulnerable master of ceremonies than its predecessor. Out the gate, he released “First World Problems,” a single that seeks to remind listeners of the blessings in simply being alive. Following that, Bobby released the visual component to the album’s title track, “Grateful,” praised on platforms such as REVOLT and Mass Appeal for his lyrics, visuals provided by German Torres and music production from Sikwitit and PICNICTYME – all Dallas-based creatives. If Grateful was anything more than an exceptional follow-up, it was a demonstration of Bobby and his community’s dedication to quality content – whether musical, visual or cultural.

Over the course of a year, Bobby attracted the attention of Def Jam Recordings, and most notably, their then-recently appointed CEO, Paul Rosenberg. And after a listen and meaningful exchange, Rosenberg signed Bobby Sessions to Def Jam Recordings through High Standardz, fulfilling a prophecy Sessions made four years prior.

Bobby’s ongoing story is a testament to the tenacity necessary to pursue and actualize one’s desires. From a city where creatives of color often suffer from what is mutually considered a cultural glass ceiling; where artists of every discipline are often lured by the promises and confidences of places like New York or Los Angeles or Atlanta where the blueprint has long been established and therefore more certain than these native but untested waters; where there are no satellites, outposts or industry insiders to report on the cultural richness breaking through cracks in the concrete, only scavengers with the scent of our sauce seeping from screen doors, filling heads and inspiring hooks, songs and dance moves FROM here, everywhere BUT here. Bobby Sessions fought against it. He fought against the sanitation of increasing gentrification that downsized stage time for Black arts and Black artists in Deep Ellum. He fought against the devaluation of local music coverage that deemed support of independent musicians disposable.

Before any of these accomplishments and accolades existed, Bobby Sessions willed it. He told himself, his loved ones and supporters: this day will come, this moment will arrive – a practice he’d come upon during some of his lowest moments. And through affirmation, diligence and a refusal of anything outside the lines of his dreams – everything he told us would happen, happened.

Bobby Sessions is the legend from Dallas, Texas.