XO the Specialist's Page

Brandon Reed a native of Mobile, Alabama, started rapping at the age of sixteen. Taking a few years to tune his skills and only armed with an electric keyboard, mixer, mike and recorder, made homemade tapes that got him pushed out onto the club scene. There he began spouting alliterations and slant rhymes that rebound off of the everyday with a kind of force and earnestness that brings complexity to what is deceptively simple. Bringing his words to crowds started earning him attention by well known producers and artist. Performing Hundreds of rhymes paved the path to him opening and working with some of the top rappers and producers of the day, including the likes of Plies, Little John, Young Jeezy, Little Wayne, Pastor Troy, and the list goes on. In addition, he appears on The Urban Network compilation album with such artist as Fabulous, Missy Elliott, Tweet, and Mob Deep. He has also produced and written for Jody Breeze, Bohagen, and Pastor Troy and also has received production from David Banner.
His voice comes out of the rough to hit you just where you are, his hooks reach across demographics, culture, and age. XO (formerly Psykotik) came out with the title album A Diamond in the Rough was partly created to address the myth behind the talent coming out of Alabama, a state with the third highest homicide rate and the highest crime rate in 2001 and the outstanding HIDTA (High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area) of the nation, so it is easy to surmise that those boys in Alabama don’t just grow hemp out they mamas backyards. XO’s (formerly Psykotik) message isn’t even about that hard core rap that is burning out over the radio anyway. It is to give more recognition to the state of Alabama in which it is more than a travel route to Florida or Georgia. When I tell people I’m from Alabama they look at me crazy, like you’re not from Alabama, because I know how to handle myself . . . there’s talent in Alabama, but nobody comes to Alabama. It’s like a dark space on the earth. Well diamonds are formed in dark, dense places. They are shaped by force and XO (formerly Psykotik) certainly has experienced enough pressure to attain a high clarity grade.
In the year 2003 with a lot of drive to further his music career he started his own record label C4ntertainment when he moved to Atlanta, GA. This move panned out to be a very great opportunity in which even more doors were opened to XO. One movement that came from this was XO going on The Southern Smoke Tour with Rick Ross, Trina, Lil Boosie, and Flo Rida in 2008. Which also in turn lead to him opening for Young Jeezy in South Carolina. With his Diamond personality he definitely got the attention of the Bentley Boyz Entertainment. That has lead to XO being Bentley Boyz Entertainment’s Flagship artist, and Down South’s newest lyrical Beast.