In 1991, he made his debut appearance on the single "Trick or Treat" by Wild West Corral alongside B.O.X., Ganjah K, Torche and produced by DJ Battlecat.
From a young age, Austin was influenced by hip hop music and inspired by a variety of emcees including Ice Cube, Rakim, Scarface, and KRS-One.
The album was released on Priority Records, as was the follow-up, Rasassination, which featured beats from Easy Mo Bee and guest appearances by RZA, Twista, Xzibit, Mack 10 and Dr. Dre.
Ras went back to work overhauling the project, procuring tracks from DJ Premier, Hi-Tek, and Dr. Dre and retaining songs from Rockwilder and Battlecat.
Tensions arose during the re-recording, from budget restrictions to lack of promotion: Despite the fact that "Van Gogh" remained shelved the album's singles "Back It Up" and "Goldyn Chyld" received a decent number of spins on Los Angeles urban contemporary radio stations KKBT (The Beat) and KPWR (Power 106) during the course of 2001–02.
Ironically, I would still somehow manage to make a couple pairs.Since 1999 Ras Kass has also been involved in MC supergroup The HRSMN, alternately called The 4 Horsemen, consisting of himself, Kurupt (of Tha Dogg Pound), Killah Priest, and Canibus.
Tragedy Khadafi - opening the compilation in question provided some proof the supergroup never parted ways permanently, but it took until 2021 before the official full-length debut LP The Last Ride became reality on Cre8yte Records, distributed by Fat Beats with M-Eighty and Ras Kass as executive producers.
It contains 12 new tracks featuring guests such as Hus Kingpin, Tragedy Khadafi, Planet Asia, Phil Da Agony and Chino XL, as well as producers Twiz the Beat Pro, Omid G, Bronze Nazareth, Nikkle Plated and Anno Domini among others.
Originally pushing "Goldyn Chyld," produced by DJ Premier, Priority executives decided to release the Dr. Dre-produced "The Whoop" instead, against the wishes of both Ras Kass and Dr. Dre.
[12] During this time, he also had minor problems with producer the Alchemist, who sold Ras a beat that he later re-sold to rapper Jadakiss, which ultimately formed the basis for the track "We Gonna Make It".
(All Day I Dream About Spittin) project and a viral marketing campaign called "Save The Ras Kass", which included a series of satirical web episodes about the plight of the endangered emcee.
When we put out The Quarterly there were people that said, ‘well how come you didn’t create a CD for this?’ and I'm like ‘well if I have to spend that $5000 and you want one, I appreciate it but there’s the small problem that I spent $5000.’"[23] His webisodes document the downfall of an emcee, as he explained, "You just see this downward spiral; it’s just that fall from grace and I’m kind of making fun of that and using me as the vehicle for it.
"[23] Finally, Ras Kass exceeded the $3,800 needed for the record in less than five days,[24] with the project being released as a limited edition double CD and LP on July 20, 2011.