Sleepy Brown

The influence of the '70s on Atlanta crooner Patrick "Sleepy" Brown is manifested in almost everything he does -- from the soulful and funk-driven textures overlaying his urban hip-hop sound to his taste in sunglasses and pants. In appearance he might resemble Isaac Hayes, but his smooth falsettos seem closer to that of Curtis Mayfield's voice. To incognizant hip-hop listeners, Sleepy Brown is simply the singer associated with OutKast, emerging in the 2000s on tracks like Big Boi's "The Way You Move" and his own Top 40 single, "I Can't Wait." Nevertheless, he has been active since the early '90s as a member of the renowned Atlanta-based production group Organized Noize. Arguably the South's most influential hip-hop producers, founders Brown, Rico Wade, and Ray Murray not only helped build the Atlanta urban contemporary scene, producing and co-writing songs for groups including TLC ("Waterfalls") and Xscape, but were intrinsically involved in cultivating the groundbreaking music of OutKast, Goodie Mob, and the rest of the Dungeon Family collective, shaping the sound of Southern hip-hop as a whole. Organized Noize continued producing hits well into the 2000s, and as Brown stepped more into the solo spotlight, his vocals often appeared next to their clientele, like Bubba Sparxxx, Nivea, and Ludacris.