Rapper still doing ‘Vegas thing’

He's beginning to live up to his name, in more than just physical terms.

At 6 foot 7 and a sturdy 330 pounds, Vegas-based rapper/singer-songwriter Big B (aka Bryan Mahoney) has earned his handle, though it has been taking on a new dimension of late.

Big B's current single, the breezy sounding, acoustic "Sinner," recently cracked the top 30 of the modern rock radio charts, and his latest disc and fourth overall, "American Underdog," is off to a promising start saleswise.

Mahoney has been a regular on hit A&E reality show "Inked," which is centered on the Hart & Huntington Tattoo Co. owned in part by Motocross star Carey Hart. Currently, he's MCing the latest installment of the Jagermeister Tour, with Pennywise and Pepper, which stops at the House of Blues on Friday.

And yet, here in Vegas, Mahoney's profile isn't nearly as sizable as his beefy frame.

"I'm kind of an outcast, where people don't realize that I still live there, I own a home there," he says of his hometown during a recent tour stop in Cincinnati. "That's where I'm from and that's where this thing was built. I don't think people really know that. And yet I've been putting out records for the last 10 years."

Some locals may remember Mahoney from his time in hip-hop inflected hard-core troupe 187 in the late '90s.

"I used to play at the Huntridge and the Sanctuary almost nonstop," he recalls. "Then, once I turned 21, I'd be playing at the Boston and any place that would have me, like The Castle in Henderson, small house parties and warehouse parties."

After 187 called it a day in 2001, Big B spent some time with SoCal rap rockers OPM, touring the world, eventually getting dropped by Atlantic Records.

At that point, Mahoney thought his recording career was over.

"I was pretty much going to just stop doing music and try and get my act together, become an adult where I could start providing for a family," he says.

But then Mahoney got a call from reefer lovin' rockers Kottonmouth Kings, who signed him to their Suburban Noize label, and Big B has been on a steady ascent ever since.

On "American Underdog," Mahoney has begun to branch out a bit, incorporating more singing and melody into his repertoire, which heretofore largely has consisted of ribald rhymes about hot chicks and cold beer, delivered in his rugged, yet laid-back flow.

"I can only rap as good as I can rap," he says. "I just want to write songs. I don't want to be known as another rapper."

But he's does want to be known -- especially in the city that he knows so well.

"I haven't left," he says of his hometown. "I'm still doing that whole Vegas thing."

Contact reporter Jason Bracelin at jbracelin@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0476.