Rodney “Brimstone” Ashford is the Chief Executive Officer of L-Town Records. Born in 1976, and originally from Ellisville, MS, his affinity for music, writing, and learning revealed itself early in life. An avid reader, he took up piano at the age of 3. By the time he was 9 he was a full-time musician at a small church In laurel. Over time he learned how to read, write, compose music, as well as improvisation and playing by ear. Like many young black men growing up in the 90’s, he developed a love for rap music. Because of his love for reading and writing, songwriting and lyrics were second nature. It became his life’s dream by the age of 15 to have his own record label. Over the years, he familiarized himself with as many genres of music, as well as instruments, as he possibly could: From guitar to the Hammond organ, he especially fell in love with brass instruments–baritone, tuba, trumpet, with trombone being his favorite.

Trombone would take him through college at Alcorn State University, an HBCU, where he was t-bone section leader of the university’s legendary marching band “Sounds of Dyn-O-mite”. After graduating from Alcorn State with a technology degree in 1998, he briefly moved to Houston, TX, where he was picked up by a record label (Game Tite Records) for his lyrical ability. The CEO of Game Tite was known as “Lil Byrd”. Lil Byrd took him under his wing, dubbed him “The Infamouzz Blazze” and began introducing him to the music scene in Texas and teaching him “the game”. He had regular dealings with rappers like Lil Flip, Fat Pat, (SPM) South Park Mexican, and the entire Swishahouse crew. After a run-in with the law, Rodney decided to come back home to Mississippi. A natural entrepreneur, he began an advertising and marketing firm called “IBG” (Inspired By God) with 3 other young men.

He learned photoshop and became familiar with design and web work. Later, after IBG had dissolved, Rodney, ever the entrepreneur, began selling mixed cds. He affectionately labeled his cds “Poboy Records”, and added on the moniker of “Poboy”. Always doing things on a grand scale, he added clothing and accessories to his mixed cd business, which was currently distributing music in Mississippi, Louisiana, and Florida (He would later go on to open the first black storefront in downtown Ellisville, MS, called “RockBottoms”, named after his infant son Rokyron (Rocky)). Still armed with the knowledge he had gained in Houston, TX, and using some of the proceeds from his hustle, Rodney invested in studio equipment and took Poboy Records a step further, turning it into a bona fide record label headquartered in Hattiesburg, MS, in the year 2000. Allen “Da Don” Jenkins was his first signed artist, and they started off promoting their music on the same mixed cds Poboy was selling around the Southern US.

“Poboy” would produce, record, mix and master most of the music himself, and as young, energetic, and enthusiastic men with an understanding of business and a lust for success, they dropped several projects and sold them worldwide. PoBoy Records quickly became popular and was known in more than 80 countries. It was at this time that Poboy was approached by Joseph Foreman, better known as Afroman. “Fro” featured on several releases with the label, including “Reel Pimps the Freestyle Album: We Flow Hard”, and “Chasin our Paper”. After one of Afroman’s songs went platinum (“Because I Got High”), Joseph, who had been signed to Universal Records, started his own label “Hungry Hustler Records”, and wanted to sign PoBoy because of his wordplay. At this time, “PoBoy the Purple Poet” was born, and became known as Afroman’s producer/sidekick. They began to tour together, performing in every state in America—sometimes doing shows in 5 states in a week, and life seemed good for a while.

He put out several projects with HH, including “Introducing PoBoy the Purple Poet”, the self-produced sequel: “Purple Dioxide (PO2)”, and features with a plethora of artists on and off the label. Rodney was living his dream, or so he thought, making more money than he could count, gaining fans around the world, doing shows, attending parties and basically living the life of a rock star. Then he got introduced to drugs—cocaine in particular—and everything fell apart. He ended up losing his record deal, his own record label, his home, his wife, his son—pretty much everything. He made all manner of bad decisions during his 10-year struggle with addiction, until one of those bad decisions eventually landed him in a prison cell and he became the property of the Mississippi Department of Corrections.

For Rodney, the music had stopped, literally, and he found himself in a cycle of relapses and revolving door trips to the state penitentiary because of probation violations and his inability to kick the habit.  It was during his 3rd stint at the infamous Parchman prison that he almost lost his life in a gang fight (he had joined a gang while in prison—the Almighty Black P Stones—and now went by the name “Bigg Stone”). It was after this brush with death that he decided enough was enough. Spending his last few months of incarceration in solitary confinement, the only thing he had to keep him company was his pen and pad, along with a prison issue Bible. If he wasn’t writing raps or poetry, he would study his Bible, sometimes for 8-10 hours a day. During this time he had a lucid dream filled with prophecies and strange music, and woke up with yet another name: “Brimstone”. Forever changed and now cocaine-free, after being released from prison he spent his first day of freedom locked in a friend’s studio, and eventually would drop his latest self-produced (from the same music he had dreamt of in prison) solo album, “The Seventh Seal”, in 2016. He, along with his friend and business partner Rodney Evans (current head of production for L-Town) began a gospel record label known as Lords Name Entertainment.

The Lords Name label was short-lived however—it was proving an impossible task for Brimstone to get past his past, and most of the people in his community weren’t willing to accept the changes in his life and continuously condemned him for his past transgressions. It was during this time that he became more familiar with a camera, (he had previously started a business shooting videos—a successful YouTube channel known as “PraiseGodTV”), and, after LNE, he started Ashford Photography & Films in 2017. He spent most of his time learning how to be the best photographer he could be, and APF thrived. Winning several awards, being featured in several magazines including “People” and “Better Homes and Gardens” and ultimately building a 6-figure per year business, Rodney, the man of many hats as well as names, had finally found his niche.  After totally resetting his life in an effort to escape his sordid past, and after being 7 years addiction-free, he used the proceeds from the photography business to start a brand new label with a brand new message: L-Town Records. Above all he wants to prevent other artists from going down the path he traveled, the one that leads to death, and, with L-Town, he hopes to be an example for the world that regardless of where you come from or the mistakes you may have made in the past, it is never too late to start over and get it right.