Raised in different parts of Atlanta and its neighboring suburbs, Antoine Rogers, better known as Bobby Creekwater, was allured by the charm of rap music. After a year of attending Clark-Atlanta University, he left the college textbooks to enter the recording studio as one-half of the duo Jatis, which also featured partner-in-crime Charlie Jangles. They first signed with Columbia Records, but were released from that contract, and so they went over to highly reputable hip-hop label Loud Records. Unfortunately, Loud, which already had experienced its heyday with the Wu-Tang Clan, Mobb Deep, Big Pun, and many others, closed up shop before Jatis could release an album. Learning from that experience, Creekwater vowed that he would make it on his own and temporarily parted ways with Jangles.

As an unsigned artist, he learned to produce his own beats and manage other tasks that otherwise would be done by a label. This came in handy when a representative of Eminem's Shady Records heard a verse of his on a demo by another artist, Aasim. More interested in Creekwater than Aasim, the label signed him in summer 2005, making the Atlanta rapper Shady's second Southern artist (after Stat Quo). Drawing on those lessons from before, Creekwater didn't rest on his laurels and released the Anthem to the Streets, Vol. 1 mixtape a few months later in order to beef up his profile. The following year, he formally debuted on the Shady mixtape Eminem Presents: The Re-Up, which also featured some of his production skills alongside the work of veterans Eminem and the Alchemist. ~ Cyril Cordor, Rovi