Former NFL player Arian Foster launches secret rap career, and he's quite good

Martin Rogers | USA TODAY

Show Caption Hide Caption Arian Foster opens up about becoming an artist and NFL's macho culture SportsPulse: Arian Foster wants you to know he's an artist who happened to play football. He also wants you to know the current state of the NFL doesn't allow players to share their emotions the way they should.

The album cover looks like him and the voice – even while rapping – definitely sounds like him.

Could it really be that Arian Foster, the artist formerly known as the NFL’s best running back, has a secret new career as a rap musician?

In a word, yes. It’s a real career too, not just the type of clumsily produced musical foray that athletes do when they’re bored. After retiring from the NFL in October 2016, Foster threw himself headlong into music, working towards an album titled “Flamingo and Koval,” that was released two weeks ago.

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“It’s been my life since I quit football,” Foster told USA TODAY Sports in a telephone interview. “Everything has been about this (new) career.”

Now, in saying it’s a secret career, it kind of is and it kind of isn’t. Foster wants to be taken seriously so he is performing under the pseudonym Bobby Feeno. But if listeners find out that the man behind the music is the same guy who torched NFL defenses for 54 rushing touchdowns and 6,527 yards over eight seasons? Well, that’s fine too.

“The hope is that people will be listening and enjoy just because of what it is,” Foster said. “Initially, of course I will get that stereotype of being an athlete. I don’t think you combat against it.”

Outside of life at a big label, making waves in the rap world can be a struggle to get your stuff heard and respected by a wider audience. Foster’s early reviews have been positive and his track “Gawd” was named among the HotNewHipHop top-100 new songs.

He embraces the struggle, too, likening it to young athletes trying to make their mark in the NFL and paying their dues. Music, he says, was always the thing that fascinated him the most, even more than the sport that rewarded him handsomely.

“I love football, but it was something that didn’t fulfill me as a human,” Foster said. “It is something I was really good at and I loved to do but it wasn’t something that I thought about going to sleep and thought about waking up.

“It was a great opportunity to provide for my family and enjoy what I do. But music is something that, when it is three or four in the morning and I am making music, suddenly I look up and I realize that I haven’t eaten all day. That’s how into it I am. When you have that kind of passion for something, that is what you are supposed to be doing. I get to do that full-fledged now.”

During a pro football career that began as an undrafted free agent out of Tennessee in 2009, it was clear that Foster was a player with more to say than most. He promoted social awareness, kneeled for the national anthem in 2016 and even read poetry with Texas legend Earl Campbell.

“He has a voice and strong beliefs and a lot to talk about,” said Kelly FitzGerald, a music producer and former William and Mary football player.

FitzGerald collaborated with Foster and former Houston Texas teammate Jonathan Grimes on the Flamingo and Koval album, named for the Las Vegas cross streets where Tupac Shakur was shot to death in 1996.

“Obviously being an athlete, there is a certain platform already there,” FitzGerald said. “But it is also a bias – like, ‘what does he know about hip hop?’ and so on. Kobe or Shaq – they made music for their own reasons, but Arian was totally serious and from the start it was just like working with a lifelong musician. He is at a very high level musically, technically and professionally.”

Foster admits that when people hear about an athlete album they think it is going to be “garbage.” He is pleased to have caused some skeptics to be surprised.

“You realize in the first track this isn’t an athlete trying to be a musician, this is a musician who used to be an athlete,” Foster said. “The goal is to make the music and the beautiful thing about it right now is that the feedback is the most positive affirmation I could get. The bar was set so low, the expectation was so low, I had to fight so many vibes in order to get that audience.

“People have to fight their own bias which they are not inherently good at. I like hearing from fans of other teams who say they wanted to hate my album, but they actually liked it.”

As a social activist Foster regularly caught some heat from those who didn’t like his attempts to promote discussion on issues such as race and equality. Back then the familiar refrain was “shut up and play football,” and Foster heard it more times than he cares to remember.

Which is why a tongue-in-cheek remark about his album on social media made him chuckle the most.

“Shut up and make music,” it read.

Which is exactly what he plans to do.