DATE: Monday, October 18, 1997              TAG: 9710170048

SECTION: DAILY BREAK             PAGE: E1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY STEPHANIE ELIZONDO GRIEST, NEW YORK TIMES NEWS SERVICE 

                                            LENGTH:   79 lines

LOCAL RAPPER IS "SUPA DUPA FLY" PORTSMOUTH'S MISSY ELLIOTT BRIMS WITH CONFIDENCE AND TALENT

MISSY ELLIOTT'S throbbing nose was the victim of a recent piercing. She said she got the diamond stud to be different, but she probably need not have bothered.

It is not as if many women these days are prancing about their videos in patent leather suits inflated to Michelin Man proportions by a tire pump.

``People wouldn't think I'd want to put on a big suit when I was already heavy and make myself look like I'm 300 pounds, but I don't pay it no mind,'' Elliott said of her video ``The Rain (Supa Dupa Fly).'' ``They seen me before; they know I'm not that big. I'm just cutting edge.''

The 25-year-old Portsmouth native oozes with a self-assurance that is not unjustified. Her first album, ``Supa Dupa Fly,'' made its debut on July 15 at No. 3 on the Billboard pop charts and has sold 308,000 copies. Her resume is crammed with work on hit singles like Aaliyah's ``One in a Million'' and S.W.V.'s ``Can We,'' and she has already earned the respect of fellow rappers and others in the music world.

``She is taking the rhythms of rhythm-and-blues and putting them down in a slow groove that could be the new sound - the next sound,'' said Stephen Hill, the director of music programming at MTV. ``There is always a risk when you try a new sound, but it's paying off for Missy.''

Elliott's first stage was a pile of trash cans stacked outside her home, where she sang about the bugs crawling along the sidewalk for passers-by.

Her parents split up when she was 13, but her mother, a dispatcher for a power company, still managed to keep her in Jordache jeans and Calvin Kleins. She was voted class clown in high school and said she skipped college because she didn't think she would wake up in the mornings.

Drawing inspiration from the female rap trio Salt-N-Pepa, Elliott formed the group Sista in the early 1990s and performed in dozens of talent shows. They won all but one and were eventually noticed by Devante of the R&B group Jodeci, who flew them up to New York, where they met artists like Ginuwine and Busta Rhymes.

But Sista's next five years were filled with a string of disappointments, and although the group released a well-received single, ``Brand-New,'' its album never came out.

The group eventually disbanded, but Elliott held onto her dream.

``I never wanted to do anything else but music,'' said Elliott, who still lives in Portsmouth. ``I felt I had a God-given talent and I'd get in some way.''

She finally got her break last year when Sean ``Puffy'' Combs, the president of Bad Boy Entertainment, asked her to do a few rhymes on Gina Thompson's remix of ``The Things You Do.'' The single was a hit, and Elliott became known as the ``heehaw'' girl, for her sly little laugh.

``It's a sarcastic laugh for all the people who said I couldn't make it,'' she said in an interview at a New York City hotel.

Her friend and fellow Hampton Roads native Timbaland helped produce ``Supa Dupa Fly,'' and she recruited backups like Busta Rhymes, Ginuwine and Lil' Kim. Her lyrics are largely stream of consciousness in which she raps about the easy life and herself. In ``I'm Talkin' '' she coos: ``Ladies and gents, dogs, cats and babies/Whoever bit my style I hope you all get rabies.''

Elliott now has her own label, Gold Mind, an affiliate of Elektra records, and is planning to produce other young artists. And never bashful, she already compares herself to megastars like Michael Jackson and the Artist Formerly Known as Prince.

``I'm futuristic, just like them,'' she said. ``What people do now, me and Timbaland were doing five years ago. We are in like the year 2000, and when that year comes, we'll be on something else.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo

Missy Elliott...

Photo

MICHAEL LAVINE

Songwriter, rapper and Portsmouth native Missy ``Misdemeanor''

Elliott is praised for her innovative beats and out-of-this world

music videos. KEYWORDS: PROFILE BIOGRAPHY

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