''It Felt More Realistic and More Natural...''
10:30PM ET March 18th, 2013
Contributor : Martin James
A Rocky Williform Company

Veteran hip-hop star N.O.R.E. has officially changed his stage name to "P.A.P.I." Despite going by N.O.R.E. or Noreaga for almost twenty years, he revealed in an interview with HipHopDX that his new moniker feels more familiar.

"Ah, you know I was in the middle of shooting the movie and P.A.P.I. has always been my nickname in my hood," he shared. "But during the process of filming this movie, my name in the movie was P.A.P.I., and everyone started calling me 'P.A.P.I.' I wasn’t used to people who don’t know me, whoever didn’t go to school (with me would be) calling me 'P.A.P.I.' When I did get used to it, I was like, 'You know what?' It did feel more natural, it felt more realistic and more natural than even N.O.R.E. did, even though I’ve been called 'N.O.R.E.' for 15…16 years. It’s just that I’ve been called 'P.A.P.I.' for 33, for 35—I’m 35 years old—and so I just feel like I was just returning back to the essence, and that’s what it was."