Four years after being gifted a key to the city, Chattanooga’s preeminent hip-hop success story will return to his hometown this weekend.
A meet and greet for Isaiah Rashad will be held Saturday afternoon at a local vinyl store in Chattanooga’s Southside neighborhood. Rashad’s first public appearance in Chattanooga since 2022 will be spent signing autographs and promoting his latest record, “IT’S BEEN AWFUL,” which was released last month and has since peaked at No. 18 on the U.S. Billboard 200 chart.
“I don’t know how it’s going to work, honestly. We’ll have them lining up there,” record store owner Marlo White said, pointing out the door of his record shop and toward the sidewalk along Market Street. “We’ll probably set Isaiah up right here in the middle of the store.”
In addition to Rashad’s appearance, local DJ Shoey Russell will fill the room with music from the start of the event until 3 p.m.
Isaiah Rashad meet and greet
When: 1 p.m. Saturday
Location: Dallos Vinyl Love, 1463 Market St.
More Info: Hip-hop artist will host event celebrating the release of his new album, “ITS BEEN AWFUL.”
Rashad’s music label, Warner Records, has supplied Dallos Vinyl Love with 200 vinyl records and 100 CDs that will be available for purchase at the event. White anticipates that more than 400 people will attend and has already sold 70 records through a presale link as of Wednesday morning. The event was coordinated entirely within the past three weeks between White and Rashad’s management teams at Warner.
“Isaiah Rashad,” White said. “This is his home.”
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Rashad’s third studio album represents some of his most explicit references to the Scenic City to date, most notably a direct reference to “Chatt” on Track 3 and the album’s cover photo, taken inside the Chattanooga Public Library.
The lead image captures Rashad sitting in front of a grooved and grandiose wooden wall, hiding his head under his shirt. Dylan Rivera, the director of policy planning and implementation in Mayor Tim Kelly’s office, called it a “pinch-me moment” to help coordinate the library photo shoot and be in the room while it was shot.
“It’s a room that, unless you’ve been in there, you don’t quite recognize where it is,” Rivera said in a phone call. “We got a chance to highlight the architectural design of one of the coolest buildings in our city and cement it in history with a potential album cover.”
Staff File Photo / Chattanooga Mayor Tim Kelly presents Isaiah Rashad with a key to the city and declaration of Isaiah Rashad Day at Bonnaroo in Manchester, Tenn. The rapper will host a meet-and-greet for fans June 20, 2026, at Dallos Vinyl Love in Chattanooga.
(READ MORE: Bonnaroo survived 2026. What’s next?)
Chattanooga’s public library was not confirmed to be Rashad’s latest album cover when it was taken. Rivera found out only when the album was released in May.
The meet and greet is part of Rashad’s press rollout in preparation for his next North American tour, called the “Lil Sunny’s Awful Road Trip Tour.” Shows kick off Aug. 13 in Atlanta and conclude Sept. 28 in Tucson, Ariz., with 31 shows across 29 cities.
Notably, as fans have lamented in online circles, Chattanooga is not included within those tour dates. Russell, who met Rashad in 2015 when they were performing in the same Chattanooga hip-hop collective, feels confident that a Chattanooga date will be announced at a later time. He said that the rapper loves visiting the Scenic City because he’s allowed to be his authentic self here.
“He doesn’t have a Chattanooga show yet, but maybe us doing this vinyl signing will determine how many people can show up and support him,” Russell said. “It might even change his mind on adding a stop to his tour.”
The record signing closely follows Isaiah Rashad Day, which the city celebrated Wednesday. That honor was announced by Major Tim Kelly when he bestowed a key to the city to Rashad in 2022 at the Bonnaroo Music Festival.
“Out of all these new things that are happening and all the excitement that’s here, people really sleep on Chattanooga and who comes from Chattanooga,” Rivera said. “The identity we’ve built for ourselves, very much driven by the arts, driven by sports culture. … People don’t quite recognize just how big of a footprint Chattanooga has in the global space.”
Contact digital producer Sam Kohn at skohn@timesfreepress.com.
Sam Kohn is a digital producer at the Chattanooga Times Free Press, where his focuses include video production, data visualization and writing the daily morning newsletter, Good Day Chattanooga.
Before moving to Tennessee, Sam worked as a podcast director in San Luis Obispo, California, and an audio engineer at a hip-hop studio in Los Angeles. Sam is a recent graduate from California Polytechnic State University with degrees in Journalism and Audio Technology.