NEW YORK (AP) — For a rapper whose debut album sold more than two million copies, Jay “Young Jeezy” Jenkins still sounds like he has a fair amount of convincing to do.It’s not that the crack-entrepreneur tales from his breakthrough disc, “Let’s Get It: Thug Motivation,” ever rang hollow — or that his glock-brandishing sneers failed to sound adequately menacing.

Far from it. Jeezy, 29, claims he speaks from such firsthand experience that he considers himself a “trap star” — slang in his native Georgia for hustler — more than a rap star.

On last year’s exultant club hit, Go Crazy, he explained his evolution: “Switched hustles, been killing ‘em ever since/Been paid to tell the truth, so it only makes sense.”

But as Jeezy promotes his second disc, The Inspiration: Thug Motivation 102, he wants to clear the air about one thing in particular: his rapping skills.

The issue has followed the rapper since his woozy, hoarse-voiced delivery and recurrent ad-libs “Yeeaah” and “That’s riiiiight!” emerged last summer as the hip-hop sensation’s trademark sound.

Some rap purists questioned his songwriting talent for relying on such vocal effects and simple rhyme patterns. Over the regal horn blasts and chilling organ chords of a Cool and Dre-produced track, “Streets on Lock,” Jeezy addresses his critics: “Ain’t no (expletive) help me write my rhymes/wanna assassinate my character/ but I ain’t acting.”

For this sophomore effort, Jeezy says he recorded more than 80 songs and got better through sheer hard work.

“The (recording) booth is easier to me. It’s easier to express my feelings. I’m good at the (stuff) now,” explains Jeezy, sitting in the New York offices of his label Def Jam. But I got to pace myself because I don’t want to outgrow (fans) that ride with me. The streets don’t move at a pace like that.”

Obviously, Jeezy doesn’t want to alienate the same fans who witnessed him go from a young hustler in Macon and Atlanta in the mid-’90s to local aspiring rapper with a mixtape buzz and his own distribution company, Corporate Thugz Entertainment, by 2002.

“I went through the gang banging, shoot-outs, all the stuff,” he recalls. “It wasn’t that that changed me, it was more so just seeing my (ten-year-old) son, and me having to take care of my dead homies’s kids for Christmas.

“It got to the point where (hustling) didn’t even make sense no more.”

In the past two years, his star has taken off. In 2004, he signed with Sean “Diddy” Combs’ Bad Boy Records as part of the group, Boyz N Da Hood.

The following year, he left the group, and signed to Def Jam as a solo artist.

If the popularity of his first album is any indication, Jeezy truly understands how to reach underground and mainstream audiences.

“The Inspiration” features gargantuan, synth-heavy beats and unforgettable hooks.

Meanwhile, his lyrics boast of material excess, depict the ruthlessness of the streets and provide hopeful messages of redemption.

“Jeezy appeals to the common folk,” says DJ Drama, the Atlanta-based DJ who featured Jeezy on one of his Gangsta Grillz mixtape CD in 2002.

“He’s lyrical in the sense that he’s not trying to put the most words in one sentence, but he’s humorous and so realistic at the same time.”

He displays that dark, populist approach notably.

Elsewhere, he contemplates familiar rap themes — his own death on Bury Me A G and his success on lead single, I Luv It.

And on the standout Timbaland-produced cut, 3 A.M. he still “talks that white”.

Though hustling has long been intertwined with rap lyrics, few are as famous for it as Jeezy: He’s known as the Snowman and his official logo, an angry-faced Frosty, was one of the most popular images of last year, represented on official and heavily bootlegged T-shirts.

Jeezy doesn’t apologise for pumping drug imagery in his music, even though parents and community leaders protested when the Snowman logo became an urban fashion craze.

“If you listen to the critics, they’ll (mess) up your formula,” he says. “My question to them is: When is it not cool to be you? When you can’t be yourself, then you’re not real.”

However, Jeezy also takes time to reveal his once-troubled home life, details that have largely remained vague till now.

On Dreamin’, Jeezy recalls beefing with his drug-addicted mother for stealing his stash, before Keyshia Cole’s achy vocals soar over the sweeping production.

“He lets you know he came from the streets, that there are things in his past that he did do to get to where he is,” says Shakir Stewart, Def Jam senior vice president of A&R, “and he wants to inspire people to let them know you can make it out too.”

And with songs such as the title track that reworks an odd sample choice — Diana Ross’ Muscles — into an uplifting tale of ghetto survival, Jeezy shows an attempt to add more humanity to his hardcore raps.

“The first album sounds like some young (guy) talking about how rich he was,” Jeezy says. “But you ain’t know the things that happened — his hurts, his ups and downs.

“I wanted to kind of express that. I can’t talk about one side, and not talk about the other. ... I can’t sugarcoat the stuff.”