In an era where the music market is saturated and the average listener’s attention is reduced to a few clicks and ten seconds of listening, it’s difficult to gain and above all to keep the listener’s attention. Always dropping some hot music, rappers are the ones who are very aware of what young people like and what they consider catchy and captivating, and that’s where their immense success comes from. Let’s see which rappers and songs marked this year and take their place in rap trends sky and about which you can read on portals like chilloutradio.com and other trending websites.
1. 2 Chainz
Rapper 2 Chainz is a product of the margins of society in which most rappers find inspiration to create. He also understands very well the current social trends and forms of communication. His approach is a form of authentic local expression through global communication platforms. And as soon as we talk about communication, we talk about marketing. Let’s just remember his album from 2017 – “Pretty girls like trap music”. Once again, 2 Chainz successfully used local authentic elements and moved them to the global level, opening a (pink) pop-up nail salon that bears the same name as the album, thus continuing to promote essential elements of hip-hop culture, at the same time targeting girls as their companions as well as brand ambassadors. Each nail design was bearing the name of the song from the album, and the whole move with a pop-up nail salon turned out to be an absolute hit. Hence there’s no wonder why he got so popular. The song from his album “Rap or Go to the League” from 2019 – “I said Me” has climbed to the very top of all rap charts this year and “threatens” to justify the success of all his previous song and album releases.
2. Travis Scott
The biggest challenge when considering Trevis Scott over the years was that he gradually emerged as one of the key characters in the rap without his music having any linear story. But along the way, the work of Trevis Scott has been able to show that he still has essential values in making music that makes people feel good, no matter how intellectually stimulating it is. From his raunchy self-tuned harmonies, through his stunning, larger-than-life production to the interpolation of his hometown sound, you know right away that Trevis Scott’s song is as soon as you hear it.
After news of the rapper Travis Scott and the world’s youngest billionaire Kyle Jenner broke up in the media, their fans speculated on why the relationship was broken. Some think their breakup is just a marketing ploy to help them promote Trevis’s new music. The rapper released a new song, “Highest in the Room,” in October 2019, allegedly discussing the problems he and Kylie went through over the two years of the relationship.
3. J Cole
Sometime in mid-2009, a young man named Jermaine Lamarr Cole, better known as J Cole, appeared on the rap sky. He was just not a rapper in the conventional sense of the word. A guy who not only made his way through high school lightly, but graduated from University St. Johns in communications, with the highest honors and an average score of over 9. And above all, he was an exceptional basketball player who, because of his incredible enthusiasm and work ethic, would probably have made it to the NBA if he had gone that route.
It’s little to say that he has brought something new to hip-hop culture. With his unique themes and worldview, J Cole gives a whole new shade to a wide range of the hip-hop genre. After the debut of Cole World: The Sideline Story, in which he continues to find himself and his place under the hip-hop sun and the songs “Work Out” and “Can’t Get Enough”, which, although brought him considerable success and wider popularity, nevertheless classified under the cliche theme of “girls shaking and scheming for one night”, his second studio album Born Sinner brought real thematic and genre refreshment. This is where he best sees his maturation as an artist while tackling more serious topics in songs such as “Crooked Smile” (which has become an anthem for everyone, especially women, who value the inner beauty of a human being), “She Knows” and “Power Trip”.
His album with Dreamville, “Revenge of the Dreamers III”, was released in July 2019 and songs like “Lambo Truck”, “Down Bad” and “Costa Rica” soon irreversibly won the hearts of the audience.
4. Kendrick Lamar
At this point, Kendrick Lamar, a Compton rapper, is at the highest point of his career then he ever was. According to wealthygorilla.com, he is the 22nd richest rapper in the world. However, unlike his equally successful colleagues, he manages to create not only a mainstream hit but also a deep song imbued with ambiguity, complex layers of verses that build mini-narratives at the level of the song itself, but also a larger one, first at the level of the album and then the entire oeuvre. Kendrick has repeatedly said that he was first a writer and then a musician. And it’s not difficult to take his statement as complete truth when one looks at his oeuvre.
The whole message of all Kendrick’s poems relates to the destinies of these people who are drawn into a single cycle of chaos, crime and death. They don’t see a way out, and each of them may have the potential to offer something meaningful, which is also emphasized in the songs. Kendrick himself did not think that he would be able to leave Compton and that he would be able to sell his talent. It turns out that he is not only a great life painter, artist, rapper, but also an infinitely powerful and innovative performer. The energy he manages to convey in his performances, the way he manipulates songs for public performances, his gesture – these are all things that are only part of his creative potency. His top hit “Momma I hit a Lick” with 2 Chainz was released at the beginning of 2019, just like “Hair Down” in collaboration with SiR.
