And this is why it's not an "old head" view that the state of rap is dead like posters say here. We don't even have a unanimous top 3 that are doing anything great with the genre. It's lackluster

Because. Yall. Not. Looking.

Those big 3 mentioned had to be discovered. No one gave a f*** about kendrick when he was k dot. Hell no one gave a f*** bout drake when he dropped the mixtapes

The reason theres no big 3/superstar is cause YALL got lazy.

/thread

Cole is top 25?

these guys ain’t carrying s*** but people sure do cling onto them because they’re like the last totems of traditionalist values in mainstream rap or some s*** lol

destroy lonely carrying the future of rap on his back

how is lebron, steph, and KD still carrying the nba

Homie, Drake Cole and Kendrick are under lil Wayne Jay-Z and Dr. Dre.

Yes people may have got out onto them early with their mixtapes and what not, but that's not the biggest reason they got here.
but I'm not talking about SoundCloud rappers here. I think that's where the misunderstanding coming from.

We have established young rappers right now with like 1-2 albums under their belt that just aren't getting it done and being the next one up like they should. They have all the attention on them and keep dropping the ball.
You're sitting here and telling me I have to search the catacombs of the internet for the next person who is supposed to be the savior of the genre.

I'm not the reason mfs that have the world's attention can't put it together.

And I'm not the reason these underground artists are still underground. Talent and consistency shines through these barriers more often than not.

To me, yes. His career is still peaking 12+ years in, has classic projects and has started one of the biggest/successful festivals especially for black people (anecdotal but I’ve been every year and literally every time I go I overhear people say it’s the black Coachella). Now he probably has the weakest case of the three but if he’s not there today he’s going to be when he hangs it up

maybe the reason it's so dry is bc none of the big names are developing successors. all we have is kendrick w baby keem who hasn't done s*** as of late and carti w his opium label.

cole tried w earthgang and jid but that went nowhere. ovo has good artists but its all rnb or alternative type dudes.

This a***ogy doesn't work at all considering none of them have been MVP in years.

As if Luka and jokic and Giannis and Edwards and Shai aren't averaging damn near the same amount of points and winning as much if not more.

There's more to it than that tbh

Well for the masses I think that nobody really had to look in the past. We relied on "the machine" to push and present these "next up" artists on a silver platter basically. That's why the XXL freshmen list became what it was. Now because of social media and streaming, "the machine" don't even know what to do and the masses aren't going to look because they've never had to.

“/thread” after this statement is pretty bold

I'll give Cole earthgang. They're not very big but I do dig their s***.

Drake tried to put on countless artists and they just ended up reserved to the sweatshop after he blows up their single.

I don't know if it's that they aren't trying, or they're just not good at developing talent.

ay wait i just remembered drake put on lil baby that counts

Considering his logic is flawed as f***.

Hey niggas, YALL find the next superstar.

Tf? That's a whole ass job.

Nobody in rap getting it done that has any eyes on them. That's not the responsibility to the listener. It's the artists job to get out there lmao

Rap is finished when these 3 are done it’s just facts

If Drake, Kendrick and Cole went off into space today and never came back the concept of a “big 3” probably wouldn’t even exist anymore

The only other rap superstar is probably Travis but ain’t nobody gonna say he’s carrying rap cus they’d be scrutinizing his actual bars (or lack there of) a lot more

i think we just changed how we see artists. there was more mythologizing back in the day, now it's hard to see rappers as anything more than guys who do songs.

Thats what the blogs were genius

Nobody initially though the big 3 (ESPECIALLY Cole) was gonna be the next big thing.

As someone that was there (and still think KRIT is the better artist than Cole), it wasnt black and white as yall history re-writers are making it out to be.

wym @op ecco bladee and thaiboy still going crazy

Nobody wants bars anymore but they actually do lmao. They just want someone to be able to exist in both worlds like Kendrick Cole and Drake do but that s*** ain't easy or common

Also the standards changed (dumbed down), rappers that any other era wouldve been superstars (e.g. smino) are looked at in a funny light for whatever reason