Weirdly enough i actually dont have many examples of this of getting introduced to a Rapper i become very interested from another Rapper because i usually know the "whole" field, but one of the biggest examples for me is Guru of Gangstarr saying "Big L rest in peace":

I was a major fan of Gangstarr (one of the few pre 2000s east rappers i was very fond of as a youngin) in late middle school early high school and one day i was like "who tf Big L" and then history was sealed. Which is funny because Big L recieved a major resurgence with my gen and the underground Rappers becoming the most influential he has ever been in the early to mid 2010s. And i was "put on" earlier than most even before most of peers thanks to Guru giving me early bragging rights

Shout out High School class 2014 n rest in peace kings 🙏

Gangstarr top 5 Rap duos and Guru better than your fav go argue with your wife

i found out about juice wrld cus g herbo was singing tf outta black & white on his ig story. i was like wtf is this?

Kanye put me on to the whole GOOD movement 2010-2012

Goddamn this beat still one of the best

This and Games Higher are so special and unique even for the time to today

Rip prodigy one of my favs 🙏

50 Cent and Game get clowned for being "just gangsta" rappers (which is a dumb critique anyways) but they had one of the best and creative ears ever in the early to mid 2000s

A lot of their beats are still one of the most unique underground or mainstream and they made it look so easy to get on

Lots of underground tryna find out who captain murphy was

i found out about trippie thru x

I found out about Tech N9ne through the rapper Yukmouth. Now Tech is one of my favorite rappers of all time.

When I first got into Kanye in middle school definitely opening up my hip-hop world. He’s worked with everyone so that’s definitely exposed me to so many rappers and just artists in general

drake thru wayne
sosa thru ye
carti thru uzi
travis scott thru TI
young thug thru tyga
teezo thru tyler the creator

there’s way way more but im lazy
(for context: i lived in a country with limited access to the internet up to my late teens, so i’d discover a lot of artists thru features)

Larry June thru Curren$y

I found out about sixnine from trippie

rylo through baby

passed the torch

The Whole Black Hippy / TDE crew because of Jay Rock.

Hey real talk if it wasn’t A$AP Rocky I wouldn’t have cared for the rest of the rappers that followed.

Which is kind of crazy to think about.

Never heard this b4 but this wild lmao

I knew Rocky and Ferg along with Raider Klan roughly the same time late 2010

Back when ASAP Rocky pre mixtape only had Purple Swag music video & Pretty Flacko 1 w SpaceGhostPurp, him n Ferg has a single collab song i forget the name of but the music video is very basic just them in new york rapping on a loosie, and Ferg had only one solo song a loosie - Hundred Million Roses which was my s*** for a lil bit

Then rocky dropped a small ep towards the end of 2010 and then 2011 with the Peso video popped it all off which leads to the mixtape proper

they was cookin

Yup!

This reminds me i found out about kendrick thru tech n9ne