Drake Has Been The Biggest Name In Rap Since…

[Devil Plisken…CMS]

2011? 2012?

There has NEVER been another rapper that has held that title half as long as Drake has.

Pac? A Year
Jay? A Year or 2?
Biggie? A Year
Snoop? Like 2 Years
Nas? Never
Rakim? Never
Kanye? A Year?
LL Cool J? Had Some Years
50? 3 Years
Weezy? A Year or 2?
Ja? A Year or 2?

We can get into semantics but it’s irrefutable that Drake has been the biggest rapper for AT LEAST ten years

Wowzas

 

[Ashtrey]

2011. Since Take Care.

But Eminem sold more in 2013 and Kendrick in 2017 . So Drake hasn't held the top spot every year.

 

[Metal Face]

2009

 

[Braman]

It’s true. But I know how the culture works. People like underdogs so if you see a ‘who ran rap’ list they’d find a way to pick other folk when really it’s been Drake 90% of the last decade.

 

[Tommy Sheppard]

2009

 

[BK The Great]

It's because he's making way more mainstream music. He started from the mixtapes but isn't making the same music anymore. He alienated his Hip Hop fan base.

 

[How Sway?]

Outside of kendrick, Nikki, and possibly j cole or Travis, does/has he really have any competition?

Kanye, been past his prime for close to a decade. He was really the only other artist that could compete with drake.

Same with Jay

Same with wayne

Same with wiz(people forgot how huge wiz was in 2010-2012)

Nas is still relevant in the game but he's considered a legacy act these days.

Future is huge but is he a megastar?

Tyga maybe?:

The man literally has no other competitors as big as he is in the game. Especially these days in 2023.

 

[shazam]

and he's been mad about story of adidon for 1,895 of those days

 

[murksiderock]

I stopped keeping up with current events in hip hop in like 2018, give or take a year. So I'm not really up on this like that but I'd say he definitively became the biggest rapper when he succeeded the throne from Wayne...

Wayne was still the biggest name in hip hop when he dropped Carter IV in 2011. Drake also dropped Take Care that year but I think Carter IV was more anticipated, Wayne still had the edge...

Drake didn't drop in '12 and that saw Kendrick really rise to superstardom with Good Kid, Maad City. 2012 was more of a transition year that saw OGs like Wayne, Kanye, Hov start phasing out for that Drake, Future, Dot, Cole, Meek, Wale, Nicki class...

So I don't think anyone had 2012, Drake was the biggest name, but he hadn't firmly taken the reins yet...

2013 I vividly remember cats calling Nothing Was The Same a disappointment, both Meek and Cole had better drops in real time. It's funny how Nothing Was The Same has become better received in retrospect because cats were not really feeling it in real time. Now he was Drake, his momentum didn't take a hit as much as the public perception of his artistry, and he has a massive white and nonblack following, international, so he was still ascending...

But these years in the middle of the 10s you could easily argue Future or Kendrick were bigger...

He didn't drop for a year and a half or in the '14 calendar year, which was really a weak year for hip hop. He built massive anticipation and when he dropped If You're Reading This It's Too Late, he delivered on the anticipation and it set the tone for an amazing 2015 in hip hop, a grip of classics dropped in '15...

He dropped two, because What A Time To Be Alive also dropped in '15, and '15 was honestly the beginning of the more aggressive, matured flow Drake...

So if you gotta hold me to a year, I'd say 2015 is when he definitively took the throne. And that's the thing, you can't even say he had the best music that year. Krit, Dot, Future and others all dropped classics in 2015, but Drake, already the biggest brand, finally delivering on massive anticipation from an artistic viewpoint, that was the year...

So it's been 8 years, by my count...

 

[mundL]

it depends on your criteria

Kanye, Eminem, Kendrick, Ross, Nicki, Future, Wayne, Macklemore,... all had huge years sometime in the 2010s

 

[Devil Plisken…CMS]

I stopped keeping up with current events in hip hop in like 2018, give or take a year. So I'm not really up on this like that but I'd say he definitively became the biggest rapper when he succeeded the throne from Wayne...

Wayne was still the biggest name in hip hop when he dropped Carter IV in 2011. Drake also dropped Take Care that year but I think Carter IV was more anticipated, Wayne still had the edge...

Drake didn't drop in '12 and that saw Kendrick really rise to superstardom with Good Kid, Maad City. 2012 was more of a transition year that saw OGs like Wayne, Kanye, Hov start phasing out for that Drake, Future, Dot, Cole, Meek, Wale, Nicki class...

So I don't think anyone had 2012, Drake was the biggest name, but he hadn't firmly taken the reins yet...

2013 I vividly remember cats calling Nothing Was The Same a disappointment, both Meek and Cole had better drops in real time. It's funny how Nothing Was The Same has become better received in retrospect because cats were not really feeling it in real time. Now he was Drake, his momentum didn't take a hit as much as the public perception of his artistry, and he has a massive white and nonblack following, international, so he was still ascending...

But these years in the middle of the 10s you could easily argue Future or Kendrick were bigger...

He didn't drop for a year and a half or in the '14 calendar year, which was really a weak year for hip hop. He built massive anticipation and when he dropped If You're Reading This It's Too Late, he delivered on the anticipation and it set the tone for an amazing 2015 in hip hop, a grip of classics dropped in '15...

He dropped two, because What A Time To Be Alive also dropped in '15, and '15 was honestly the beginning of the more aggressive, matured flow Drake...

So if you gotta hold me to a year, I'd say 2015 is when he definitively took the throne. And that's the thing, you can't even say he had the best music that year. Krit, Dot, Future and others all dropped classics in 2015, but Drake, already the biggest brand, finally delivering on massive anticipation from an artistic viewpoint, that was the year...

So it's been 8 years, by my count...

Them other guys aren’t touring nor streaming like Drake.

That’s what it boils down to. J Cole is top tier but realistically none of them guys are bigger

 

[Devil Plisken…CMS]

it depends on your criteria

Kanye, Eminem, Kendrick, Ross, Nicki, Future, Wayne, Macklemore,... all had huge years sometime in the 2010s

I don’t count Eminem nor will I ever in rap discussions

 

[The Prince of All Saiyans]

He been a cornball since day 1

Amazing

 

[DrexlersFade]

He been a cornball since day 1

Amazing

See why Rap is where it's at look at it's leader passive aggressive homo

 

[Piff Perkins]

The only year I felt like someone was as big or bigger than him was 2017 when Kendrick crushed the building. Outside of that he's been the dominant figure in mainstream rap since 2011. I wouldn't have faulted anyone for wondering if that first album, which many people thought was disappointing, was a fluke. You could tell some big producers were hoping it would be, without naming names. But him coming back with Take Care in 2011 was when it was clear ok, this guy isn't going anywhere anytime soon.

I don't really see anyone on the horizon who can surpass him. Assuming we aren't counting Bad Bunny. The two guys I thought could do it are dead. Ju1ce World and XXX were on their way to arena shows and massive success. Honestly I think their deaths altered hip hop in a way people don't talk about or acknowledge.