Name Some Rappers Whose Career Never Took Off Because They Couldn’t Write A Hit To Save Their Life

[Kliq_Souf]

This is streaming. Which is a weird way to call something a hit, these days. The RIAA had to come up with new ways to certify what's gold and platinum. So what this means now is that the songs were played a lot on the streaming services, though people aren't actually buying these singles. So if you check the actual charts, they don’t have the same success. That's where it really counts. The actual platinum, is what sells, not streamed. Cole is a good example. He's selling records and being streamed heavily. So his album is a Top 10 album, across all genres. And had 4 tracks in the Top 10. Those are hits. He and Wayne are the only MC's to ever do that.

So for Wale, he's heavily streamed, but the songs aren't selling. So they're not charting that high. Before, you were platinum if you SOLD 1,000,000 pieces of your album or single. Now, if you stream 100,000,000 million times for free, they'll throw you a certification. When artists have Top 10 hits on the charts, that's counting actual sales and everything else. Those are actual hits.

Bruh most the songs I named are 8-10 years ago before the streaming boom.
These was actual big records

 

[Piff Perkins]

Horrible take. Damn near everything u said is objectively inaccurate when it comes to his career. My problem ain’t even with u saying u don’t fukk wit him or he not gonna blow up. But u can’t be dishonest.

Everything I said is correct. Point to the lie lol.

 

[thekidfromqueens]

Bleek

 

[spliz]

Everything I said is correct. Point to the lie lol.

Son. He was with Nas for years before Def Jam even picked him up. His buzz he created is what got him the deal with Def Jam. U obviously one of them cats who ain’t peep who he was before the major deal.

 

[Awesome Wells]

Bruh most the songs I named are 8-10 years ago before the streaming boom.
These was actual big records

I hear you.

But streaming started way before those songs dropped, lol. They've been counting streams forever, they're just starting to do the certifications for the past 6-7 years though. So for every 1,500 streams, they're going back and saying that that's "equivalent" to selling one actual album or 10 singles. There's a difference between songs being known and songs being actual hits. If people aren't buying the records, they're not hits. Take a song like Migos' "Bad and Boujee". That's an actual hit. It was the #1 song in the country. But it actually SOLD 4,000,000. Which means that 4,000,000 people bought the song. Either digitally or in physical media. That's not streams. That's purchases.

None of those Wale joints charted highly on Billboard, like the examples I gave with Cole. The certification was based on sales and streaming alone, but the actual songs didn't chart well, or hold any high position when they dropped over the 10-11 year span. They were certified due to the amount of streams, not big sales or chart positions. Wale's biggest tracks you listed weren't even Top 20 hits. That says that people weren't actually buying these records. They were streaming them. Which is cool, but actual hit records are the ones that do well on the streaming platforms and on iTunes and physical media.

 

[Rembrandt]

This gotta the dumbest fukking post all year

 

[Breh Obama]

Lol breh everyone's fukking clowning your dumbass

 

[JC_USN]

Jadakiss.

Dude is a beast in features and with the lox, but a hit song all his own…nope.

 

[RennisDeynolds]

Lil Twist, Lil chuckee, Lil poopy

 

[CrimsonTider]

This is streaming. Which is a weird way to call something a hit, these days. The RIAA had to come up with new ways to certify what's gold and platinum. So what this means now is that the songs were played a lot on the streaming services, though people aren't actually buying these singles. So if you check the actual charts, they don’t have the same success. That's where it really counts. The actual platinum, is what sells, not streamed. Cole is a good example. He's selling records and being streamed heavily. So his album is a Top 10 album, across all genres. And had 4 tracks in the Top 10. Those are hits. He and Wayne are the only MC's to ever do that.

So for Wale, he's heavily streamed, but the songs aren't selling. So they're not charting that high. Before, you were platinum if you SOLD 1,000,000 pieces of your album or single. Now, if you stream 100,000,000 million times for free, they'll throw you a certification. When artists have Top 10 hits on the charts, that's counting actual sales and everything else. Those are actual hits.

Those are all hits

 

[Pop123]

Not to derail but your career can take off without writing hit records. Nas probably has 1 or 2 billboard/radio "hit" records in close to 30 years...he's still Nas. A lot of people's career never took off, despite being nice, not for lack of hit making skills, but probably lack of song making skills overall, the bars was good but the music quality itself was ass. See Canibus, etc...

 

[Flawdaboi]

Nick grant

 

[nieman]

"Cant deny it". LOL!!

You're right, I think it depends on how you look at "success" though. There are underground artists like KA, who are not widely known, but he's aiming for a certain segment of listeners and selling out his inventory every release. That's success for him. He's doing what he aimed to do. Using Fab as an example, Clue is saying that they didn't meet expectations even though they tried to mad times. My point was that, he had all the resources at the best time possible, and still wasn't able to do what he and the label expected and wanted. During his Verzuz with Jada, he was being clowned on Twitter for playing shyt that people didn't even know. Every song Kiss played was a banger that people loved at some point. That's the tale of two different kinds of careers.

I think success is about what you aim to do and what the expectation is. Scarface said one time, "I don’t care about selling a million on one or two albums and then everybody forgets about me. I have the same 400,000-500,000 people coming out for me every album, so I'm good with them." That's success. But if you're shooting for superstar level shyt, and people know you more for your mixtapes, then you fell short. That's what Clue was saying about Fab. And it's true. He didnt see the success of his peers at the time. And they were working with a lot less than he was.

People know Fab for his hits though. His fans of "Sport" want mixtape type bars and music. His fans based on the hits want that type of music. His albums try to cater to both, so both are underwhelmed because each sect want more of their expectations. His commercial fans more than likely don't even know he started as a mixtape type guy. He's never put out street type singles, and has always been a commercial single type artist. Breathe is probably the closest, and that ish tiptoed as street music. He had a hit single...or at least a single in heavy radio rotation every album. His career followed the Mase blueprint, which was why he was dubbed that early on.

Fab does not fit the criteria.

 

[St_clair_Og]

The correct answer is Saigon....
This was close to being a hit tho.....

 

[L&HH]

Stalley

party next door

Tinashe

Rowdy Rebel


Remy Ma

Yeah if Rowdy could make more hits he could have a ASAP Ferg like career. Doubt it will happen