Lil Wayne photographed on July 9, 2023 at Quixote Studios in Los Angeles.
Ramona Rosales
After being featured in the top 10 of Billboard and Vibe‘s Greatest Rappers of All Time list, Lil Wayne has decided to share his own ranking.
In his new Billboard cover story that was published Wednesday (Aug. 2) in honor of hip-hop’s 50th anniversary this month, Weezy shared the top five from his G.O.A.T. rappers list (in “no specific order,” he clarified): Missy Elliott, Jay-Z, UGK, Goodie Mob and The Notorious B.I.G. “It’s because I organically grew up on [them]. You know, when you’re asked, ‘How’d you start listening?,’ there’s a story for everybody … like, someone I know told me to start listening or whatever. But like I said, every decision I make is organic,” he told Gail Mitchell, Billboard‘s executive director of R&B and hip-hop.
Weezy himself ranked No. 7 on our list, for being “one of the most masterful lyricists of our time, delivering mind-boggling verses for the last quarter century,” and for “setting the stage for rap hopefuls and fellow Billboard all-time chart stars Drake and Nicki Minaj, both of whom Wayne helped develop into the global icons they are today by way of his Young Money/Cash Money record label.” When asked during his Billboard cover interview about his placement on the list, Tunechi responded, “That’s awesome. You would be happy to be anywhere on that list.”
Billboard broke down Wayne’s relationships with each rapper and rap group from his G.O.A.T. list below.
-
Missy Elliott
Even if Weezy says his list is in “no specific order,” he previously said Missy was “always going to be first” during Fox Sports’ What’s Wright? With Nick Wright podcast last year. “She’s a huge influence of everything I’ve ever done.” Missy retweeted the clip and relayed her gratitude by writing, “Whenever @LilTunechi says my name in his interviews twitter don’t have enough space for my tosay my GRATEFULNESS because he is a LEGEND himself who birthed many emcees after him & as a man to acknowledge me as a big influence 4 him I send you love WAYNE.”
The two sat down in May for an episode of TV One’s Uncensored, where Tunechi continued to sing her praises. “Before Jay — this was before I even knew Jay-Z existed — I was into Missy Elliott. And it was because you… would say things that I would want to say as I’m rapping. You not only made ’em, you made me love it. And you made a whole song of it…. I became so interested in you,” he told her.
Missy and Wayne have collaborated multiple times, on songs like 2009’s “All 4 U,” the 2012 remix of Busta Rhymes’ “Why Stop Now” (also featuring Chris Brown) and Timbaland’s “The Party Anthem” (also featuring T-Pain) in 2013.
-
Jay-Z
Weezy’s 35-minute track “10,000 Bars” from 2002 marks the last time the MC wrote down lyrics before hopping in a booth, after he discovered that Hov spits whatever comes to him, he said during The Pivot Podcast last month. “Like Biggie, love Biggie, love Jadakiss, I love all that sh–. But Jay…. the moment I heard it, I stopped. You could ask my boy. ‘I heard that n—a Jay-Z don’t write no more,’” he said. “We went in the studio, and we did ‘10,000 Bars.’ And that was the last time I rapped anything off of a paper.”
In 2020, during a conversation with Lil Baby for Rolling Stone‘s Musicians on Musicians series, Wayne discussed how Jay’s 1999 album Vol. 3… Life and Times of S. Carter changed his life. “It was the first album where I actually [got] the car that the rapper was talking about. That was my album,” he said. “Also, Jay talked so crazy. He went bananas on that album. I got lyrics from the album tattooed on me and s–t. I have songs that are remakes of spinoffs of songs from that album, you know?”
In 2007, Wayne appeared on “Hello Brooklyn 2.0” from Jay’s American Gangster album. The following year, Jay appeared on “Mr. Carter” from Wayne’s Tha Carter III album, and the two co-starred on “Swagga Like Us” (with Kanye West) from T.I.’s album Paper Trail. DJ Khaled brought Weezy and Hov together again last year (alongside Rick Ross, John Legend and Fridayy) for the God Did title track, which was nominated for three Grammys this year — song of the year, best rap song and best rap performance.
-
UGK
Tunechi was featured on Bun B‘s “Damn I’m Cold” on his 2008 album II Trill, before the two appeared together on “Uptown,” from Drake’s 2009 mixtape So Far Gone. In 2011, Bun B, Nas, Shyne and Busta Rhymes performed the “Outro” of Weezy’s Tha Carter V album, and Wayne lent a verse to Bun B’s “Rudeboi,” from his 2018 LP Return of the Trill.
He also appeared on “3-Way Freak,” from Pimp C’s 2015 posthumous album Long Live the Pimp, which was released on the eight-year anniversary of the MC’s death. Prior to collaborating with UGK, Wayne sampled the hip-hop duo multiple times, including their 1996 track “Murder” on 2006’s “No Other,” featuring Juelz Santana, and their 2001 track “Woodwheel” on 2008’s “Magic,” featuring Gudda Gudda.
-
Goodie Mob
“I’ve been listening to Goodie Mob since I was in the seventh grade,” Wayne said during a 2016 Genius sit-down interview alongside 2 Chainz, before spitting CeeLo Green’s classic verse from “Goodie Bag,” from 195’s Soul Food.
“My homeboy CT — we call him Thugger, Camouflage Thugger, he’s one of Mack good, good homeboys — he put me onto [Goodie Mob] back in the day, in the seventh grade,” Wayne further explained. “He had me listening to that s–t every day. It changed my life. I started rapping about different things, and found out that it was OK to rap positive, actuall,y and to make it sound right. If you spittin’… not that it doesn’t matter what you’re spittin’ about, but if you spittin’, you got their ears. So you might as well make the most of it and take advantage of that fact. That’s what CeeLo and the whole Goodie Mob used to do.”
Three years ago, Weezy interpolated Goodie Mob’s 1995 debut single “Cell Therapy” on “Wayne’s World,” from his Funeral album.
-
The Notorious B.I.G.
Wayne’s earliest credit on a Biggie record was when the Hot Boys and Big Tymers were featured on “Hope You N—as Sleep” from Biggie’s first posthumous album, Born Again, in 1999. Tunechi was later featured on “I’m with Whateva” (alongside Juelz Santana and Jim Jones) from Biggie’s second posthumous album, Duets: The Final Chapter, in 2005; he sampled another track off that album, “Spit Your Game,” on “Spitter” from his own Dedication 2 mixtape that was released the following year.
But two years ago, Wayne recalled during Emmanuel Acho’s Uncomfortable Conversations series about how Biggie’s “One More Chance” music video was playing on the TV screen when he attempted suicide at age 12. “Biggie was on. I’m looking in the mirror, so you could look through the mirror and the television was behind me. So I was watching the video through the mirror. ‘One More Chance’ was on, and [I] think Biggie was already gone or something,” he said at the time. “So I was just looking, I was like, ‘You know what? Start thinking I had to get myself mad and noticed that I didn’t have to.’ That’s what scared me. How I knew I had mental health problems was I pulled the trigger.”