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Young Miko is sitting, legs crisscrossed, atop her purple bed, surrounded by bookshelves, a boombox and a big Tamagotchi. A microphone clutched to her chest, she’s visibly emotional, almost teary-eyed. But she’s not alone in what appears to be her bedroom. On this September evening, she’s onstage at Miami’s Hard Rock Live, and a crowd […]
J Balvin and I have a date at Tiffany’s.
Admittedly, even I don’t realize this until I reach the storied display windows on Fifth Avenue, where I’m led to a private elevator manned by a uniformed attendant who silently takes me up, up, up. The doors open to a stunning private room with unfettered views of the Manhattan skyline and Central Park — where I also find José Álvaro Osorio Balvin himself. He looks every bit the lord of the manor, in a casually elegant short-sleeved white T-shirt tucked into sleek black Prada cargo pants. His beard is trimmed and his hair is pulled back in neat cornrows, exposing the matching diamond studs in his earlobes. On his wrist is a Patek Philippe watch.
It’s a rare oasis of calm for an artist who lately seems to have been moving nonstop in multiple directions at once. Since the beginning of the year, Balvin has appeared in the cinematic teaser for Usher’s Super Bowl halftime show; released a new shoe in collaboration with Air Jordan; been the face of Cheetos’ new “Deja tu Huella” campaign; performed a major Coachella set (the second-highest billed artist of the day, behind Doja Cat), featuring a surprise appearance by Will Smith; toured Europe and then Australia and New Zealand; and in August, released Rayo, his first album since 2021. He’s currently preparing a collaboration with G-SHOCK watches. Before the year is over, Peacock will broadcast a new interview series he’ll host. And he’s already gearing up for his first feature film lead role, in the drug drama Little Lorraine, helmed by Grammy Award-winning director Andy Hines and planned for a 2025 release.
It’s a remarkably fruitful time — both creatively and commercially — for the Colombian star who three years ago, during the pandemic and at the height of his popularity, saw public opinion in some quarters turn sharply against him after a rapid-fire series of unfortunate, almost surreal incidents.
In 2021, following the birth of his son Rio (with his longtime girlfriend, model Valentina Ferrer), Balvin found himself in the crosshairs of rapper Residente, who took umbrage with Balvin’s call to boycott the Latin Grammys due to the absence of reggaetón in the main categories and who posted several scathing videos chastising him on social media.
Not long after, Balvin was criticized for his portrayal of women in the video for his 2021 song “Perra,” an edgy collaboration with Tokischa. Directed by Raymi Paulus, Tokischa’s collaborator, it showed Tokischa, who identifies as a queer woman, eating from a dog bowl and Balvin walking two Black women dressed as dogs on leashes, prompting Colombia’s then-vice president, Marta Lucía Ramírez, to call out the song’s “misogynist lyrics that violate women’s rights, comparing them to animals.” Days later, Balvin apologized publicly and removed the video from YouTube.
Mere weeks after that, confused fans questioned why the 2021 African Entertainment Awards named Balvin Afro-Latino artist of the year. “I am not Afro-Latino,” Balvin posted to his Instagram story in Spanish. “But thank you for giving me a place in the contribution to Afrobeat music and its movement.”
Then, in March 2022, Residente, whom Balvin had considered a friend, resurfaced with “Residente: Bzrp Music Sessions, Vol. 49,” a no-holds-barred, nine-minute opus made with Argentine DJ Bizarrap that torpedoed reggaetón in general but zeroed in on Balvin, criticizing him for, among other things, “using mental health to sell a documentary” and for the “Perra” video.
And through it all, Balvin’s mother was in and out of intensive care in the singer’s native Medellín. (She is now better but still has health struggles.)
While Balvin kept up with social media posts and appearances, privately he was taken aback. “In my entire career, I had never been a person who had scandals,” notes the 39-year-old, who says he hasn’t spoken to Residente since. “I used to say, ‘Why do all these artists have things happen to them, and nothing happens to me!’ You’re looking at it from up there, and then, suddenly you’re in the middle of it.”
Musically, Balvin went quiet — mostly — for nearly three years. An extraordinarily prolific artist, between 2014 and 2021 he had released six albums, all top 10s on Billboard’s Top Latin Albums chart, including four No. 1s, and charted 96 singles on Hot Latin Songs (including nine No. 1s) and 18 on the Billboard Hot 100, including the chart-topper “I Like It,” with Cardi B and Bad Bunny. (Balvin also holds the record for most No. 1s on Latin Airplay, 36.) After March 2022, he put out only a handful of singles and no albums.
But Balvin, a relentless hustler at heart, regrouped with his family; parted ways with Scooter Braun, who had managed him during this turbulent period; and took stock of his friendships. During this dark hour, he sought advice from Maluma, a colleague who had never been a close friend, but who had experienced similar public excoriation in 2016 when he released his controversial song “Cuatro Babys.”
“I was always very willing to help José when all this happened because I went through that,” Maluma says. “At end of the day, even if you pretend it doesn’t matter, it hurts when people have the wrong idea about you, and defending yourself against the entire world is very difficult. Plus, we’re both Colombian, we’ve both had beautiful careers, and we’ve elevated our country and our genre. José is one of the most important pillars of Latin and urban music. He takes his career very seriously. It was the least I could do.”
Entire Studios top.
David Needleman
Balvin began to formulate a plan for returning to the spotlight. He approached Roc Nation co-founder and longtime CEO Jay Brown, and two years ago, signed with Roc Nation to manage all aspects of his career. “He was being very thoughtful about what he wanted. He was looking for insights on how to grow his brands, how to expand on what he wanted to do with his career, outside his music,” Brown says, noting that he and Balvin communicate almost daily. “It’s about managing his enthusiasm, his inspiration. He loves what he does, he loves touching people, he loves being out there. I think that’s refreshing. And he’s a good guy. It’s hard to say no to something like that.”
In 2022, Balvin launched his education-focused foundation, Vibra en Alta, in Colombia. Earlier this year, he also switched labels, moving within the Universal family from Universal Music Latino to Capitol under Capitol Music Group chairman/CEO Tom March and Interscope Capitol Labels Group executive vp Nir Seroussi, a good friend. At the same time, he returned to the studio, working with longtime producers like Jeremy Ayala (Daddy Yankee’s son) and Luis Ángel O’Neill, while also trying out new material with young, rising artists like Saiko, Dei V and Feid.
In short order, he cut more than 40 tracks, which he then narrowed down to 15 spunky reggaetón bangers for an album he named Rayo, which translates to “lightning.” The name and the sleek, silver car on the cover pay homage to Balvin’s first car, a beat-up red Volkswagen Golf that he drove to gigs — a hopeful symbol of all the possibilities before him.
“I wanted to focus on the clear comeback of a Balvin focused on music, his career and his legacy,” Seroussi says. “When I sat down with him to see where he was spiritually, I saw a José that is going to win. He wakes up in the morning as if he were a new artist.”
Four months ago, Balvin wrote me on WhatsApp. He was ready to talk, he said, about everything. And so, here I am high above Tiffany & Co. for a private afternoon of coffee and macarons — just the two of us. As we chat, his openness surprises me. But then again, as Seroussi says, “He’s an artist who has nothing else to prove, but wants to keep doing music. Every [Latin] artist today who has something to do with urban music at a global scale can in some way trace back to what José opened for them.”
Balvin will sit down for a live one on one interview during Billboard Latin Music Week. You can purchase your tickets here.
Luar jacket and pants, Vetements shoes.
David Needleman
Your son Rio was born at a hectic point in your life. What did his arrival mean to you at the time?
His arrival was perfection because having Rio at that moment allowed me to really focus my energy on a person who came to bring me light. It was as if God was saying, “OK, I sent you a trial, but here’s a gift.” And I say that because since Rio’s birth, my — how do I say this — my emotional intelligence has grown very much. I don’t remember losing control since my son’s birth. I’ve had complicated moments, but I’ve never lost control. He brought me strength, a lot of patience, but yes, a lot of light. In fact, I made the Jordan Rios — which are black but have a sunset in the sole — based on the fact that in a moment of darkness, my son came and brought me light.
Let’s talk about this moment of darkness. It became really complicated for you on many fronts, particularly your dispute with Residente.
Have you ever had a friend turn on you? I considered him a friend, and I spoke with him as if he were a friend. Very openly. Con mucha confianza. That’s what surprised me and hurt and opened my eyes. I still believe I can make new friends, but it’s a little more complicated finding them these days. Because some of the people I thought were my friends ended up not being that. Obviously, this happened, it’s done, I’ve matured and I’m not holding a grudge or anything like that. I had to forgive myself for being so naive and opening my heart so easily to some people. The toughest part was to encounter a dark side of humanity in a moment of darkness. And I’m not saying I’m the most illuminated person either; I’ve made mistakes, and maybe I’ve made friends feel bad. But I’ve never betrayed a friend.
Personally, I never found you offensive. How do you think you made people feel bad?
I’ve been very honest. But as a paisa, we’re jokesters and we can get out of hand, and not everyone understands. We’re very open, and other cultures sometimes don’t understand that and take it the wrong way.
Feuds are common in rap and reggaetón. But this felt more like an attack than a feud. You never replied to Residente’s dis track, did you?
Never. First of all, you need to know what court to play in, right? When all this happened, it was the most complicated moment for my mom’s health. She was in intensive care. She told me, “Promise me you won’t reply and you won’t say anything. Do it for me. I know you, I know your essence, and this isn’t for you.” And the weight of a mother’s word is everything.
Is she aware of these things that happened to you?
Of course. And my mom suffered a lot. Now that I’m a father, I understand. It’s crossing a powerful line. A line that’s family, it’s sacred. The pain caused to a mother, a family, a sister, to the people who love you, was complicated. And it was complex for me because, following my mother’s advice, I never spoke out about this and I never defended myself. But I’m very clear on who I am. I’m not going to go out there and explain who I am to the world because clearly, people who know me know my essence and those are the people I want to be in good standing with.
I think not replying was wise…
As one of the leaders of Colombia’s movement I can’t set a bad example, no matter what people would like to see. I’ve always strived to be a better person and a gentleman in life. Being a decent person is a much harder task than being an “artist,” [which is] easier in the sense that if you have a talent and patience, you’ll get there. But being a better person is a daily task.
J Balvin photographed August 20, 2024 in New York. Entire Studios shirt.
David Needleman
You also had an issue surrounding the video for “Perra,” your single with Tokischa.
I’ve always been known for supporting new talent, and in Tokischa, I saw a woman who was very empowered and daring and who spoke positively about her sexuality in a way I had never seen before [in the Latin world], like Nicki Minaj or Cardi B do here in the U.S. If men in reggaetón can speak about their sexuality this way, I was struck to see a woman doing it. My mission was simply to do what I could to elevate and promote Tokischa and her art to a wider audience. I respect the way each person wants to conceptualize their vision, and this was her vision and her creation. I went there to support her vision, and I paid dearly for it.
In this case, after many people criticized the video, you not only took it down from your YouTube channel, but you spoke out and gave a public apology. Why?
I spoke out because this was a much deeper issue in that it went into topics like race, masculinity and machismo. However, if people had listened to the song, they would have realized it’s a story that has nothing to do with going against a race or gender. It was totally the opposite. Tokischa is an Afro Latina woman, and she was representing her race, her culture and the idiosyncrasies of her world. And obviously, my lyrics, I always approach them in a very commercial way and I’m very careful about what I say. But when things happen, they happen all at once.
I know you went to Maluma for advice. What did he say?
Maluma and I weren’t really friends. We were colleagues, but we also competed with each other. But I wrote him, and then I sat down with him. We’ve become very close. I’ve come to appreciate him and respect him more than ever, and now I can say he’s like a younger brother to me. I imagine it must have been tough when things happened to him, but then you grow an armor. That’s what happened to me. I became very cold; I didn’t want to open my heart to anyone. When I went back on social media, I didn’t want to go back to the old José who’s always making jokes and teasing, because I had a mental block. Until Rayo came around and I started to make music again for the love of music 100% and stopped thinking about the business.
How was your approach different?
I began to make music with a sense of security that came down to: I don’t have to prove myself in this business. It would have been complicated if I hadn’t achieved anything [before] and I had to prove myself. But we’ve achieved so many changes and evolutions. I remember you interviewed me years ago with Nicky Jam and you asked: Do you think a song in Spanish will make it to No. 1 on the Hot 100? And I said yes.
I remember that conversation well. And it happened.
We unlocked that. We unlocked performing at the Super Bowl. We unlocked having the most streamed artist in the world, we unlocked the first stadium played by a solo reggaetón artist, we unlocked sneaker culture, fashion, Guinness Records, so many things that hadn’t happened before. So I kind of look back and say, “Prove what? I need to regain my confidence after all these blows and enjoy the process.”
Luar jacket and pants.
David Needleman
You didn’t release an album for three years. For you, that’s an eternity…
And during those three years, I never left the top 50 of the most streamed artists in the world [on Spotify, where Balvin ranked No. 31 at press time]. It’s a beautiful thing to see that in a business where so few artists have the luxury of even saying, “I’m taking a year off.” Obviously, I questioned myself a lot when I came back. “Why the f–k did I leave?” Although I never stopped working. I kept playing festivals in Europe and all that. But I think my official return was when I played Coachella.
I have to imagine that setting foot on that Coachella stage was a little nerve-racking.
Of course! Plus, that show was planned for a year because Coachella had never allowed something to be hung from the roof, because of the wind in the desert. So we took the risk of hanging the [giant inflatable] UFO, and the investment was very high. But it was finally spectacular, and having Will Smith [make a guest appearance to perform “Men in Black”] was very cool. I saw myself in him, in the sense that both of us went through a dark period — and I know that mistakes don’t define a person and can’t detract from the greatness of what he’s achieved. I was so happy to share his return because after the Oscars incident, this was his first public appearance, and a week later, Bad Boys [for Life] came out. And it wasn’t planned!
Were you two friends?
No, we had never met. I [felt] I needed something else to really make a statement in the show. And Will Smith came to mind, because what’s better than Men in Black? [Balvin reached out to Smith’s team and ultimately FaceTimed him.] I told him my mission, with my passion. He said, “Give me a week.” [While I waited] like a good, hardworking paisa, I sent him a photo of the Virgin [Mary] praying. Then I sent him a votive candle, as if I were praying; then a voodoo doll. And exactly a week later, he called and said, “Let’s do it.”
Following Coachella, you took your tour to Europe, Australia and New Zealand to play for big and very receptive crowds despite these regions not being your core markets. Was that gratifying for you after a traumatic period?
When I did that tour, [and when] I went to Medellín to release the album and I saw the euphoria among the fans, I thought, “It was all in my head.”
Entire Studios top and pants, Air Jordan 3 x J Balvin shoes.
David Needleman
You’ve achieved global domination in many spheres. Most recently, you became the artist with the most titles, 15, in YouTube’s Billion Views Club. What drives you today?
What’s most important is a super reconnection and a super service to my Latinos, 100%. They’re the foundation of everything. The reason I’m a global artist is because Latins gave me that power. And I want a super reconnection with new generations and Gen Z. It’s never been a problem for me to connect with new generations because I like new artists and I enjoy collaborating with them. From there, I’d like to do a grand tour of the U.S. and Latin America. And I want to unlock India. Unlock it completely.
You were perhaps the first major Latin artist to talk frankly about mental health and your struggles with it. I know this has been a journey for you and you’ve taken medication for anxiety at times.
I still do. Always. Some people can do without meds. In my case, they’ve been lowering the dosage and I haven’t had any issues since my son was born. None. That’s why I said before, in the darkest moments, I didn’t lose control. But I take my pills daily. It’s perfectly normal, as if someone had an issue with high [blood] pressure. But there’s also meditation — I’ve been meditating since I was 19 years old — daily exercise, eating habits and the people you surround yourself with. The fact that I don’t do drugs or anything like that has also been part of having that mental, spiritual balance.
What role has Colombia’s music scene played in exposing the country to the world?
Music has been a path of light for Colombia at a global scale. I think it saved an entire generation. Now, all these Gen Zers want to be artists instead of drug dealers or killers for hire. When I started in music, there wasn’t a map for urban music in Colombia. There was Shakira and Carlos Vives and Juanes, but they were completely different genres. [Daddy] Yankee inspired me, but he’s Puerto Rican. No one had globalized urban music from Colombia. We literally took a pick and an axe and paved the way. I don’t know how we did it, but we did. And now I see this whole new generation of artists, like Ryan Castro, Blessd.
Karol G has also been steadfastly by your side. In fact, she invited you to perform at one of her shows at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey last year…
Karol is a friend who’s also become a teacher. That was a beautiful moment here at [MetLife] to come together again in a stadium full of people who came to see her. I told her, “You used to look up at me, and now, I’m your biggest fan.” It’s a beautiful cycle and I’m so proud of Colombia. We’re a small country but so strong in our music.
Luar jacket and pants, Vetements shoes.
David Needleman
How do you see yourself today?
I value what I’ve achieved, without a doubt. The insecurity I felt has gone, and I feel like a brand-new artist. If you listen to Rayo, you hear a refreshed J Balvin who had a good time. I didn’t make this album thinking I was going to make an album. I went to make music and remembered how I felt when I was 19 years old and I just wanted to show every song I made to my mom, my sister, my girlfriend, my friends. That’s why, when I finished the album, I wanted to name it for that moment in time, when my only ambitions were artistic, when I really knew nothing about the business.
You really feel like a new artist?
One hundred percent. And I’m working like a new artist. I mean, most artists of my level don’t go to Mexico and sit down for 200 interviews. I do, and also, it’s been three years! I’m ready to be overexposed. Whatever I need to do, it’s Balvin time. And I say that with certainty and because I know what I have and what I can give. Something positive always happens when I give it my all. I went through the dark times, and now, the sun is out and it’s shining on my face.
At 39 years old, how do you feel about longevity?
I’ll perform and record as long as I’m happy and people connect with me. We have yet to see the first elder reggaetón artist. We have the OGs — Yandel, Wisin — who look great. Yankee looks younger than when he started. But honestly, we haven’t had the example of seeing how long a reggaetón artist can go for. I see myself super gangster in the future. Not evil gangster, but as someone who’s done well, who’s been strategic in his movements and has done something well for society and culture. Like a Latin Jay-Z.
This story appears in the Oct. 5, 2024, issue of Billboard.
J Balvin and I have a date at Tiffany’s. Admittedly, even I don’t realize this until I reach the storied display windows on Fifth Avenue, where I’m led to a private elevator manned by a uniformed attendant who silently takes me up, up, up. The doors open to a stunning private room with unfettered views […]
As the California sunset paints the sky bright orange on a scorching August day, a caravan of luxury SUVs makes its way across the dirt roads outside Los Angeles that lead to Pico Rivera Sports Arena. When they arrive, the door of one pristine white Mercedes-Benz G-Class opens and 28-year-old Luis R Conriquez emerges. Clad in […]
On a balmy May evening in 2023, the Glasshouse — a neon-lit venue six stories above the Hudson River in Manhattan’s Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood — buzzed with excitement. A music-industry crowd of hundreds had gathered for a private Telemundo Upfront event and its featured performance by Nicky Jam. And from the moment the seminal reggaetón star stepped onstage, clad in his signature baseball cap and an athletic Amiri ensemble beneath a wool trench coat, he showcased why he’s not just part of the genre’s history but also a vital architect of its present and future.
As Nicky sang 2003’s “Yo No Soy Tu Marido,” a bold attendee leapt onstage to dance alongside him. “Oh, ella quiere perrear!” (“She wants to twerk!”) he exclaimed, happily engaging with his unexpected partner as she enthusiastically began to grind on him. For about two hours, Nicky commanded the spotlight with that kind of effortless swagger, cycling through his expansive catalog of hits, from his 2014 international breakout smash, “Travesuras,” to the pulsating beats of “Hasta El Amanecer,” to the pop-reggaetón banger “El Perdón,” to the groundbreaking collaborative track “Te Boté (Remix).”
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Two decades into his career, Nicky is still vital onstage — which made it all the more shocking when, last October, he told his more than 40 million Instagram followers that he was “retiring soon.” He paired his social media announcement with footage from his 2018 Netflix bio-series, Nicky Jam: El Ganador, which chronicled how he’d recovered from a turbulent past marked by drug addiction (and a stint in prison) to become one of Latin music’s most illustrious figures. “I’m not going to be a singer for the rest of my life,” he tells Billboard today over Zoom from his Miami home. “I think I’ll probably retire soon… Well, not retire. Singers never retire. You just tone it down.”
Nicky Jam will headline Rumbazo on Sept. 13 at the Downtown Las Vegas Events Center. For more information, go to rumbazofest.com.
Offstage, the 43-year-old born Nick Rivera Caminero certainly doesn’t look like he’s slowing down. He’s channeled his creativity into a burgeoning business empire, running a chic Miami restaurant, La Industria Bakery & Cafe, and a few boutique hotels in Colombian cities including Cartagena, Guatapé and Medellín. “I have another hotel in Tierra Bomba that we’re almost finishing. It’s on an island resort [in Colombia] that I bought,” he mentions casually, then adds with a grin: “I’ll probably come out with weed too.”
In addition to these ventures, he’s recently launched his own lines of vape products (NickyJam x fume) and energy drinks (Athon) and even dipped his toes into the media world as host of The Rockstar Show (which streams on his official YouTube channel as well as all podcast platforms), where he’s interviewed Latin music stars including Karol G, Rauw Alejandro and Tainy (not to mention Billboard’s own chief content officer of Latin/Español, Leila Cobo). “We’re coming out with the third season right now,” Nicky says. And he also just signed his first full management client, up-and-coming Bronx rapper Axel Leon. (Nicky is also part of the management team for Manuel Turizo.)
However, for the moment, Nicky continues to find music creatively fruitful. The artist has been open about his battles with addiction, but when speaking with Billboard, he also reveals that he’s grappled with anxiety and depression for the past two years. That emotional turbulence — and the sleepless nights that came with it — inspired his sixth studio album, one of his most personal to date. Insomnio, out Sept. 6, delves into his personal reflections and nocturnal musings, while musically blending the sounds of Afrobeats, soul, trap and reggaetón.
For the project, he enlisted a range of talent from all over the world including Jamaican dancehall veteran Sean Paul, Puerto Rican trap star Eladio Carrión, Italian DJ-producer Benny Benassi, Argentine rapper Trueno and Colombian reggaetón star Ryan Castro. “It’s crazy to collaborate with a person you grew up listening to on the stoops of your neighborhood, the cars blasting his music in your city,” says Trueno, who guests on the classically reggaetón single “Cangrinaje.” “It’s like being able to transcend the line from being an admirer to being able to collaborate with that influence. Nicky Jam, without a doubt, was one of those visions that has stayed with me.”
“Having a track with Nicky for his latest album is very special to me because I watched him perform in nightclubs in Medellín,” says Castro, who’s listened to Nicky since he was a kid. “Seeing him overcome everything he went through in life and achieve what he has is the ultimate inspiration for me. Nicky is a star, and since I met him, we’ve developed a great friendship. I feel like he’s one of our own in Colombia.”
KSUBI shirt, Amiri pants and Louis Vuitton glasses.
Devin Christopher
Before his resurgence in the mid-2000s, however, Nicky faced significant struggles on his native island. “In Puerto Rico, I wasn’t booking any shows. Nobody wanted to deal with me — I had a bunch of problems on the streets, I was into drugs, I was a mess. Back in Puerto Rico at that time, I was the embarrassment of reggaetón music,” Nicky told the podcast Drink Champs last year. “But in Colombia, I was a legend,” he added, noting that Colombians appreciated both his hits and the songs that weren’t popular back home.
When Nicky moved to Colombia in 2007, he experienced a rebirth. “He arrives from Puerto Rico to Colombia con una mano atrás y otra adelante,” says his longtime manager Juan Diego Medina, using the Colombian expression for arriving with nothing. “In Colombia, he went through an entire musical process. He says that he learned to be human there, in the city [of Medellín] and country.” (In July, the two amicably parted ways after 13 years but remain close friends.)
“Moving to Colombia gave me the mojo to do the music,” Nicky says. “I got to Colombia in a moment when I desperately needed to work. They were listening to my old songs; they said they were classics. It changed my way of thinking and my way of writing music. I just sat down and I said, ‘If I make a No. 1 hit in this country, that would mean a lot of views on YouTube.’ With 45 million people [back then in Colombia], I was motivated. So I did a No. 1 national hit in Colombia, then four, five more. I became the new Colombian sound.”
In Colombia, Nicky embraced local culture while leveraging then-emerging digital platforms to reach a wider audience. “He had his whole trajectory in Puerto Rico and went to Colombia to try to reinvent himself, to find that audience that would give him a second opportunity,” says Stephanie Carvajal, artist relations and development, Latin lead at YouTube. “What allowed him to break beyond was a platform like YouTube. Nicky Jam was one of the pioneers in understanding and harnessing the power of YouTube to extend his music to audiences worldwide.”
Released in February 2015, “El Perdón,” Nicky’s game-changing collaboration with Enrique Iglesias, was a pivotal moment in reggaetón’s evolution from crude barrio genre to global juggernaut. “Nicky Jam was blowing up in Colombia, and Enrique had just put out ‘Bailando,’ ” recalls industry veteran Gerardo Mejía, who had worked closely with the Spanish pop superstar at Interscope Records and remained in close contact with him. “I said to Enrique, ‘Bro, you got to do something with Nicky.’ Nicky sent us ‘El Perdón.’ I said, ‘Wow, this is a hit.’ We saw how the [reggaetón] crossover began to happen through Enrique’s pop strength. All reggaetón started becoming more [mainstream] — it wasn’t so street anymore.”
But Iglesias’ pop-oriented style initially gave Nicky pause when he first heard it. “I felt the song was too pop-ish,” he admits. “I was worried about my street community. My urban community. I thought they were going to criticize me, so I put out the song without him. Then the record label, Sony, was like, ‘Yo, bro, we need you to put Enrique back on that track because it will be the best move you would do.’ We did the video and the version with Enrique, and that became a global hit.”
Louis Vuitton glasses, Gucci belt, Amiri pants and Palm Angels shoes.
Devin Christopher
Almost a decade later, Nicky Jam is one of YouTube’s most watched Latin artists of all time, boasting seven videos in the platform’s Billion Views Club. On the Billboard charts, “El Perdón” began a run of nine entries on the Hot 100 for him, and two of his albums, 2017’s Fénix and 2019’s Intimo, charted on the Billboard 200.
His Insomnio singles have also fared well: The 2023 Feid collaboration “69” climbed to No. 41 on Hot Latin Songs, No. 37 on Latin Airplay, No. 18 on Latin Digital Song Sales and No. 10 on Latin Rhythm Airplay; “Calor,” with Beéle, reached No. 20 on Latin Airplay and No. 6 on Latin Rhythm Airplay; and the title track, released in August, soared to No. 9 on Tropical Airplay.
And as he prepares for Insomnio’s release and contemplates what might come after, Nicky is well aware of his influence. “I came out exactly at that moment where everything happened,” he says. “For some weird reason, me being an old-school singer, I started what’s going on right now. I’m lucky to say I’m from the old school. I did a lot of hits back in the days, but when it came to the new stuff and the new movement, I’m one of the creators and pioneers of that moment, too.”
Insomnio is an evocative title. What inspired it, and how does it relate to the music’s themes?
I’ve been having two crazy years. I was struggling with anxiety and depression. A lot of the problems from the past were catching up to me. It led me to drink a lot. I had problems with drugs in the past, but never with alcohol. Alcohol is something legal that you find anywhere you go. I started drinking a lot, and it took me to a dark spot where I was feeling like it wasn’t the Nicky people are used to. I was partying too much, going out and I wasn’t sleeping. The crazy thing is sometimes, out of bad things, good things come. I did badass songs for this album during this dark moment. The reason why the album is called Insomnio is because most of the songs [were written, recorded and] take place at night.
How did the nocturnal songwriting process influence the album’s overall tone and message?
Remember, music is the art of expression, and I’m expressing myself. I’ve always been that type of person who’s very transparent. I never hide who I am or what I do. If you listen to “3 a.m. y yo en la cyber truck, pensando cuando contigo me daba los shot” [from “La Cyber” featuring Luar La L], “Exótica” [with lyrics] like “ver el sol caer,” most of the songs talk about me in full self-destruction mode, partying and not giving a f–k about life and just going crazy. If you listen to “Insomnio,” the merengue song, it’s a very sad song [lyrically].
Louis Vuitton glasses, Gucci belt, Amiri pants.
Devin Christopher
Merengue is usually joyful, but “Insomnio” takes a darker turn. How did you balance its upbeat rhythm with its somber themes?
If you listen to “El Perdón,” it’s a sad song. But you put that beat [on it], it automatically becomes a happy song. I think that’s part of my magic. I can make a sad song sound happy. That’s part of my creation mode. I really like that people can sing a sad song not even known as a sad song. That’s magic! If I were to sing that with low, dark chords, you automatically would have been like, “Damn, this motherf–ker is sad as f–k.” The reality is I was sad when I wrote that song, but in the production moment, I said, “I am not going to make this a sad song, I want this upbeat.”
Every album has its own unique creation journey. How would you differentiate Insomnio from Infinity, Intimo or Fénix in terms of the creative process?
I’m going to be honest with you. Fénix is an album that you can realize is Nicky Jam in his prime, doing his comeback and very happy about life. It was a different moment in my life. These other two albums, it was just working. I was touring so much and I just did music and put the [album] name after. These other two albums have no meaning for me. Insomnio has more meaning than any of these albums because I’m telling the people how I felt in one of my darkest moments.
On Insomnio, you navigate between trap, merengue, reggaetón, Afrobeats and electronic music. Can you talk about exploring a wide spectrum of genres?
I’m not this guy that stays in one corner. I could sing R&B, hip-hop, trap, reggaetón, merengue, whatever. The merengue thing is something I’ve never done. That’s why I wanted to do it. That’s funny because I’m half Dominican. Merengue right now is doing really good. Karol G came out with a merengue, Manuel Turizo, and a couple of others. I wanted a part of it. But the whole trap song thing was because Eladio Carrión sent me the [beat]. Then the Afrobeats is something that’s really going on right now. Quería cubrir todas las partes — I wanted to have every corner block. That’s what I did with the album.
Alongside your music, you’ve ventured into business, investing and launching restaurants and hotels. How do these fit into your long-term plans?
I’m not going to be a singer the rest of my life. I’m 43 years old. In a [few] years, I’ll be 50. A 50-year-old reggaetón artist; I don’t know if that looks so good. Daddy Yankee retired at 47, 48. I think I’ll probably retire soon, too. Not now, but probably in seven to 10 years. Well, not retire. The word “retire” for a singer does not make any sense. Daddy Yankee said he retired, and he came out with a song [“Loveo”] a couple of months ago.
There are a lot of new kids, and you’re not going to compete when you’re almost 50 with a 20-year-old that has that brand-new sound, that new vibe that kids like. The reality is this is young people’s music. I’m not saying older people don’t listen to it, but if you see the list of the people, you’re going to see that it’s mostly the youth that listen to this music. You can’t compete with that. So I prepared myself businesswise.
When people say, “OK, Nicky, you’re too old for this,” I’ll be like, “All right, but I’m rich, baby. I got businesses that take care of me and [I] still live the lifestyle.” That’s what you want, to capitalize so many businesses that you don’t even have to perform and do music to live the lifestyle. I worked hard for it. That’s why I do businesses on the side, where I could profit enough that I can keep living that good life.
Faith by Luis hat.
Devin Christopher
How do your restaurant, La Industria Bakery & Café, and your hotels reflect your personal interests?
La Industria is mostly a brunch place. You get your pancakes and French toast. It’s that type of vibe. Here in Miami, I used to go to a lot of these spots, but I recognized there wasn’t a Spanish one. So I came out with the bakery, and it’s been a boon. It has my DNA everywhere. I was born and raised in Massachusetts, but I lived in Puerto Rico most of my life. At the end of the day, it’s a sweet pancake spot — but the bestseller is a hamburger called La Boricua. Everybody goes and gets that hamburger. They love it. You have a knife right through the middle.
You recently signed a management deal with hip-hop artist Axel Leon. What qualities do you look for in artists you mentor?
They got to be talented, disciplined, versatile and have a lot of charisma. That charisma goes crazy with the people. Just with that, you could conquer the world in the music industry. Talent is something, but if you have charisma and you’re hungry to work…
What led you to start The Rockstar Show?
I was in pandemic [mode]. Bored. I wasn’t doing anything. I was in my house and I said, “I got to work.” So I got a studio and I started interviewing artists. It started with a couple of interviews. From there, we went to The Rockstar Show. We’re coming out with the third season right now.
You took The Rockstar Show to Billboard Latin Music Week in 2023, and during your onstage interview with Ivy Queen you started beatboxing. What was that about?
I’m from the old school. Back in the day, we were MCs and we did everything. We’d rap, beatbox and dance. I used to breakdance. I used to [freestyle] battle in the corners like they do in the Red Bull Batalla. I’m very good. Believe me, ain’t nobody f–king with me.
As you continue diversifying your career, are there any other new avenues you’re looking to still explore?
Mostly hospitality, hotels. That’s what I’m really doing. I’ve done acting [in movies like 2017’s xXx: Return of Xander Cage and 2020’s Bad Boys for Life], I’ve done music, I’ve done it all.
Everything I do is to inspire people. Yes, it’s business, but at the end of the day, I come from a black hole most people don’t come out of. A lot of people that were raised with me, they’re dead right now. I’m not talking about one or two, I’m talking about hundreds of them. There’s a chance. There’s hope. If I did it, you could do it. That’s my philosophy.
This story appears in Billboard‘s Rumbazo special issue, dated Sept. 14, 2024.
On a balmy May evening in 2023, the Glasshouse — a neon-lit venue six stories above the Hudson River in Manhattan’s Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood — buzzed with excitement. A music-industry crowd of hundreds had gathered for a private Telemundo Upfront event and its featured performance by Nicky Jam. And from the moment the seminal reggaetón […]
I don’t know if this is going to work,” Mike Shinoda told his Linkin Park bandmates one day in the studio last year. They were recording the vocals for a wall-rattling thrasher, and Shinoda, the band’s co-lead vocalist and main producer, wanted his voice to match the pummeling production — so he tried something a little different. When he opened his mouth, he let loose with rare ferocity: After years of singing, rapping and harmonizing, Shinoda emitted a full-blooded scream.
Months later, Shinoda downplays the sound he makes on the track. “Is it a scream, though? Is it?” the 47-year-old asks, mischievous grin widening. “It’s kind of an awkward yell.” He leans back on a couch in the lounge of Los Angeles’ EastWest Studios, where Linkin Park recorded part of the new album that track would ultimately appear on; bassist Dave Farrell is sitting next to him, and recalls commanding Shinoda to “push more” after hearing him wail in the booth. “I don’t think I’m capable of doing more than that,” says Shinoda — then he looks across the couch, toward Emily Armstrong. “My voice isn’t built like Emily’s voice,” Shinoda adds. Armstrong, a seasoned scream-singer, subtly nods and replies, “I got you.”
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Seven years after Linkin Park pressed pause following the death of singer Chester Bennington, one of the biggest rock groups of the 21st century is roaring back — with a new lineup, album, tour and collective outlook. The band announced Sept. 5 that Armstrong, the veteran leader of power-rock hell-raisers Dead Sara, would be Shinoda’s new co-vocalist, while studio polymath Colin Brittain (Sueco, All Time Low) would sign on as drummer and co-producer.
With Armstrong and Brittain on board — as well as original members Shinoda, Farrell, guitarist/co-producer Brad Delson and DJ/visual director Joe Hahn — Linkin Park will release From Zero, its eighth studio album, on Nov. 15 through longtime label Warner Records. The band will also play six arena shows across four continents this fall before “touring heavily” in 2025, according to Shinoda.
And with a two-decade catalog of hard-rock hits — as well as plenty of fresh material — to bring back to live audiences globally, the band is aiming for stadiums next year. Linkin Park’s new agency, WME, expects sky-high ticket demand for a band that has grossed over $120 million during its career, according to Billboard Boxscore. “Linkin Park is one of the biggest touring rock bands of our time,” says John Marx, partner and agent at WME, which the band quietly joined earlier this year. “The excitement their fans will have, being able to see and celebrate them after seven years, will be massive.”
Linkin Park planned this new era — including the arena shows that will kick off Sept. 11 with a hometown show at the Kia Forum in L.A. — in total secrecy, with abstract rumors swirling across the Linkin Park fan sphere as the band once again became active, hammered out new songs and rehearsed. Months of outside speculation was followed by a week-and-a-half of band-sanctioned teasers — all leading to this week, when Linkin Park announced Armstrong and Brittain as new additions, launched a global performance livestream and released the hard-charging anthem “The Emptiness Machine” as From Zero’s lead single.
“An immense amount of thought and care go into everything the band does,” says Ryan DeMarti, the band’s longtime manager (alongside Bill Silva and Trish Evangelista) at Machine Shop Entertainment. “I feel the utmost confidence that commitment shines through in every social media post, every press release, every liner note.”
Understandably, Linkin Park is starting its next chapter with heightened sensitivity, as the first band project since Bennington’s tragic death in 2017. Following a tribute concert featuring dozens of special-guest vocalists that October, Linkin Park’s members went their separate ways: Shinoda released the contemplative solo album Post Traumatic in 2018, then toured the world to commune with grieving fans, while Delson, Farrell, Hahn and drummer Rob Bourdon (who isn’t returning for this new era) largely stopped making music.
As the members reconvened for 20th-anniversary rereleases of their multiplatinum first two albums (2000’s Hybrid Theory and 2003’s Meteora), as well as this year’s greatest-hits album, Papercuts, the future of the band remained uncertain. What could a version of Linkin Park without Bennington’s fragile scream sound like?
“Part of working under darkness was simply the fact that we didn’t know how far we would get in our efforts,” Hahn explains. “We didn’t want to set ourselves or anyone else up for disappointment if we weren’t able to do it. This has been years of struggling to understand what it can and should be.”
There is plenty of historical precedent for mega-selling rock acts reinventing themselves following the death of an iconic frontman: Think Queen with Adam Lambert, Alice in Chains with William DuVall or Sublime with Bradley Nowell’s son, Jakob. If Linkin Park simply re-formed as a live act — with a new vocalist re-creating Bennington’s parts on hits like “In the End,” “Numb” and “One Step Closer” — it’d be able to book sizable venues. The band’s numbers have been, and remain, huge: 22.7 million combined copies of the group’s seven studio albums sold in the United States to date, according to Luminate, with millions of monthly streams seven years after the band’s last activity and most recent album. And early last year, “Lost,” an unearthed single released as part of the Meteora reissue, cracked the top 40 of the Billboard Hot 100 and became Linkin Park’s longest-leading Alternative Airplay No. 1 in more than a decade, demonstrating the continued appeal of the band’s classic sound.
“The importance of their deep musical catalog cannot be overstated,” says Tom Corson, Warner Records’ co-chairman/COO. “Linkin Park’s songs are timeless — they’ve become part of the cultural fabric, and we actively promote and market their music, whether it’s of the past, the present or the future.”
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Yet instead of functioning as a nostalgia play to sell tickets, From Zero pulsates with renewed energy, a dynamic extension of Linkin Park’s multifaceted aesthetic. Some of the songs previewed for Billboard recall the quicksilver rap-rock aggression that made the band diamond-sellers; others iterate on specific eras, like the pulverizing metal of 2014’s The Hunting Party or the atmospheric alt-rock of 2010’s A Thousand Suns. Across the board, they carry a sense of pace and urgency — as if the band members refused to let up or phone in one moment of their grand return.
At the heart of the group’s new identity is the interplay between Shinoda, who sounds revitalized as both quick-twitch rapper and heartfelt crooner, and Armstrong, whose formidable rasp can both wallop and deeply affect rock listeners. On “The Emptiness Machine,” their voices collide over cleanly produced guitar blasts and form a magnetic tension. “It’s a great introduction to the record, and to this lineup,” Delson says of the single. “The song starts with Mike, and Emily’s vocal kind of sneaks in surreptitiously and then hits you hard over the head in the second chorus, and just builds intensity with both of their vocals through the end of the song.”
Shinoda and Armstrong also complement each other in person, cracking jokes in between studio anecdotes and communicating a shared passion to nail this next iteration of Linkin Park. “Now that we’re getting ready to do some shows, it’s been better than I imagined,” Shinoda says. “Emily was always going to be able to hit the notes and scream the parts. It’ll be a question of, ‘How does it land with people?’ And I don’t know how it will. But I know that, when I hear it, I love it.”
Did you guys ever think you’d be sitting here, talking about a new Linkin Park album?
Dave Farrell: I could give you 100 different answers, because my brain was in 100 different places. At one point early on — this is going back to pre-COVID, so call it 2018 or 2019 — Joe, Mike and myself were starting to write a little bit, or just get together and say, “Let’s do some stuff and see if we even like it; let’s be creative together.” There wasn’t an endgame to that, in my head at least.
So that process continued moving forward over a period of years, and then the last maybe 18 months or so, accelerated quite a bit. I think me, Mike and Joe got a lot more intentional: “If this is ever going to have a chance to do anything, then let’s be intentional of spending time together. Let’s see what we come up with,” rather than spending a month doing stuff and then not doing stuff for 10 or 11 months.
What was communication like between you guys over the course of those years?
Mike Shinoda: Everybody’s always close, even if they’re not talking all the time. I don’t really pay attention to how often I’m talking to anybody in the band — it’s usually just like, “Oh, this thing came up and Dave will think it’s funny.” You just reach out to each other, just like anybody. But I do think at that point in 2019, it’s safe to say we were talking less. For me personally, between ’19, ’20 and ’21, I would float the idea of getting together, [we’d] get together and it was fun, but there wasn’t any creative momentum. It was kind of start and stop.
[The band] met Emily around 2019 — she came in, we worked together at my old studio. We worked together… how many days?
Emily Armstrong: Maybe three.
Shinoda: And we played around with a couple ideas, but it was just meeting each other. Then at a later point, Em came in with the whole band for an afternoon and worked on something that day. And then it was… years [later]! I did a couple other songs and worked with some other people. It was almost like everyone was just exploring the idea of other things, what other things are out there. At some point, I realized that the other things that I was doing were not as exciting, not as fulfilling, as this.
Getting back into the group — at first it was Dave and Joe, and then Brad came in too at some point, and we were starting to do sessions with other people, some of [whom] I had written with in the year or two before that, including Colin. And then we brought Emily in, but we did sessions with a lot of different people, and as we worked, things just came into focus, naturally. Even with Emily and Colin, we didn’t say, “Hey, come in, we’re doing Linkin Park sessions.” We just said, “We’re going to write songs.”
Armstrong: “We don’t know what we’re doing, but we’re writing.” That’s what you said.
Shinoda: I was really clear about not knowing, not calling it anything. That’s what me and Dave and Joe agreed we would say. We were telling ourselves, “We’re not calling this Linkin Park,” because, who knows?
Armstrong: That was better — to see where it lands, instead of making it something and then having to fulfill that.
As you guys worked, how helpful were projects like the Meteora 20th-anniversary set and the Papercuts greatest-hits album, to put a bow on that era of Linkin Park?
Farrell: It did all that, and those projects kept us engaged with each other in a lot of ways, even in the midst of the band not being active for years. You need to talk and figure out, what do we want to do, and how do we want to do it? Do we want to do the Papercuts project, and how do we want to do press around it?
Shinoda: (To Armstrong.) Were you paying attention to those things? We never talked about that. The Hybrid Theory rerelease, and the greatest-hits album — did those show up on your radar?
Armstrong: Absolutely. Especially Papercuts, because I had started to be around a lot during that time.
Shinoda: What was that like?
Armstrong: It was great! It made me feel a little old.
Shinoda: It did? (Laughs.) I love it. It made you feel old? Well, thanks, because now I feel extra old!
Farrell: We were just talking about how, when we were in high school, a classic rock album was like, Led Zeppelin IV, and now we’ve reached a point where for somebody in high school, their classic rock album is Hybrid Theory. (Sighs.)
Shinoda: Emily and Colin are roughly 10 years younger than us — they’re this different generation, and what strikes me about that is that they’ve got a different perspective, with different ways of doing things, but they’re also old enough that they’ve got the [musical] experience. In Emily’s case, that’s particularly important. She’s been on the road and played a ton of shows, so when I was thinking about [playing shows], I was like, “OK, we don’t have to worry.”
Emily, what was your relationship to the band as you were growing up?
Armstrong: I was in a band when [Hybrid Theory] came out. “One Step Closer” was the song for me, and I was just like, “Holy s–t, that’s what I want to do. As a singer, I want to be able to scream.” That album was everything — I’ve listened to it a trillion times. I would skate to it. I would mosh to it.
Shinoda: Didn’t you tell me that, when you first heard it, you didn’t know you could scream?
Armstrong: No, I didn’t scream at the time — but I just knew that’s what I was going to do. It took me time to develop it, but I learned by listening to singers. I didn’t have training and stuff, so [Bennington] was somebody that I knew — and I was obsessed. All I would listen to was that album.
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Emily, when you guys started working together, even before Linkin Park was part of the equation, what was it about Mike’s process that appealed to you?
Armstrong: First off, it was very safe — and as an artist, if you feel safe, you’re going to get more out of the person, right? It’s a place where you can explore whatever it is that’s happening. “What do you want to talk about? What’s going on in your life?” It’s vulnerable, and that was key. And I just knew that process was fun, and it opened up a lot for me. That was the beginning — and then I had to wait a few years.
Shinoda: (Laughs.) I literally said to her, “FYI, we move so slow. We move slowly normally, but right now, everything’s really slow. It’s going to be a long time before you hear from me, probably, so just please be patient with me.” I remember being like, “Please don’t assume that just because you haven’t heard from me in a while that I don’t think you’re great. I do think you’re great. This is our speed right now.”
Armstrong: And I’m like, “Cool, coo coo coo cool, cool…”
Shinoda: But once it picked up — once we were coming here [to EastWest Studios], we were clear. I said, “We’re going to be there for this many weeks. You can come as often as you want, whatever you feel like you want to do.” And she said, immediately, “Is it OK if I come every day?” She cleared her schedule and showed up.
Armstrong: What schedule did I have? (Laughs.) I was just camping out with you guys.
Farrell: It’s so fun to look at it from this vantage point now, but in the midst of it, we didn’t know where it was going. I sincerely didn’t know if it was going to be something completely different than Linkin Park or a new version of it. In my head, I would shut down when I started asking myself, “OK, well, if this is new stuff, then how do you play old stuff?”
Mike was talking earlier about him doing music [after Bennington’s death] — I was the opposite. For a long time, I was like, “I don’t want to do any music. That hurts. I want to avoid that.” It took a while to get to a stage where I started feeling like this is actually energizing. And that was the shift for me, where it went from like, “Is it Linkin Park? Is it something else?” Emily feels like Linkin Park, Colin feels like Linkin Park. The six of us working together, figuring stuff out — that’s energizing, and I want to keep doing it. It was like filling a battery instead of draining it.
Shinoda: What was happening with me, Dave, Joe and Brad as well — we were showing up, and they were the best versions of themselves that I’ve ever seen. Since 2017, I feel like everybody did some real reflection and some real work on themselves. And to use Joe as an example — he and I are more creative types and have a long history together, so we’re brothers like that, where we’ll just get under each other’s skin over very specific, usually creative things. And when we started hanging out again more frequently, in the process that turned into this record, I was like, “What the hell! That guy is awesome!” He was awesome before — we’d just pick on each other. And now I’m, like, inspired by Joe? I don’t even have words to explain what a good feeling that is, that a person that you’ve known for so long is now different in a way that feels like spending time together is more fun and productive. I just like it more.
At what point in this gradual process did you guys go, “OK, this is Linkin Park, and these songs will be part of a Linkin Park album”?
Shinoda: As the songs came into focus, the band’s DNA was really thick with this body of work. To call it anything else would be strange and misleading. We teach our kids that when you fall down, you have to get back up and you have to go try again, right? The idea of us doing some other thing, with this group of people and the sound of this music, feels like it would have been a resignation, in a way. I hate to say “cowardly,” but it would feel like hedging a bet.
Really early on, I think I was just spitballing out loud, and I was like, “If we do some shows or something, maybe there’ll be a few people doing vocals.” Because we weren’t fully committed [to a new lineup] yet, and at that point, I didn’t want to put expectations super high on Emily. But it was a real thought: “Maybe it’s a bunch of people onstage.” And then Dave was one of the first people who was like, “I don’t want to half-ass anything. If we’re going to do something, let’s do it bold. If people don’t like it, so what? As long as we like it, and we’re confident, then let’s be bold with it!” So that’s what we’ve done, and that’s part of why I felt so empowered when we were making the record — to be like, “This is a Linkin Park song.”
Farrell: I also don’t want it to come across that I ever would think that Emily and Colin would automatically be in! From our side, it’s not an automatic yes — Emily has a ton of stuff going on, and same with Colin, who was having a ton of success writing and producing. Like, “Hey, Colin. Do you want to come drum on tour and leave everything else you’ve been working on?”
Shinoda: The guys and I thought we should ask Emily and get a serious temperature check — this was around this time last year. She was going to go on vacation for a week coming up, so we were like, “We should ask her before, so when she goes on that trip, she’s going to have some open time to think about it, and if it’s a bad fit for her, she’s going to know.” Later, Emily told us that we played it too cool.
Armstrong: They’re like, “Hey, um, just a couple questions.” And we were recording at the time. “Hey, so, you know, we got some shows coming up, and some big festival stuff. And, you know, it’s a year out, and we think that you’d be great. We think you could sing all the old songs, and we love what you do and what’s happening with this whole process…” I’m just like, “Cool, coo coo coo cool!” I had already talked to the people around me, and Dead Sara, who were like, “Absolutely. If they ask, it’s a no-brainer.” I’d already put my feelers out just to make sure, and they were putting their feelers out on me. It was like Melissa McCarthy in The Heat: “That’s why you don’t feed stray cats!” I had just kept showing up; I was the stray cat. But that was the moment.
So then imagine hearing that, and then you have to nonchalantly waltz back into the studio, and they’re like, “OK, Emily, let’s think of another line, we’re working on the verse!” I can’t f–king think of anything else, and I have to pretend that I’m not [freaking out]. I’m there for another few hours, and I’m just trying to play it cool, because they played it so cool. But there’s f–king no way you can process it. I remember we were there late that night, and afterward I was panicking in the best way: “Is it real?” For three days at least, I don’t ever remember touching the ground. And then everything was different when I came back down — knowing my life was going to be different, in the best way. I came back to a dreamland.
Once that reality sunk in, was there a sense of pressure? At that point, you knew that you were going to be singing Chester’s parts on these huge songs, taking over for this iconic voice.
Armstrong: There is so much to this band — this is a very, very important band to this world. And the integrity of the band was really helpful in keeping me grounded. There were so many of those moments where it was like, “Holy s–t,” when you talk about the size of the shows, stuff like that. I’m on cloud nine, but then it hits you that there’s a lot of work to be done.
And going into these [older] songs, by a singular voice that’s beloved by so many people — it’s like, “How do I be myself in this, but also carry on the emotion and what he brought in this band?” That was the work that I had to do. The feeling, the energy, was already there as we were doing the album, so it’s just incorporating that feeling. [I had] to identify what the song meant to me as a singer, not just as someone listening to it. You got to marry the technical part and the emotion. It’s Chester’s voice, and it’s mine, but I want it to still feel the way I feel when I listen to the song, because that’s what the fans love. There is a passion to it that I’m hoping I can fill.
You also couldn’t tell anyone you were a member of Linkin Park — and this was around a year ago. Why prepare all this under cover of darkness?
Shinoda: I love surprises. I love to plan a surprise. So when it comes to this month, the party is ready, the streamers are on the wall, and we just need to invite the guests over.
Once we decided to move to WME — and we had avoided a large agency for pretty much our entire career, but it felt like the best fit — we had to work out a way to do that, not only without making an announcement, but trying to keep the word as quiet as possible, so that we didn’t have Billboard and whoever else saying, “Hey, Linkin Park just switched agencies! Something must be f–king happening!” And they were really good partners in that sense — getting such a huge company to also not tell everybody. I was nervous about that, and it worked out. I wasn’t worried about people in music finding out — I was worried about our fans hearing it and saying, “What does this mean?” and starting to create narratives.
I wanted to ask about Rob not joining this new project, and Colin becoming the new drummer.
Shinoda: Rob had said to us at a point, I guess it was a few years ago now, that he wanted to put some distance between himself and the band. And we understood that — it was already apparent. He was starting to just show up less, be in less contact, and I know the fans noticed it too. The Hybrid Theory rerelease and Papercuts release, he didn’t show up for anything. So for me, as a friend, that was sad, but at the same time, I want him to do whatever makes him happy, and obviously everybody wishes him the best.
I had done sessions with Colin — I met him around 2021, when I got an invite to a session with a couple of different writers, and Colin was one of the guys in the room, and I immediately clicked with him. He’s playing drums in the live show, and drums are his first instrument, but he plays guitar and bass and keyboard, and he produces and mixes. We have a similar way of looking at music, of starting from scratch, and I really enjoyed working with him and bouncing ideas back-and-forth. I don’t know if any of these songs are going to be released, but we had done something with grandson, Bea Miller, Sueco — just getting in the room together to make stuff. And then when Linkin Park started making stuff, for whatever we were going to do, it was just like, “Oh, Colin. We’re making stuff. You should come over.”
Mike and Dave, what was it about Emily that just worked in this template, in terms of her voice, ideas and approach?
Farrell: Going back to 2017 or 2018, I was familiar with Emily’s voice from Dead Sara, and I just loved it — you have that relationship immediately with the vocalist of a band where it just hits you. And then as we got to work with Emily more, it wasn’t just the fact that she’s supertalented vocally, or that she’s a great person who I love hanging out with — when she sings, I connect with it. For me, that’s what’s always felt like Linkin Park: being able to connect with what Mike’s doing, what Chester was doing, on an emotional level, and be able to absorb that and feel that for myself. As we worked more, and as we got to see what Emily was capable of and the different things that she could bring to the music, it just felt like such a natural, easy, powerful fit. It’s hard to describe, other than just that sense of “This works.”
Shinoda: I’ve always been the vocal producer, and I’m always there for the recording of all the vocals. With Chester, he was the type of vocalist who, like most really good vocalists, could imitate lots of other people. You could say Dave Gahan from Depeche Mode, you could say Perry Farrell [from Jane’s Addiction], you could say Scott Weiland [from Stone Temple Pilots], and he could push in that direction very accurately. So when we were working together, I knew all of those levers to pull, and I could say, “Hey, you’re singing it a little like that person. Can you please try and sing it like this person?”
And then with Emily, in the beginning especially, I’m like, “OK, I don’t know your voice super well. I don’t know you super well and what you like.” (To Armstrong.) Do you remember when I came in here with the… I can see her face, the country artist…
Armstrong: Bonnie Raitt.
Shinoda: Yes! I was driving here to EastWest, and it occurred to me that Emily has a texture of her voice that could go in a Bonnie Raitt direction. And I ran in, and I go, “Do you like Bonnie Raitt?” She’s like, “Yeah, I love Bonnie Raitt.” We got into what Bonnie Raitt songs you knew and you liked, and you sang along with those to get in the mood. And then we sang our song with that texture. And I was like, “OK, that’s a thing I need to know. You can sing that way. That’s really f–king useful.” For example, I now know to say, “Em, we’re going Feral Cat Mode.” And she knows what that sounds like! We’ve got shorthand now!
How much have you guys missed performing live?
Shinoda: I don’t miss it at all, because we do it every day.
Armstrong: Every day.
Shinoda: Every day! It’ll be nice to do it in front of people, though.
Armstrong: God, I can’t wait. I’m at that point where I’m like, “OK, we’ve done this enough. I’m ready.”
Shinoda: I think you are. It’s funny, because we’ve been rehearsing with basically just the road crew, and then the other day, we had some of [our] families visit, came over with the kids. And they were in the room, and you turned it up. You went 95% show mode. And I was like, “If that’s what happens when you put 10 people in a room, I can’t wait until we have a lot more people in the room.”
As we were working out the songs, we had to pitch some stuff, to change the key so that it’s in Emily’s target register. We had to relearn songs that we’ve been playing live for 20 years in order to do that, and it’s such a mindf–k! (Laughs.) It’s so hard! My brain is just having a really hard time with a couple of songs.
Armstrong: Imagine 50 songs with that feeling! (Laughs.)
Shinoda: Yeah, for you and Colin, it’s a whole other thing. And Colin is a very organized thinker — he sent me a text, like, “Hey, here’s a YouTube video of you guys playing this song in 2015, and you did the outro this way. And then in 2017, Rob changed it and played it that way, but that’s different than the record, right? So could you tell me which one I should play?” And I was like, “Uhhh, dude, I’m trying to relearn ‘Breaking the Habit’ in a new key! Which way do you want to play it?”
The other cool thing that I noticed is that we didn’t have to change gender in any of the lyrics. In the whole f–king catalog! All the singles, all the songs, and we didn’t have to change any words. And that’s great — I feel so lucky.
How often do you guys think about your fans’ reactions and expectations? There’s going to be a ton of excitement.
Shinoda: I think that we expect that every single person will love it, there will be no haters at all, the fan base will only grow, and that all the numbers will go up!
Armstrong: That’s lowballing it.
Shinoda: (Laughs.) With every album we’ve put out since our first record, there were expectations. There are no expectations on the first record, and the second record on, there are always expectations, and we’ve always been realistic about those. We know that there will always be a wide variety of opinions and reactions, but when we release something, it’s because it’s ready to be released, we’re proud of it, we’re happy with where we’re at, and we feel like it’s the best snapshot of the band in the current moment. And as the reactions come in, our door just stays open, because as a music listener, sometimes I hear things and go, “That’s terrible,” and the next thing I know, I keep coming back to it and I love it.
Are you playing it by ear after this album and tour, or are you already thinking about new songs and creative projects? How are you thinking long term?
Farrell: I think everybody might have a different answer. I’ve just been in this mode of not getting ahead of myself. I’m so good at living in tomorrow — I excel at that. I’ve been intentional as much as possible about taking one step at a time with what we’re doing with the band. And having said that, if it continues as it already feels and is going, I’ve got endless energy to put back into it. I’m sure we’re going to do some hard touring in 2025, and I’m sure that we’ll want to catch our breath, take a second, regroup, reflect. But if it keeps going as it has, I’d be very excited to reinvest and see what our next steps are.
Armstrong: It feels like we got into such a good rhythm toward the end of [recording] the album. I feel like there’s more, and that it’d be cool to continue. And also, getting to play live, you get to see a lot more, obviously, but I learn a lot on the road, especially with a band.
Shinoda: Yeah, that’s a great point — the learning on the road part, because you get the reactions to the songs and can go, “Oh, these things work really well live.” And as we were going back through the record today, I was thinking about how we learned about your voice and how it works, and how you work. And I think there’s lots of untapped stuff that I haven’t tried, and I always love that. Of all the albums that we’ve made, each time I go into it looking for what we haven’t done, what stone we can turn over. Sometimes it’s just stuff that I’m curious about, and other times it’s stuff that somebody else in the band is just obsessed with. So we’ll see what happens, after we get through this next chapter and go back in to make something new.
Linkin Park
James Minchin III
It’s the first night of July’s Broccoli City Festival in Washington, D.C., and actor-writer-producer Issa Rae has some exciting news to share with the 30,000 fans in attendance: She’s releasing her first rap album. Although moments later she clarifies that it was a joke, the Hollywood polymath reveals what might deter her if she was really angling to become music’s top female rapper. “Megan Thee Stallion has bars and body,” Rae says as she introduces Megan’s headlining set. “She’s actually intimidating. I can’t look into her eyes for too long.”
It’s easy to see why Megan Thee Stallion would give anyone pause. Standing at 5 foot 10 inches, she’s bold, bright and bodacious — an awe-inspiring trifecta. When I meet Megan at D.C.’s Four Seasons Hotel the next morning, her larger-than-life persona is in full force: Clutching a Louis Vuitton Murakami bag, she walks into the plush hotel suite with model-like precision as if it were her personal runway. But her imposing aura quickly melts away to reveal her signature wit. When we last spoke two years ago, Megan gave me a hard time when she learned I’d never had Flamin’ Hot Cheetos — and neither of us has forgotten it. “So, you really never tried Hot Cheetos?” she asks before giving me a quizzical look. “What kind of childhood did you have?”
Trending on Billboard
In 2020, Megan’s two Billboard Hot 100 No. 1s — her “Savage (Remix),” featuring Beyoncé, and her Cardi B collaboration, “WAP” — helped her become one of pop culture’s biggest names, and her three Grammy Award wins in early 2021 cemented her critical bona fides. Since then, she’s been omnipresent, becoming one of just 40 artists to pull double duty as both host and musical guest on Saturday Night Live (and on Sept. 11 she will host the MTV Video Music Awards), guest-starring in the Disney+ Marvel series She-Hulk and later appearing in 2022’s campy Dicks: The Musical as well as 2024’s big-budget musical remake of Mean Girls. She expanded beyond entertainment through savvy brand partnerships with Nike (her sneaker collection The Hot Girl Systems) and Popeyes (her signature Hottie sauce), and she even has her own tequila coming, Chicas Divertidas, which was inspired by a conversation with Beyoncé. “ ‘You better have your own s–t,’ ” Megan quips, imitating her fellow Houstonian. “You better know the next time she saw me, I said, ‘Hey, Beyoncé. Look what I got.’
“I’m proud of all my business deals because everything I do is personal to me,” she continues. “I put 100% into my partnerships, and I’m always so grateful when people want to step into my world. When I see a brand I f–k with and they want to come into the Hot Girl World, I’m like, ‘Thank you, this makes sense. I love that you’re recognizing me as much as I was already recognizing you.’ ” She’s stepping into worlds outside her immediate orbit, too: In July, Megan performed at Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign rally in Atlanta, using her Hot 100 top 20 hit “Body” as a vehicle to speak up for reproductive rights.
But while the 29-year-old enjoys wearing multiple hats — college graduate, philanthropist, actress, mogul — she’s always happiest when she’s rapping, and her extra-musical pursuits have made her a wiser businesswoman as she pursues her passion. Following a yearslong legal dispute, Megan and her label, 1501 Certified Entertainment, amicably parted ways in 2023, making her an independent artist. In February, she partnered with Warner Music Group for distribution, gaining complete ownership of her masters and publishing — an unprecedented move for a female rapper. Her third album, Megan, is her first under this new arrangement.
Released in June, Megan debuted at No. 3 on the Billboard 200 with 64,000 equivalent album units in the United States, according to Luminate, making it the biggest debut for any rap album released by a woman in 2024. Megan also topped Billboard’s Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart for the second time in her career — the sixth female rapper to do so.
On Megan, the Houston MC’s world of bruising Southern rap and rump-shaking anthems is alive and well, as is her deep and abiding love for Japanese culture. “Otaku Hot Girl” samples the popular anime series Jujutsu Kaisen, while she performs alongside Japanese rapper Yuki Chiba on “Mamushi.” After the latter track broke out on TikTok — bolstered by Megan creating and demonstrating the song’s dance in a Sailor Moon-inspired outfit — she shot its video in her second home: Japan.
“When I’m out there, I always feel happy,” she says with a smile. “The air is clear, the people are polite, the food is good. The culture is so interesting to me. I learn something every time I go out there. I learn a little bit of Japanese every time I go. The shopping is good. It just feels super positive every time I’m there. I really like being there because I’m big on energy. As soon as I touch down, I always feel like I can take a breath. Everybody good.”
House of JMC dress, Anabela Chan earrings.
Ramona Rosales
On Megan, the Houston Hottie lives up to her nickname, returning to her hometown roots — including her pairing with hip-hop duo UGK on album standout “Paper Together.” Megan grew up a fan of UGK’s Chad “Pimp C” Butler and received a gift from his widow, Chinara Butler, during the recording process: unreleased vocals by the late legend that she sent Megan to use. “From the first time I met Meg, I knew she was meant to work with Chad,” Butler tells Billboard. “She’s an extremely talented MC, and I’ve always appreciated her genuine love for my husband’s music. She’s helped introduce Chad to a new generation of hip-hop fans.”
Though Megan can be an aggressive rhymer, she knows how to calm things down and keep it sexy, too — like on the Magic City-ready anthem “Spin,” featuring Victoria Monét. “She’s a very confident and strong woman,” Monét says. “Megan knows exactly who she is. She doesn’t let people push her off her dot. There’s a lot of respect there. Also, she makes great music that brings people together and makes them dance. You want to watch her shake something and learn to shake something because of her. She’s inspiring.”
But at her core, Megan is still an MC — and like a coiled snake, this fierce iteration of her strikes on album opener “Hiss,” released in January. Aimed at collaborator-turned-detractor Nicki Minaj, “Hiss” ignited the year of competitive rap — in which Kendrick Lamar and Drake have also feuded, as well as Latto and Ice Spice — as Megan delivered a searing diatribe at Minaj, following the Pink Friday star’s slights against her on 2023’s “FTCU,” when Minaj rapped: “Stay in your Tory Lanez, bitch, I’m not Iggy,” referencing the rapper found guilty of shooting Megan in 2020 who was sentenced to 10 years in 2023. A year later, Megan lashed back: “These hoes don’t be mad at Megan, these hoes mad at Megan’s Law,” she raps on “Hiss,” referring to the federal law mandating that law enforcement make information about registered sex offenders public. (Minaj’s husband, Kenneth Petty, is a registered sex offender who was convicted of rape in 1995 for assaulting a 16-year-old.) The song debuted at No. 1 on the Hot 100 — Megan’s third chart-topper on the list.
“I’m going to keep doing what I’m doing,” Megan says. “If people feel like I’m somebody to aim at, then I must be pretty high up if you’re reaching up at me. I must be some kind of competition. That makes me feel good. That makes me feel like I could rap because if I wasn’t the s–t, y’all wouldn’t be worried about me.”
Though Megan relishes competitive battles, she prefers championing her peers. Following the success of her first-ever headlining tour, this year’s Hot Girl Summer, she reconnected with the run’s opener and her new bestie, GloRilla, on “Accent.” Earlier this year, she’d scored a top 15 Hot 100 song with Glo’s “Wanna Be,” and the sold-out arena tour created a rock-solid bond between the female MCs that sharpened their studio chemistry; now, they want to release a joint project together.
“Megan is a real rapper, and I’m also a real rapper,” GloRilla says. “We actually be talking and coming with bars on some down South gangsta s–t. [It would be] some down South, real turnt, real rap [s–t].” (“I think that would be very fire,” Megan says. “I ain’t gon’ say too much, but it feels like it’s going to get done.”)
While being the face of female rap may sound enticing, it doesn’t move Megan, who, during her three-month tour, happily shared the spotlight with not only GloRilla but also Cardi B and Latto, who made guest appearances at the tour’s New York and Atlanta stops, respectively.
“I got a lot of people trying to critique me and tell me what I am and what I’m not. I feel like I’ve proved myself over and over again,” she says. “If there’s a question if Megan Thee Stallion can’t rap, you need to go ahead and quit asking that question. We know I could rap.”
Ramona Rosales
You began your career playing the Texas circuit and now you’re an arena-caliber superstar. How did your beginnings prepare you for this?
It definitely taught me how to be the performer that I am. It made me understand, “OK, all you got to do is get out here and have fun.” So every time I get onstage, I’m not thinking too hard. I’m thinking like, “I’m partying with my people.” Going around my home state definitely set me up to be prepared to be comfortable with people everywhere else.
Because of the pandemic, Hot Girl Summer was the first time you hit the road since 2019. Was the extended layoff a blessing in disguise?
It wasn’t a blessing in disguise — it was a blessing outright. I was so happy to see that so many people came out and sold out a bunch of these dates. People were genuinely excited to see me, genuinely excited to see [GloRilla]. You had people like, “Oh, we don’t know if she can [sell out arenas].” Bitch, it ain’t no question about it now.
Take me back to your concert at Madison Square Garden, where you, Cardi B and GloRilla shared that stage. It was a powerful moment.
It was a little East Coast-Southern sandwich we had going on. I was very happy. I genuinely love Cardi. I genuinely love Glo. In the industry, you really don’t meet a lot of girls who want to see you be successful. You meet people, and I’m not just going to say girls, but you don’t meet a lot of artists that want you to have success because they’re scared sometimes it’s going to take away from their success. Music is competition, rap is a competition, but those two ladies, I feel like we all like to see each other do good things. We like to see each other win. Sharing the stage with people that want to see you do good and you want to see them do good, it felt very uplifting. I felt like we were feeding off each other. I felt like we helped each other. Being onstage with them made me feel good because I knew we were proud of each other.
In 2022, I spoke to Q-Tip about you, and he said, “People still haven’t even seen her full artistry yet.” Is Megan the peak of that artistry?
I still feel like I have more to give. With this album, I wanted to show people my personal interests and thoughts. I wanted to touch on my love for all things anime, all things Southern, how much I like to have fun, and I wanted to be myself. I feel like I did that. A lot of people were expecting me to come on this album talking one way and I wanted to introduce myself — this version of myself that I am right now. Sometimes, people listen to me with ears of “I don’t like her, so I don’t want to like it.” The more people sit with the album, the more and more they’re like, “OK, you know what? This s–t is banging.”
Ramona Rosales
On “BOA,” there’s a bar where you say: “Y’all do this s–t for TikTok/Bitch I’m really hip-hop.”
Nothing wrong with TikTok. TikTok is fun. It’s for people to get on there and have fun. Show me what you’re eating, show me how you’re dancing, show me what you’re doing. I feel like TikTok is happy.
I say that because you’re one of the biggest stars in the world. How do you still maintain that hip-hop essence?
Because I really like to rap. Where I come from, people are really freestyling. What I come from is hardcore rap, Southern rap. The one thing in my life that I knew I was really good at was rapping. I don’t ever want to get away from that. I don’t ever want to play with it. I don’t ever want people to think I don’t take it seriously. I’ll be the rapper that is good for a bunch of verses and freestyles because that’s what I like to do.
Your mother, Holly-Wood, was a rapper. What did you learn from her, skillwise?
Just that attitude. My mama was so feisty. She had a lot of aggression in her rap voice, and because in her nature she was naturally an aggressive woman, she sold it. I feel like the main thing for me is always selling it. Making sure who I am comes through in my voice when I’m rapping. You’re not going to believe what I’m saying if I don’t deliver it strong. My delivery lets people know that I’m strong.
What was it like when you received Pimp C’s verse, which you used on “Paper Together,” while in the studio with your producer, LilJuMadeDaBeat?
We both cried. Like, “Oh, my God. I can’t believe we got this verse.” I love Pimp and Ju love Pimp, and we share that same love of Southern rap. Pimp C made me feel so gangster, he made me feel so cool. To have my voice on a song with my favorite rapper ever, an unreleased verse? Motherf–kers ain’t walking around with Pimp C verses. And I got blessed with one.
I heard you’re sitting on more unreleased Pimp C verses.
I mean, we might [have] some more stuff. It’s more stuff in the chamber, but I want to keep Pimp C alive. Not saying it’s not alive; [his wife] Chinara keeping it alive, his children keeping it alive, people in Texas keeping it alive. I really want people to know who the f–k Pimp C is. As much as I get to put his voice on wax, I will.
House of JMC corset, Jimmy Choo shoes, Anabela Chan earrings.
Ramona Rosales
You’ve said that your relationship with Warner Music Group is based on trust. How has the label proved its trustworthiness?
They ain’t told me “no” yet. They did exactly what they said they was gon’ do. Everybody that I work with there, we’re on calls together all the time talking about how we feel like we could make the partnership better. Everybody’s been so cool, and they’re so easy to work with. Everybody’s been super nice, and I like nice people. They’re just nice at Warner.
Very few artists can say they got their masters before they turned 30. Why was that a priority for you?
I’ve been fighting for my freedom my whole rap career. I just couldn’t take no for an answer. I don’t ever want to be in a situation where somebody got their foot on my neck ever again. You got to do things to make yourself be your own boss.
How has it been navigating that road as an independent artist?
Being independent is hard. When you got a label that does everything for you, all you got to do is wake up and be the celebrity. That’s a very easy life. I have to do s–t other people aren’t doing. I do work as my own label. I do fund a lot of my own things. There’s a lot of things I’m still learning as I go. The s–t is not just handed to me in my lap — I really got to go figure out, “OK, now I’m doing it by myself.” Not that I’m doing it only by myself, but I’m in a position to be my own boss, so I got to figure out how to be the boss and how to be the employee. It’s tough, but I like figuring it out. I like doing things on my own. I like working. I’m not going to stop. The more I know, the better I’ll get.
You’ve been so open about your love for Japanese culture, especially anime. As a Black creative, how influential has it been on you?
I really like the storytelling in anime. The thing that resonates with me while watching a lot of the anime I like is watching the character development — seeing the character go from nothing to everything. When I feel like I’m getting beat up in life, I remember some of my favorite characters. I see that they had to go from literally zero and getting their ass whooped in their training. Even when they start popping and getting their muscles — because you know they be skinny as hell, then they start getting a little ripped — even when you start seeing the character getting a little swole, you like, “All right, he’s going to defeat all you motherf–kers. It’s over with.” Then he still getting his ass whooped and it’s like, “Man, I feel bad for my boy.”
Even after getting his ass whooped, because you got to fall down a few times, the character doesn’t ever get discouraged. They always like, “All right, I may have got my ass whooped but Imma get back up, and watch how I come back 20 times stronger.” I resonate with that. No matter how many times I get knocked down, I never feel like, “F–k it, Imma quit.” I just need to get better. I need to get back, try again, train harder and go harder so I can keep evolving into my best self.
When you did “Pressurelicious” with Future in 2022, you paid him $250,000 for a verse and said you treat your features like a business. Why, and how?
When you cool with somebody, you should support their business. You shouldn’t ask them to do nothing for free because you cool with them. I feel like that’s a lot of people’s problem with their homies. Just because your homie got a clothing line, that don’t mean he got to give you clothes for free — like, support your friend. Don’t expect anyone to give you something just because we cool. That’s how I treat my artist friends. I’m not asking you to do nothing for free. I wouldn’t come in your house and take all your food out your house and I invite you to my house and it’s like, “Oh, what?” Just as much as I give, I can receive. I just feel like it’s a back-and-forth thing. I just want them to know I really respect what they do. I go all out for myself. I splurge on myself, I love myself, I love what I do, and I want everything to look right. I want everything to be right. I feel like you’re going to take me seriously once I let you know: This is not a favor; I’m asking for this.
Natalia Fedner dress, Alexis Bittar earrings, XIV Karats rings.
Ramona Rosales
I think you started this competitive rap energy we’ve seen in 2024 when you released “Hiss.” Do you feel you’re the reason MCs are rapping competitively again?
I would like to think that I start things. I don’t know; I just knew what I had to do and what I had to say. If it opened up the door for everyone else to get s–t off their chest, well, I’m glad.
You took shots at Nicki Minaj. Is there a chance for a reconciliation or even another collaboration one day?
I still to this day don’t know what the problem is. I don’t even know what could be reconciled because I, to this day, don’t know what the problem is.
Does being the face of female rap for the next 10 years drive you? Is that something that you want?
I just want to rap. I want to be Megan Thee Stallion. I want to rap for as long as I can.
After he made some inappropriate comments about you last November, Shannon Sharpe apologized. Do you feel you’ve been getting more support from Black men over the last few years, or is that something you’re still looking for more of?
At this point in life, I really don’t care. Maybe if you would’ve asked me this last year or two years ago, I would’ve wished I had more Black people in general in my corner. It would’ve felt nice to be protected by some Black men in this instance, but the more I wasn’t getting it, the more and more I realized I wasn’t going to get it. Who should feel safe and important at the end of the day is me, and I was going to have to make myself feel that way. I wasn’t going to find it in people I don’t know at all. Now I don’t care. As long as I make myself feel happy, then that’s what matters to me.
I’ve seen a lot of Black men rapping your lyrics at your shows. That must be a dope feeling.
Because we actually are going the hardest right now. The women are killing it right now. We are the hardest MCs right now. We going harder than the boys, for sure.
Ramona Rosales
How do you maintain personal peace while living a good chunk of your life as Megan Thee Stallion?
I feel like Megan and Megan Thee Stallion are the same person. When I’m Megan Thee Stallion, I’m having to wear armor. I definitely got to go onstage and get in that mode, but I’m still the same person. Just when I’m not in public, I can really decompress and slouch, and I could watch anime all I want. I can play with my puppies, I can talk on the phone with my cousin, I could be with my best friends in peace. I don’t have to worry about being too strong. I could just be me.
You’ve been extremely vulnerable on songs like “Cobra” and “Moody Girl.” How therapeutic were those to make?
It felt really good to make them because it used to be hard for me to be vulnerable on songs. I could be upset and make a song like “Freak Nasty.” [I’ll be] pissed and I’ll go make that. I’ll be sad and make something like “Body.” I’ve always wanted to open up and not make it too preachy or too sad. I still want to ride the beat. Now I’m getting in a space where I can figure out how to express myself over beats that still allow me to be hard. It’s tough, but I use it like a diary now. I really do it because I know there are other Hotties that like to listen to those songs, and they resonate with the lyrics. I feel like it makes them understand, “OK, this my girl and she might appear to be Superwoman, but she going through it just like me.” I don’t want everyone to think I’m a goddamn robot, because I’m not a robot. I want them to know it’s OK to be human, to feel anxiety, depression and to feel low. You’re not going to feel like that all the time.
How inspiring is it for you to see Kamala Harris running for president, especially as a young Black woman?
To be alive in a lifetime where a Black woman or a woman at all could be the president, I feel so blessed. This is what the future is about. We really about to get a strong, Black female in there. I feel like America needed a woman to come in here and put a woman’s touch on it. It’s been going a little crazy lately, and we need somebody to put their foot down. I feel like Kamala, she gon’ do that.
I never thought we’d be in a situation where we could have two Black presidents…
Yeah, in the same lifetime. We are really doing the damn thing. I’m proud of us. Now we just got to get out there and go vote. I don’t like it when I see people saying, “I’m not voting. F–k it.” What the f–k are you talking about? You’re going to complain about what you don’t like but you’re not going to help the cause? I think that’s very irresponsible because if you don’t like what Trump has going on, why even aid in him being the president again?
You’ve said this is your “selfish era.” Do you feel like you’ve been able to reclaim some of your power?
Yeah. I used to really care how I made a lot of people feel before how I made myself feel, before how they made me feel. Somebody could make me feel like complete s–t, but I still never wanted to do anything to make anybody else feel like s–t. I still don’t want to make people feel like s–t. At least now I know, “Let me put up my boundary.” As soon as you make me feel a way that I don’t like, I just don’t want to deal with you anymore. You don’t got to fight evil with evil, but I don’t have to deal with this at all. I don’t have to do things to make other people smile. What am I going to do to make me smile? What you going to do to make me smile? Everything was about making other people smile and other people happy. Now I’m in a space where I want to be happy. I’m not going to take away [from] being happy so I can put other people’s life and happiness as a priority over mine.
This story appears in the Aug. 31, 2024, issue of Billboard.
With 90 minutes to go before he takes the stage at Lyrical Lemonade’s Summer Smash festival, Playboi Carti is already involved in a performance — just outside of his trailer.
Sprayed on the trailer’s side in red graffiti art is the word “OPIUM,” the name of Carti’s creative agency and partnership with Interscope Records, along with an eye that looks like something an eighth grader might say is an Illuminati symbol; the trailer’s window, in a massive font, bears the number “666.” Carti’s trailer is stuck between several others, plus the big SUV that transported the 28-year-old rapper from his hotel to the Chicago-area festival. An entourage of about a dozen people — including rising artists and Opium signees Ken Carson and Destroy Lonely — swarms around him. Marijuana smoke hangs over the area, a smell so perfectly foul that it reminds you why one of the drug’s nicknames is “loud.” At one point, members of the entourage light something on fire with what looks to be a butane torch, cackling like hyenas.
Jagger Harvey custom leather sling and Pelle Pelle pants, in collaboration with Rose Marie Johansen; Arena Embroidery custom hat, in collaboration with Rose Marie Johansen and Dawid Dinh; VAIN tank top and leather gloves.
Matthew Salacuse
If you’re going to get to know Carti, you might as well start here, as he prepares to do the thing he currently does better than any rapper on earth: perform. Though his albums are rapturously jolting — and wildly popular — Carti is most in his element onstage, and right now, the vibe is something like a pregame warmup meets secret society gathering. His entourage embodies the punk attitude that Carti celebrates in his aesthetics, music and concerts. It’s a diverse crew, from heavily pierced Nyree Morrison, a skater and artist known for reworking shoes and clothing with spikes, jewels and all manner of scribblings; to Carti’s barber, wearing a chain with a barbershop pole on it that Carti gifted him; to a white kid with hair fashioned into giant black-and-white spikes who looks like a Degrassi extra (and is actually skater-model Burberry Erry); to Carti’s manager and Opium COO, Erin Larsen, a white woman whom the rapper affectionately calls “Mom.” Soon, Lyrical Lemonade founder Cole Bennett shows up with the rapper BabyTron. The gang’s all here to watch hip-hop’s most innovative artist of the 2020s headline Summer Smash for the third straight year. “Every year, he is the one person that people really look forward to,” Bennett says. “It’s tradition at this point.”
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In the seven years since Carti burst into the public eye with his self-titled 2017 mixtape — now platinum-certified — his music has developed from the trembling trap that he took from Atlanta forebears like Future into the peerless rage he debuted on his most recent album, 2020’s Whole Lotta Red. Behind the leaks, the album delays and the general secrecy surrounding his existence is an undeniable talent — someone whose voice could make a retirement community resident perk up in an instant. Performing live is a key part of his artistic package and how he delights fans — he and Larsen, a former CAA agent, first paired up after she saw him pop out at a Brooklyn show around 2015 and sought to meet him backstage — not to mention how he winks at his biggest skeptics as they realize they can’t deny his volcanic presence.
His talent has also propelled him on the charts, where Carti has been a force for nearly a decade. Since his first Billboard Hot 100 top 40 hit, 2017’s breakout single “Magnolia,” he has scored four top 10s on the chart (all as a featured artist), including this year on Ye and Ty Dolla $ign’s “Carnival” and Future and Metro Boomin’s “Type S–t,” which peaked at Nos. 1 and 2, respectively. Whole Lotta Red, released on Christmas Day in 2020, debuted and peaked at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 in January 2021 and has spent 147 total weeks on the chart. Carti isn’t just culturally significant — he’s one of the most commercially successful hip-hop artists of the last decade.
VAIN full outfit, custom embroidered durag.
Matthew Salacuse
In person today, without the prosthetics or startling makeup he often wears on his face, he’s surprisingly good-looking — classically handsome and tall, with a jawline that would make a TikTok girlie swoon. Wearing the ensemble he has chosen for his Summer Smash set, he could pass for a runway-bound Rick Owens model. Several chains wrap around his neck, some seemingly crosses — startling for a man who, at times, calls himself a vampire. He’s draped in a Pelle Pelle leather jacket with a strap attached that hangs so far down his body it’s almost like a kilt. This is fashion as war paint — one way Carti makes himself seem larger than life.
If success was merely about an artist’s ability to perform, Carti would be as famous as Axl Rose or Jimmy Page. Lights — and sometimes, actual fire — blaze around him onstage. His sets disseminate an entire worldview through sound and atmosphere: Carti knows that fans see him as a hero, as someone who can help them exorcise their demons simply by moving around the stage with gusto, screaming lyrics that could function as cryptic Instagram DMs with his serrated vocals. “We want to continue championing him as a festival headliner,” says Ryan Thomson, his booking agent at CAA. “If we can achieve that success, and also do arena tour shows, we are in a good position in perpetuity.”
Outside of his guest performance with Travis Scott on the 2024 Grammy Awards stage in February, Summer Smash marks the first time Carti has performed all year, but if he’s nervous, he’s not showing it. For Carti, who started truly focusing on hip-hop when his high school basketball coach kicked him off the team, this never gets old. “I want to make the people feel like they don’t know what is about to happen,” Carti tells me after the show once he has come down from his intense set. “I get ready for a show like a boxer gets ready for a match.”
Matthew Salacuse
Like many rap superstars of the recent past, Playboi Carti — born Jordan Terrell Carter, his last name inspired his stage name — hails from Atlanta. Though he moved to New York shortly before making his first commercial mixtape, 2017’s Playboi Carti (following a few he had made under the name Sir Cartier), it’s still home to him, and he wears his pride for the city of fearless creativity — the place with a hip-hop lineage including OutKast, Gucci Mane, Young Thug and, now, Carti himself — like a badge of honor.
Just nine years ago, the king of rage rap was working at H&M. But when Carti moved to New York in 2015, it catapulted his career. After meeting A$AP Bari, Carti began rolling with the Harlem rap collective A$AP Mob — and especially its leader, A$AP Rocky. In Carti, A$AP Mob saw an ambitious, talented kid, and it helped him navigate the city and make connections; through Rocky, Carti met rapper Maxo Kream, producer Harry Fraud and more. For fashion guys who could rap at the time, Rocky was the biggest blueprint, and he mentored Carti, signing him by 2016 to his AWGE creative collective.
Even then, Carti’s music was distinctive. He took a more minimal approach than peers like Lil Uzi Vert and Young Thug, relaxing listeners with cloudy, euphoric production. Take “Location,” which opens his 2017 mixtape: Produced by Fraud, the song revolves around a beat that sounds like a lost Lil B file, with Carti’s spacey vocals drifting above it. “He had told me that he was a big fan of Curren$y,” Fraud says. “We were messing around and we started to knock them [songs] out.”
VAIN full outfit, custom embroidered durag.
Matthew Salacuse
Having recorded on his own for a few years, Carti was remarkably confident in the studio from the jump. He knew how to create soundscapes for songs, and as he spent more time with the A$AP crew, his intuitiveness and discipline in the studio made his records highly cohesive. But Carti’s also a perfectionist, and his frequent collaborator Cardo — who produced the December 2023 loosie “H00DBYAIR” — says he gets threats from impatient fans because the rapper’s releases can take a while. “It’s cool, but they got to stop threatening me,” Cardo jokes. “He’s putting it together! He isn’t rushing it.” That ability to take his time creatively and keep new music under wraps — even Fritz Owens, Carti’s mixing engineer, purposefully stays mysterious, Cardo says — is another way Carti cultivates his mythos and ensures it grows as big as the crowds he performs for.
Fraud says that when he started working with Carti, he knew that the young artist was on the cusp of greatness. “I could feel it,” Fraud recalls. “This kid is going to turn the corner; he has the personality. He is not the loudest guy in the room but he has a certain energy about him.” Carti knows what he wants to do when recording, and his catalog is proof. Released in 2018, his debut album, Die Lit, largely produced by Pi’erre Bourne, turned up the volume from his self-titled mixtape a few notches and became a smash, debuting and peaking at No. 2 on the Billboard 200. According to Carti, they spent time in Miami while recording it, performing throughout the city, and the energy of those shows bled into the album. “I’m always thinking about performing, even when I am making the music,” he says.
It all built toward Whole Lotta Red — the album Carti had been waiting to make his entire career and, so far at least, his masterpiece. He still has more boundaries to push, more biting vocals to spit, but that swaggering, urgent album — some of the crudest, most raging rap music since Yeezus — forced Carti’s peers back into the laboratory, like any real masterpiece does. Production played a huge role in that: The guttural beats from F1lthy (who has also worked with Lil Yachty and Yeat) were engrossing. “It’s all based on confidence. I believe in myself,” Carti tells me. “The moment I started recording, someone came to me and said that they like my songs. I stay in the studio every day.”
Friends love to tell stories about Carti’s infamous nightly sessions — and by the time he was crafting Whole Lotta Red, Carti had fully bloomed into a studio madman with a rigorous process, somewhere between George Martin and Ye. Cardo remembers one time they pulled a recording all-nighter; he finally crashed around 6 a.m. — and only got two hours of sleep before Carti woke him up and exclaimed, “You ready, twin?” “I was up for a whole damn near 48 hours with Carti — straight up working,” Cardo gleefully recalls today. Carti sometimes calls himself a vampire and plays with the aesthetics of being one, and the description isn’t entirely off base. “Vamp Anthem” might be a song on Whole Lotta Red, but it’s also a way of life — music has consumed Carti.
Matthew Salacuse
That’s why the leaks of Whole Lotta Red bothered him so much. When music from the project prematurely hit SoundCloud and YouTube, Carti tinkered with the album, delaying its official release. (Leaked tracks from the sessions still litter YouTube.) Sure, Carti loses money when his music leaks, but the creative loss bothers him more: Fans hear something that’s not the exact product he wanted to put out, and he has to come up with new songs. “He’s giving people his absolute best, things that he wants to put his stamp on,” Larsen says. “It delays the process. You don’t want to see the Mona Lisa in an art museum before it is a finished piece of work.” Carti seems exhausted by this, and the broader rabidness of his fan base that it demonstrates. Last year, fans managed to send flowers directly to his mother’s house (presumably to thank her for birthing him); when they found out where his own place was, he had to move. “I’m very blessed,” Carti says. “But it is frustrating because [that’s where] we have to lay our heads.”
Now in the midst of making his third studio album, I Am Music (planned for release by year’s end), Carti is still the workaholic who made Whole Lotta Red, and the sessions for the project, at Carti’s Means Street studio in Atlanta, have been predictably long and meticulous. Carti’s style is in constant evolution, and he and Cardo already have a name for the sound they’ve been workshopping for the project: “burnt music.” “We’ll be in the studio, like, ‘This music is burnt,’ ” explains Cardo, describing the sonics of DJ Toomp, DJ Paul, Juicy J, The Legendary Traxster and even the aesthetic of John Carpenter’s movies as influences. When they first started working together four years ago, Cardo wasn’t sure what style of beats Carti would want — whether he would be on the disorienting F1lthy wave or his pugnacious trap Pi’erre Bourne wave. They ended up building their creative relationship off “H00DBYAIR,” which was originally intended for release on the 2021 Candyman soundtrack. (Carti ended up releasing it as a single in late 2023.)
But even as he has earned praise — and become a genre figurehead — for his work in the studio and onstage, Carti has made headlines for other, less admirable reasons. In 2017, he was arrested for domestic battery after grabbing a woman’s backpack and forcing her into an Uber. In December 2022, his then-pregnant girlfriend, Brandi Marion, told police that, amid an argument about a paternity test, Carti had physically attacked and choked her; when police arrived at the scene, they found her with visible injuries on her neck, back and chest. And that’s to say nothing of the nonviolent charges he has faced. In April 2020, he was caught driving with 12 bags of marijuana, three guns, Xanax pills, oxycodone and codeine. Rapper Iggy Azalea, the mother of Carti’s son Onyx, has publicly accused him of being a neglectful father.
When asked about his various legal issues, Carti declines to say much: “I don’t want to answer that, you know? Jail ain’t no fun.” But that’s not entirely out of character for him: Throughout our interview, Carti dodges questions about relatively benign topics, too, including his relationships with Lil Uzi Vert and Lil Yachty, two artists who have been involved in his career since his self-titled mixtape.
Matthew Salacuse
In the moments before Carti takes the stage, the thousands of fans assembled feverishly chant his name in unison at the top of their lungs. A full five minutes before he goes on, their phones are out, ready to capture him on video the moment he appears. When he does, it’s on a mount with windows, a stage over the original stage, and he’s screaming and athletic — the supreme commander of this sea of acolytes.
“He’s always wanted to produce his own concerts, and he has wanted to cultivate a fan base that has become what it has become in terms of its rowdiness,” CAA’s Thomson says. “He’s brought in the guitar element, the heavy rock aspect. It was night and day in terms of performance style once we got out of the pandemic.” Carti has even expanded the conceptual ambition of his shows: Tonight, fire roars above him as if he is Al Pacino in The Devil’s Advocate. Though they’re not performing, the Opium artists who huddled around Carti before the show have accompanied him onstage for the ride; between flame blasts, they emerge from the smoke that billows out of an onstage cannon.
Matthew Salacuse
It’s every bit as electrifying as punk rock, though even that might be an understatement. Over the next hour, Carti cycles through an eclectic range of features, album tracks and unreleased songs, from his collaborations with Future (“Type S–t”) and Travis Scott (“FE!N”) to “Stop Breathing,” a fan favorite from his own catalog. He also tests some unreleased songs on the audience, and while it’s hard to imagine anything he does getting a less-than crazed response, they all absolutely play.
After the concert ends, he’s clearly pumped about how it went. He thanks everyone, then enters a car that will drive him to a club in downtown Chicago. But once inside the vehicle, removed from the high of performing, Carti becomes distant — the vampire retreating into his coffin for the night. As I ask him questions, he seems disengaged, asking me to repeat them often. He’s back to real life, but for Carti, real life is onstage, where he experiences an electricity that will never be matched by normalcy. As we drive steadily on the freeway, his once-burning intensity peters out. But then another car pulls up and a group of white teenagers shout, sure that the dark-tinted windows of his SUV conceal their hero: “That’s Carti! Is that Carti? I know you have Carti in there! That must be Carti!” He hears them and slowly rolls down the window, greeted by their now even-more crazed exclamations: “Carti! Holy s–t, Carti! Carti! F–king Carti!” Their lives are made. “Love y’all!” Carti shouts back. “That’s what we do it for.”
This story appears in the Aug. 31, 2024, issue of Billboard.
In the back room of an industrial art space in Brooklyn’s Bushwick neighborhood, A$AP Rocky is venting. Not about the muddled reaction his first official AWGE clothing collection garnered at Paris Fashion Week. Not about the devoted fans who keep asking what’s going on with A$AP Mob, the long-dormant hip-hop collective he co-founded nearly two decades ago. And, surprisingly, not even about the potshots Drake sent his way during the Rap Civil War that took place earlier this year.
Nah, tonight Rocky is venting about children’s TV shows — Cocomelon, to be specific. “That s–t is driving me nuts! Don’t tell my girl I said that,” he says before flashing his million-dollar smile, tonight speckled with platinum and diamonds, and letting out a laugh. “I’m totally joking, I don’t give a s–t. She’s tired of it, too, probably.”
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His girl, of course, is Billboard chart-topping, Grammy Award-winning, billionaire business mogul Rihanna. The two first met over a decade ago when they were rehearsing for their joint performance of her “Cockiness” remix at the 2012 MTV Video Music Awards. The following year, Rocky joined the North American leg of her Diamonds World Tour as the opening act; a few public appearances together later — 2018’s Louis Vuitton show at Paris Fashion Week, Rihanna’s 2018 Diamond Ball and the 2019 London Fashion Awards — speculation began swirling that the two were more than just friends. By 2021, after a series of high-profile outings including a Bajan vacation, the two stylish superstars made their relationship official when, in a GQ interview, Rocky called Rihanna “my lady” and the “love of my life.”
Tonight, however, Rihanna is simply a “great mother” — to their two children, 2-year-old RZA Athelston Mayers and 1-year-old Riot Rose Mayers — and an inspiring partner. “It’s crazy how we find balance with our chaotic schedules,” says Rocky (born Rakim Mayers). He’s wearing a custom black AWGE suit that he designed himself, complete with the multiwaist pants that he’s popularized recently. “[The relationship] is going great. I don’t think there’s a more perfect person because when the schedules are hectic, she’s very understanding of that. And when the schedule’s freed up, that’s when you get to spend [the] most time together. It’s all understanding and compatibility.”
AWGE suit, shirt and tie.
Ruven Afanador
That may seem a bit rich coming from one half of the couple who seems to relish keeping their fans endlessly waiting for their next project to drop. But despite not releasing an album since 2018’s TESTING, Rocky’s schedule has been surprisingly hectic — and music has kept him surprisingly busy in recent years. He went on his Injured Generation Tour and headlined major festivals (multiple Rolling Louds both in the United States and abroad; Montréal’s Osheaga in 2022) — much to the chagrin of the pundits and haters who wondered how a guy with little to no new music (and fewer plaques and Billboard chart-toppers than many of his contemporaries) was getting all these looks.
To be fair, it’s not as if Rocky hasn’t tried — if he had it his way, the streets would be flooded with his product. For one thing, there was the small matter of his July 2019 arrest in Stockholm, where a jury found him guilty of assault. (In a bizarre turn of events, then-President Donald Trump called for his immediate release but, according to Rocky, was unable to make anything happen.) And over the past six years, every time he’s gotten into a good creative groove and amassed a worthwhile collection of songs, they’ve been prematurely leaked to the public. “At this point I’ve been working on music for six years, but they leak my music and I get over it and say, ‘F–k it,’ ” he says. “They leak a lot of the music and it ruins it. Like my ‘Taylor Swift’ video. I was pissed off about it, so I never released it.”
In case you haven’t been keeping up, he’s not referencing a video featuring The Eras Queen — he’s talking about the trippy visual for a song named for her that found its way onto the internet last year. Directed by Vania Heymann and Gal Muggia, it would have felt right at home on The Eric Andre Show, while the music was Rocky’s usual brand of experimental, location-agnostic, luxury rap.
Today, Rocky seems confident that he’s in full control of his creative output and says he’s finally ready to drop his long-awaited fourth album, Don’t Be Dumb. He’s only been working on it for the past year but he believes, like most artists discussing their new work, that it’s the best album he’s ever made. (During the course of reporting this story, he does push its release date from Aug. 30 to the fall.)
Don’t Be Dumb skews slightly heavier topically and goes deeper than Rocky’s usual vainglorious works. The 35-year-old jack-of-all-that’s-fly chalks this up to him getting older (“I’m an OG now”) and wiser and the world being bats–t crazy at the moment; one of the first songs he recorded for the album is a grim, experimental track called “Shroom Cloud” that deals with “current affairs and world wars and, you know, the world dying and whatnot.”
“At times like this, only two types of people strive and survive,” Rocky theorizes. “I’m not trying to sound like I’m glorifying wars, [but] I think artists and druggies, they make it through. I mean, what was the hippies doing? They was getting high at Woodstock and f–king and having a great time and having these hippie babies who subsequently had us.”
AWGE suit, shirt and tie; Ray-Ban sunglasses.
Ruven Afanador
Tough times have been occupying Rocky’s thoughts for at least the past year or so. German expressionism — the popular art movement born in 1919 that focused on the artist’s innermost fears, desires and turmoil — has been a major influence on not just this album, but all his recent artistic endeavors. When asked to describe who he is at this moment, he says, “Grim.”
“In this very moment, it’s very grim. That’s an abbreviation,” he explains. “It’s infusing German expressionism with ghetto futurism.” When making Don’t Be Dumb, Rocky tried to get one of its most famous American practitioners, director Tim Burton, to lend a hand and create the cover art. The two couldn’t align their schedules to make it happen, but Rocky was able to play him the album. “I sat and I played the album for Tim Burton, and he was f–king with it heavy,” he says. According to Rocky, when the Beetlejuice director heard it, “he was rocking his head and he’s like, ‘Wow! I didn’t know you made that kind of music!’ ” And though he couldn’t get Burton himself involved, Rocky did succeed in nabbing the director’s longtime collaborator, composer Danny Elfman, to contribute musical snippets throughout the album, including on a song produced by The Alchemist.
Don’t Be Dumb will still feature the kinds of collaborators Rocky’s fans expect, like rapper and friend Tyler, The Creator, and an all-star roster of producers including Pharrell Williams, Mike Dean, Hitkidd, Madlib and Metro Boomin, as well as some they most definitely won’t, like Morrissey. But getting such a crew on your album when you’re as famous and renowned as Rocky isn’t a feat; the hard part is making all of those disparate sounds work together to make something cohesive and accessible.
“You got to know yourself,” Rocky says when explaining how he connects everything. “You got to know, ‘OK, this is too much. This is too far. This is overkill. This is not enough.’ That’s what I think makes you a unique artist: when you could determine what’s needed. And what’s unnecessary.”
A$AP Rocky knows himself very well. The painter Jackson Pollock once said that “every great artist paints what he is” — and the joy of discovering new artists is watching them figure out the best version of what they are. But A$AP Rocky entered the game seemingly fully formed, with a well-hewn aesthetic, image and point of view. Sure, some of his outfits and songs from 2012 may make him cringe today, but that’s the price you pay when you’re on the cutting edge of culture.
Few rappers have the innate self-confidence that Rocky has had since he first burst onto the scene in 2011 with “Purple Swag” from his debut mixtape, Live. Love. A$AP. Along with his Harlem-based crew, A$AP Mob, Rocky reenergized New York rap by melding the promethazine-drenched sounds of Three 6 Mafia with the swag and styles of his Harlem hood. New York rappers before him had hopped on tracks with Southern rappers — Jay-Z and Ma$e come to mind — but they all did so either on their own terms or those of the guest MC. Rocky, aided by his late collaborator and mentor Steven “A$AP Yams” Rodriguez, utilized the internet to break down geographical walls and make some of the first post-regional rap. Their style literally changed the game: No longer did rappers have to sound like the city in which they were born. Influence could come from anywhere your Wi-Fi could take you.
AWGE jacket, shirt, belt and pants; Puma sneakers.
Ruven Afanador
Even as his star grew brighter, Rocky never rested on his laurels, using his albums as laboratories to cook up what he felt the game was missing. His heavily anticipated studio debut, Long. Live. A$AP, expanded on the NYC-meets-Memphis amalgamation of his 2011 mixtape by bringing in a slew of collaborators from across the musical world including Skrillex, Santigold, Drake and Kendrick Lamar. The album cemented Rocky and A$AP Mob as the ones to push NYC hip-hop into a new era — and also proved, for better or worse, that Rocky knew how to swing for the fences for a pop hit. At. Long. Last. A$AP, released in 2015, five months after Yams’ untimely death at 26 from an accidental overdose, was another departure, with Danger Mouse and Juicy J joining Yams as executive producers. The album slinked from track to track, mixing psychedelic rock with modern trap and acoustic folk, the lattermost courtesy of a guitarist named Joe Fox whom Rocky met on the street while traveling in Europe.
It was a critical and commercial success, topping the Billboard 200 — Rocky’s second straight No. 1 album — and proving that he had a clear and unique creative vision. And he was concurrently demonstrating that vision wasn’t limited to his music. At a time when Ye (the artist formerly known as Kanye West) was revolutionizing sartorial horizons for Black men everywhere, Rocky was working to push the style game even further. He partnered with up-and-coming brands like Hood by Air that sold the kind of garments most fans never imagined they’d see a rapper wear. Before Rocky, it wasn’t common to see a rapper rock a kilt, or tight leather pants or a handbag (or a satchel, quite distinct from a simple “purse,” as he taught listeners on his and Tyler, The Creator’s “Potato Salad”). He helped make all of that not just cool, but normal.
“I grab inspiration from so many different places, genres and cultures, and I make it original. Originality is a skill set. I think I have a talent in finding and recognizing that in people,” Rocky says. That skill set helped him launch AWGE in 2016. A collective that’s part record label, part clothing brand and part creative agency, AWGE has allowed him to explore each of his diverse passions.
But it took until earlier this year for Rocky to produce an entire collection worthy of a runway show at Paris Fashion Week. Titled “American Sabotage,” the collection featured pieces that looked as if they came straight out of an ’80s sci-fi flick. Rocky calls it “ghetto futurism” and, much like everything else he does, he believes that despite the mixed reviews the show received, it’ll be the norm sooner than later. (On the latest tease for the new album — the song “Highjack,” which takes Rocky back to the block with a woozy but airy beat that melts into a folk-rock ditty, assisted by indie artist Jessica Pratt — he reminds listeners that he was the one who started most of the trends they enjoy today: “Before we dropped ‘Peso’ on you n—as, you ain’t like Raf,” he raps in his usual laid-back lilt, referencing Belgian fashion designer Raf Simons.)
To hear him tell it, it took him these many years just to learn how to really make clothes. “You learn the game before you play it. Crawl before you walk. I wanted to do what was right,” Rocky says. “I’m from New York. I’m a Black man. The fact that we premiered my first show in Paris, France, with some of the biggest people in fashion? It was just surreal.” At that moment, he says — even amid a crowd that included some of the biggest names in art and culture — he was just Rakim.
“I’m not cocky in the sense where I’m like, ‘I got the president’s number in my phone right now!’ Until you sit back and say, ‘Oh, s–t. Pharrell and Pusha T and Malice is [at my show], man.’ That’s support,” Rocky says. “[Designer] Tremaine Emory is here to show his brother some support. Kris Van Assche, he gave me my start [as a face of Dior when he was artistic director of Dior Homme] and they signed me in 2015. [Tiffany & Co. executive] Alex Arnault was here. My girl was here! There were so many people, and I’m so appreciative of them coming to see me do my thing because I wasn’t about to fall flat on my face. We made sure of that. It’s like I said: Any critique, save it, ’cause my mindset is already like, ‘This is what it is. This how everyone should look. This is what it’s going to be for the next couple seasons. So get with it or get left.’ ”
AWGE suit, shirt and tie.
Ruven Afanador
AWGE’s most successful division so far, however, is its record label — and a lot of that success is due to the imprint’s first signing, Atlanta’s Playboi Carti. Rocky first met Carti when Carti was crashing at a friend’s house in New York. Carti’s 2017 debut mixtape became an internet sensation, spawning the hits “Magnolia” and “Wokeuplikethis,” and his debut studio album, 2018’s Die Lit, debuted at No. 3 on the Billboard 200, solidifying both his burgeoning star power and Rocky’s prowess as a music executive.
The success of Carti’s debut made him a sort of cultural folk hero, the inspiration for memes and entire subreddits dedicated to deciphering his coded language and Dracula-meets-suburban Hot Topic fashion sense. But more importantly, he became rap’s new vanguard, with his next album, 2020’s Whole Lotta Red, spiritually picking up where Rocky’s third, TESTING, left off. Both albums eschewed popular rap tropes, sounds and themes for something wholly original; both got mixed reactions, but Carti’s transformed him into a cult hero.
When I ask if Carti is the future of rap, Rocky gets serious. “That’s where rap is. I knew that’s what it was going to be. What do people expect? We not just signing people to be signing people. We want to be the best of the best and that’s all it is, and his s–t speaks for itself.
“Statistically, what I’m saying is right. Sonically, theoretically, what I’m saying is right,” he continues. “Because there’s a Pharrell that comes with [each] generation. There’s a Jay-Z that comes with [each] generation. There’s a Kanye West that comes with [each] generation. There’s a 50 Cent that comes with [each] generation. The people that’s been most influential in the past 10 years, nine times out of 10 comes out of our camp. If not, we rubbed off on them or they picked up some type of influence. That sounds cocky, and I didn’t want to go there with it, but I swear it’s true. Behind the scenes. On the scene. I promise you.”
AWGE jacket, shirt, belt and pants; Puma sneakers.
Not content with leaving his mark on music and fashion, Rocky looked to Hollywood early in his career. After landing a bit role in the 2015 coming-of-age indie film DOPE executive-produced by Williams, in which he basically played a fictionalized version of himself — a young, fly, street-smart dope dealer — Rocky began looking for newer and better opportunities. “I’m tired of being a gangster,” he says. “I guess because I’m so removed from being a gangster in real life. They always want to cast me on some gangster s–t.” He pauses for a moment, reconsidering. “I ain’t tired of being a gangster, I’m lying. But I need to play a doctor or a lawyer or some s–t. A therapist. Something.”
Outside of fashion, film is the art form he’s most serious about now. “When I do movies, I show up on time. I’m rehearsing. I’m practicing, I’m reciting. I literally take it as a real job. Nothing else matters,” he says. “I’m a Method actor, so I embody whatever character I’m playing at the moment.” His upcoming projects include Spike Lee’s much-anticipated High and Low, a remake of Akira Kurosawa’s 1963 opus starring Denzel Washington. It’s damn near impossible to not pick up anything when working alongside two legends like Denzel and Spike, right?
“Denzel is still a heartbreak kid,” Rocky says with a smile, clearly comforted by this discovery. “That man going to be 101 years old and he still going to have girls fainting and s–t. So I learned how to keep my pizzazz even when I’m his age. I’m like, ‘Oh, I’m going to be aight. I’m Young Denzel. I’m Himzel, you heard?’ ”
On Sundays during the summer, Melba’s, a locally beloved soul food restaurant on 114th Street that’s been a Harlem staple for close to 20 years, partners with neighboring businesses along Frederick Douglas Boulevard to host big outdoor parties. Go at the right time, and you might catch some Harlem royalty partaking in the live music, food and drink and general good times.
On this particular Sunday, around 3:30 p.m., A$AP Rocky is strolling through the crowd, his hair in tight cornrows, his ensemble of a button-down shirt and jeans unusually unassuming. (His teeth, on the other hand, are adorned with enough diamonds to fund an indie film.) He slinks into Melba’s trying to go unnoticed, but even in his everyman outfit that’s a fool’s errand. He’s Harlem’s hometown hero, and as soon as he steps inside, people jump up to ask for a photo. A police officer approaches him and tries to convince him to attend a local event. Another Harlem legend, fashion designer Dapper Dan, just happens to be stopping by to grab a bite and embraces Rocky.
When we step back outside Melba’s, true chaos erupts. A throng of Harlemites encircles Rocky, clamoring for a moment with the local superstar. Despite it all, Rocky remains calm and courteous. He poses for what seems like 100 photos, even helping some elderly women with their phone cameras. Some people walk up just to tell him that they remember him and his mother, who grew up around this corner; one man sees us and crosses the street to tell Rakim that he’s proud of him. Rocky says the man once babysat him. “People calling me by my first name; he said ‘Rakim.’ That’s how I knew he knew me,” Rocky explains, still basking in the tumult of the crowd. “If it would’ve been A$AP or Rocky… But that man said Rakim. So you turn around and respect your elders and show love and grace, and I think that’s what’s most important. This is somewhere I would consider raising my family. You know what I’m saying? Seriously. If I found a brownstone nice enough to, you know what I mean?”
AWGE suit, shirt and tie; Ray-Ban sunglasses.
Ruven Afanador
Rocky says he comes back here often, though the response from the public makes it seem like he’s an exotic whip you would only see in magazines or YouTube influencer videos. People lean out of windows screaming, “Harlem!” or “I love you, Rocky!” Cars zoom by and screech to halt; as we walk to Morningside Park, one slowly pulls up next to us — worrying, at first, though it turns out to be a group of women so nervous that they simply yell, “I love you! You’re so fine!”
It’s clear that Rocky revels in this. Being in Harlem brings him back to his childhood: to the days long before he became known as the Pretty Motherf–ker, before he became involved with one of the most famous women on the planet.
We walk to his first childhood home, an apartment building on 118th Street and Morningside Avenue. He says he would like his children to have a Harlem upbringing even if they’re not raised here. “I think being in Harlem allows you the freedom of walking to the store, walking to the park, getting clear in your mind, going to the swings, being more present and active,” he says. “I think if you live in a suburb somewhere, you’re probably more inclined to just go to work, go to the mall, driving and s–t. Here is just present. You are more in the thick of it.”
But surely Rocky and Rihanna’s kids won’t be able to live the same kind of childhood he did here in Harlem, right?
“Yes, they do,” Rocky snaps back. “Man, let me show you little RZA last night, bro. Look, this is my little man right here.” He pulls up a video of Rihanna and RZA walking and playing along a cobblestone street in SoHo, as if that indicates the type of life the child of a billionaire creative couple can live. “They still human. They human beings,” he tells me.
AWGE shirts, tie and pants; Ray-Ban sunglasses; Bottega Veneta shoes.
He doesn’t have a Range Rover (he drives a Hummer EV), but, to paraphrase Cam’ron, Rocky is a changed man. He’s no longer the rambunctious kid from Harlem who was trying to prove to the world how much iller than everyone he was. For a guy who already had a supreme sense of self, he’s even more comfortable in his own skin. For example: Instead of launching into a full-on rap beef when it was reported that Drake sent a few disses not only his way but Rihanna’s as well, Rocky simply hopped on “Show of Hands,” a bonus track on Future and Metro Boomin’s We Still Don’t Trust You, and threw a few light jabs his way.
“You got to realize, certain n—as was throwing shots for years. I ain’t in the middle of that s–t,” he says, looking off into the distance. “That’s not how I retaliate right now. I got bigger fish to fry than some p—y boys. It is real beef outside. It is real. N—as getting really clipped and blitzed every day. N—as sniping n—as every day. That little kitty s–t ain’t about nothing.” His voice trails off as he looks at the photos of his kids on his phone.
This story will appear in the Aug. 24, 2024, issue of Billboard.