R&B/Hip-Hop

Cash Cobain is exhausted when he arrives at Billboard’s Manhattan office in late July. But that’s to be expected when chasing the momentum of a breakout hit like “Fisherrr.”
The rapper’s last few months have been a blur, from performing an impromptu park jam this April in New York’s Union Square after his Irving Plaza show was shut down (due to police concerns about crowd size) to featuring on his first Billboard Hot 100 entry in June to recently hitting the studio with Frank Ocean. Cash has quickly become a staple — and propellant — of hip-hop today, particularly in New York City.

The 26-year-old (born Cashmere Small) grew up in the Bronx listening to his grandparents’ Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder CDs alongside Biggie Smalls, 50 Cent and Aaliyah and developed an early interest in music production. His mother bought him drum pads and Yamaha keyboards, while he taught himself how to incorporate samples into his trap and drill-inspired beats on a jailbroken version of FL Studio.

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As he carved out his sound, he was careful to avoid impersonating his biggest inspirations, telling Billboard earlier this year: “ I wanted to add my own flavor… I didn’t want to bite guys like Southside and Metro [Boomin].”

Cash Cobain photographed on July 25, 2024 in New York.

Elianel Clinton

The result is a style all his own, best known as sample drill. As the name suggests, Cash’s beats often incorporate other tracks in some capacity, whether he’s flipping Snoop Dogg and Pharrell’s “Beautiful” on Don Toliver’s “Attitude” — which peaked at No. 58 on the June 29-dated Hot 100 — or Ciara’s “Body Party” for his song of the same name with Chow Lee.

He’ll even snatch a sample out of thin air: “I can be in the elevator or watching a movie,” he says, “and if I like the song or hear a part that I can use, I’ll Shazam it.” Ironically, the music discovery app is also how Cash’s team realized “Fisherrr” was gaining traction.

His A&R at Giant Music, Daniel Byrnes, says they first noticed that Shazams for the song were taking off in New York and that it coincided with a spike on TikTok. “That’s when you know it’s time to go to radio,” says Byrnes. “We then hired [independent] radio plugger GOAT Troy Marshall and Shazam started going even crazier. Then [the song] broke the Top 100 Shazams in the country and it was No. 1 in New York for weeks. Nothing was touching it.” By May, “Fisherrr” debuted on Billboard’s R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay and Rap Airplay charts, and it has since reached the top 10 on all three.

Cash was initially connected to Byrnes through his co-managers, William Foster, Glyn Brown and Makeda Tewodros. (The Bronx rapper started out independent, beginning his career under the guidance of Casanova and his 2x Entertainment label, but eventually decided to seek out new management around 2020.) And while his new team wasn’t focused on getting him a record deal at first, Byrnes jumped when the time was right. “[He] was just one of those people that was always there, continuously checking on us and checking on Cash’s growth,” Tewodros says.

Giant signed Cash in June 2023, and the rapper has leaned into his social media savvy since then, becoming notorious for previewing unreleased tracks on Instagram that he then deletes as the official release nears. “He’ll hide the song, or he’ll archive it after a day or two, and everyone’s like, ‘Where did it go?,’” Tewodros says. “Then they’ll start to chase for it.” Adds Cash: “I’m not the type to post a snippet and then you never hear it,” he says. “Nah, it’s going to be on the album.”

Cash Cobain photographed on July 25, 2024 in New York.

Elianel Clinton

The strategy is exactly how “Fisherrr,” which Cash started teasing on TikTok and Instagram in January, started to thrive. As Cash recalls, when he walked into the studio at the top of 2024, producers FckBwoy! and WhoJiggi were already cooking up the beat. “I cut it up,” he recalls. “The beat was taking too long to drop; I didn’t like that. I wanted it to drop right away.”

From there, he and Bay Swag “started going crazy” in the booth — humming some of the song’s bars as he remembers its creation. Over an intoxicating loop, Cash and Bay Swag go back and forth like a horny Jadakiss and Styles P, with easy-to-remember one-liners like, “And your ass fat, know you eat your rice and your cabbage too/She a savage too, I’m a savage too, it’s compatible.”

The song soon started bubbling on social media and in the streets thanks to a From the Block performance clip from its release day in February that went viral. A couple weeks later, when Brooklyn rapper Kareem Gadson (aka Reem) did “The Reemski” dance to the song — in which he dances like a cobra to the tune of a snake charmer — “Fisherrr” grew even larger. “Once Reem came out with the dance, it was over,” says Cash. Byrnes felt the same way, saying the team dropped their own marketing plans to focus on the dance. “You couldn’t plan for it to be that big,” says Byrnes in astonishment. “Everyone on social media was doing the dance.”

To capitalize on the song’s momentum, Cash came quickly with a remix in April, tapping his old friend and fellow Bronx rapper Ice Spice. “Shout out to Makeda, I know she wants her credit. She made it happen,” Cash says playfully. “There were some ideas and names thrown about and I think we all kind of unanimously agreed Ice made the most sense,” adds Tewodros. “It felt really New York, so we felt like this would be the best amplification for the song.”

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The remix not only resonated with fans, but more importantly, with Cash himself. “I felt loved when I heard her verse. She had the whole flow, it was fire. She was on some Baddie Drill s–t.” Following its first full tracking week, “Fisherrr” debuted on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs at No. 33.

Cash has been an opener for Ice during her stateside Y2K! trek since the end of July, and he’ll continue on the tour through August. And come Aug. 23, he’ll drop his sophomore album, Play Cash Cobain. “He’s in the zone,” says Brown. Everyone on his team shares a similar sentiment. “I saw him cook up a beat in a bowling alley parking lot and record it in like, 12 hours — and it sounds like another hit,” says publicist Sam Hadelman. “He’s making the best music of his life right now.”

“Straight sexiness. Back to back, play it out — no skips, sexy music,” Cash adds, previewing what fans can expect. “I just want to show y’all I’m really serious about this. I’m not no one or two hit wonder — I am here to stay.”

From left: Glyn Brown, Cash Cobain, Will Foster, and Makeda Tewdoros photographed on July 25, 2024 in New York.

Elianel Clinton

A version of this story will appear in the Aug. 24, 2024, issue of Billboard.