Atlanta’s Lil Yachty is one of the most prolific rappers of the last few years, and his favourite artist is a true trailblazer that changed the direction of travel of hip-hop almost a decade ago.
Yachty’s rise to fame was a digital one, and he expertly used social media to develop a following which allowed him a platform to go viral that springboarded his career. He left Atlanta for New York with one thing on his mind, and he made sure that he was going to make himself a star.
Lil Boat cleverly associated himself with Instagram fashionistas in The Big Apple which allowed him to build his own page. Bizarrely, it was the surprise inclusion of his track ‘One Night’ on a viral YouTube comedy video that opened Yachty up to a wider audience in 2015 and helped him breakthrough.
After this success, the SoundCloud effort was then given an official release, Yachty signed a major record deal, and ‘One Night’ has since gone platinum. Furthermore, two months later, he was modelling for Kanye West’s Yeezy brand at Madison Square Garden.
While Yachty’s career hasn’t quite progressed in the way we all imagined in 2018 when he looked certified to be the next megastar of rap, there’s no denying that he’s still one of the definitive names from the SoundCloud era, and he put a fresh, playful spin on trap.
When he made his come-up in 2016, people were soon to jump on Yachty’s back by saying that he doesn’t care for hip-hop traditions and knows nothing about rap. Rather than letting this criticism get to him, Yachty wore it as a badge of honour and revelled in winding up those who saw mumble rap as the work of the devil.
Lil Boat only poured fuel on the fire when he was asked on Twitter who is his favourite rapper of all time, and he said, “Lol I right now here declare @chancetherapper as my favorite rapper”.
At the time, Chance was only 23 and had just released his acclaimed Coloring Book mixtape, but he was yet to even release a full album. The Chicago native was gracious about the kind words and replied, “It is truly an honor good sir.”
A few years later, Yachty got a call-up from his hero, and they teamed up on ‘Atlanta House Freestyle’, which saw Chance pay homage to Boat’s hometown by deploying a moody, hypnotic trap beat.