How Rap Became the Sound of the Mainstream
When Philadelphia rapper Lil Uzi Vert was 20 years old, he uploaded a few songs to SoundCloud, a free music-sharing platform. The tracks got a couple hundred plays, then a few thousand. Three years later, on the strength of a moody song called “XO Tour Llif3” and a series of streaming-only mixtapes, the rapper, now 23, has racked up over a billion Spotify streams and nabbed a Best New Artist Grammy nomination. Lil Uzi Vert’s rise is impressive. But this year, he’s just one in